I should preface this whole story by saying that I have never been to Atlanta and that this trip was not actually awful. My friends and I thought it would be cool to go when we found out that a band we liked was playing there. When tickets were only $15, we immediately jumped on it. This was in December, so we had months to decide what we wanted to do and plan our trip.
But, uh, we definitely did not do that.
As the day of the concert got closer the “plan” that we did have fell through. Two friends could not go because they had scheduling conflicts, so it was just me and my friend Caitlin. We booked our hotel room and were ready to go.
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Then we hit crazy traffic, turning a seven-hour drive into a ten-hour trek. And Caitlin got a fraudulent credit card scare. And then, when we thought we would be able to fall into our fluffy beds at a nice hotel, the receptionist gave us the worst news yet. Since we were not 21, we could not check-in. Did not matter that Caitlin had already called and they said we would be fine. We had nowhere to stay and we were ready to have a breakdown.
But then Caitlin texted a friend that lived in the area, and he said his roommates were all out of town so we could stay with him. Now, I really could not appreciate his kindness more. We were at our lowest, and he offered us a bed.
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That being said, the bed had a bug crawling on it. The apartment smelled like trash, the actual trash can was over flowing and her friend could not stop talking about all the ragers he throws (and gets invited to, of course).
We stayed the night and I braved the bug-infested bed, covering my whole body so skin to bed contact was not made, obviously, and as soon as we could the next day, we got out of there. Caitlin booked us a hotel room in Macon where we would drive after the concert that night.
Photo courtesy of Lizzy Hoffman
We found some cool stuff to do in the city before the show and, for the first time on the trip, enjoyed ourselves. We went to The Varsity diner, which has been featured on The Food Network, we found a Starbucks Reserve which was super classy, and we drove by the Rainbow
Crosswalks where the intro of Queer Eye was filmed. We killed time at the Ponce City Market, and then we finally saw The Aces.
Photo courtesy of Lizzy Hoffman
They put on a great show, the venue was small, and where we stood (next to the merch table in the way back) was not crowded. Caitlin and I could not believe that we really did it. What we had faced all these ridiculous obstacles and managed to stick it out. There were so many times that we could have given up and crashed, but we did not. I am almost proud of us for being given the tools to fail so very easily and deciding to make the whole trip a win.
So, get together with your friends and take an impromptu trip to some place you’ve never been before. Or, maybe do not do that. Yeah, just learn from my mistake and make at least a rough plan when going on a road trip. Then the journey can be as fun as the destination.