Stone Mountain getaway

Now that I've gotten a few hours of sleep, I thought I'd elaborate on our Stone Mountain "adventure". We were there back in May and LOVED it and decided to go back for one night. We had BEAUTIFUL weather and the colors were really great also, despite the drought.
There is actually so much to do inside the park. During our first visit in May, we even hiked up to the top (I thought they would have to airlift me back to the bottom, but I survived). The Marriott has two locations inside the park, including the Evergreen Resort which offers spa services and the Stone Mtn Inn which had a HUGE room and large bathroom/dressing area (we decided that we could fit three pack n plays in there and still have plenty of room to move around).
When we were there in May, the park offered a laserlight show nightly on the side of the mountain which was very cool. Right now, they are getting ready for the holidays and will have over 2 million lights throughout the park. We got a glimpse of some as the holiday event begins November 10th. There are so many great walkways and nature trails to wander around and beautiful views in the picnic areas also. Troy decided we should picnic before we headed home yesterday and we found a great location near the Grist Mill where we could see the lake and the fall colors.
I don't mean to sound like an advertisement, but I wanted to let people know about it as we hadn't heard much until we decided to go there earlier in the year. Now we wish that we had been going for the last few years.
A few other favorites in the Stone Mtn area: The Village Corner (a German restaurant, bakery and tavern in the little downtown/historic area - www.germanrestaurant.com, www.germanbakery.com), Potz & Panz (a small cafe that also does catering), Miss Katie's Sideboard (restaurant in the Crossroads area of the actual park - they give you a little appetizer of fried pickles, onions, etc - YUMMY). OK, yes, those are all places to eat, but that's what we like to hunt down, especially after a day of walking and hiking and burning calories.
This trip didn't allow us to do any hiking, although Troy did take a pretty long walk when we first arrived while I took a nap before our anniversary dinner out.
OK, so that's my "plug" for Stone Mtn. It really is a nice area and we are really excited to take the kids there someday.
A little explanation of the pics that we have posted (not sure what order they will appear): Memorial Carving on Stone Mtn, Grist Mill where we had the picnic lunch, lake with fall colors, our anniversary dinner with a guest who wanted to be in the picture (and yes, we look like crazy people in this one).
Have a great weekend!