Day 94: Off to Atlanta – how to get around during the Final Four

Downtown – this is why we didn’t drive. The sign says “Enjoy more Madness” – haha, so true

Well, here I am in Atlanta.  I am so excited to see my granddaughter and of course my two daughters and son-in-law, too.  We’re here for the Final Four festivities, but also to see a little of the city.  Since it will be difficult to do any actual projects for a few days, I thought I’d use a few Atlanta tourist pins to get some ideas of places we’d like to see. I can use my blog to  report on my findings, in case anyone else is thinking of going to Georgia for a little vacation.

First, I’d like to say that Atlanta is really an easy city to get around.  We think it may be partially because they have hosted the Olympics.  They have a clean, inexpensive  and easy to understand public transportation system that we utilized extensively.  We stayed on the north side of the city in Dunwoody, which is quite far from the airport.  We discussed renting a car but decided it would be expensive and difficult to drive in the city with all the Final Four events.  It worked out perfectly and we’re SO GLAD we didn’t waste $400.

MARTA – the way to go in Atlanta. Trust me – do not rent a car during the Final Four

You can easily go from the airport to downtown and the northern suburbs on MARTA (Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority).  It only costs $5.00 for a round trip ticket anywhere in the city.  I think you can even do it cheaper if you buy more trips, but I didn’t do much research on that.  It was so much cheaper and easier than trying to drive into the city and pay for parking, if you could even find parking.

The really cool escalator in the MARTA in Atlanta- it went almost straight up and down!

I do have to say that some of our trips into the city were pretty crowded and crazy because of all the basketball fans crammed onto the train – especially the crazy Michigan fans!  But I think as long as you just go with the flow it’s a lot of fun and I’m sure that it would be a lot more calm on a normal weekend.

So that’s what I found out about travel in Atlanta.  I did read a good post before I left at a site called “It’s Marta”.  Here is the link – it has lots of great information:  http://www.itsmarta.com/.  Be sure to check all this out before you go.