Atlanta - Part 3

I forgot to talk about this church in my last Atlanta post. I had heard about Christ the King Cathedral on Trip Advisor (where I do all my serious trip research) and decided we had to at least stop by and take some pictures. This is a BE-AU-TI-FUL church. If you're ever in Atlanta and have some extra time to kill, you have to stop by. It's in Buckhead, which is the nicer part of Atlanta, so the drive to the church in itself is fun. But the best part of this church is on the inside and unfortunately, I just couldn't bring myself to take any pictures. You know, people were praying, it was quiet and I would have felt really foolish snapping away on my camera. But oh man, I reeeally wanted to. (I took my in-laws when they arrived and my mother-in-law didn't feel the same sort of hesitation so I guess I should have just gotten over it and snapped away.) Anyway, the inside of the church is just gorgeous. I can't even do it justice with words, but I'll try. You try to picture it.

When you first walk in, you have to let your eyes adjust to the dimmer light and you notice that it smells like the incense they use during mass. The main front altar looms out of the dimmer light and you can see it is a large wooden piece that takes up more than half of the front wall. Everything is decorated for Christmas with red and white poinsettia plants covering the altar. There were two smaller altars on either side of the main altar, one held a big gorgeous nativity scene and I can't remember what the other one was.

It wasn't a huge cathedral but it definitely felt big. The walls were made of cement, which at first seems cold and stark but instead you realize that it gives the church a feeling of strength and stability. The ceilings were very high and supported with large round pillars that lined the side aisles. The pews and kneelers were cushioned with red material that showed signs of use. All that in itself gave you a sense of awe but then when you turned around to walk back outside, you saw one of the largest, most magnificent organs covering the entire upper back half of the church. The pipes sticking out looked like long skinny trumpets and it was bright gold. Centered on the back wall behind the organ was a beautiful colored stain glass window. It really made us stop and stand in awe. I so badly wanted to hear it play. I bet it sounded as magnificent as it looked.

So the stop we made at this church was definitely worth it and as I said before worth another stop to show my in-laws later on. They were as impressed as DJ and I were.

The next day, Monday, DJ only had to work a couple of hours so that gave us the majority of the day to explore. We had intended to take in the Coca Cola tour that day but when we arrived the line was immensely long, so instead we purchased tickets for Wednesday and walked around the Olympic Park across the street. They did a beautiful job building that park for the 1996 Olympics, and I would love to see what it looks like in the summer.

The CNN Center was on the other side of the park and we walked in to see if we could take a tour there but we struck out again. They were sold out till the next day. Instead we walked around some of the shops for a little while (I finally bought a UT shirt for the game) and headed back to the hotel.

That night we had planned on going to dinner and a movie but neither of us was really hungry yet and decided just to go to the movie and eat popcorn. We were very surprised to find out that the theater we went to not only sold popcorn but had an entire menu! And the theater didn't just have seats - there were tables with little buttons that you pushed to order from the menu. You could get whatever you wanted! It was probably one of the highlights of our trip. We couldn't believe there was such a thing and we had a great time ordering drinks (I had a glass of wine in my movie! Could it get any better??) and our dinner, which we ate while we watched the movie. I had chicken parmesan and DJ had beer batter dipped chicken fingers. The food was actually really good and they make the food as you order it so it was hot and fresh. We plan on looking for those theaters everywhere we go from now on. It was the best.

I have one more part - Part 4 - to share tomorrow and then the Atlanta saga will come to an end. It's been a great time so far!!