9.5 miles each way...not a long ride, but ambitious in that we had not done any part of the route, it was through a neighborhood we did not know with lots of turns, and it would be dark on the way home, and it was a Saturday night. All of that combined, along with us planning to drink a bottle of wine meant we were in no hurry and needed to plan to go SLOW.
It turned into a great night! We left the house at 5:10 in broad daylight and directions partly from one of Jett's bikely.com routes and part from my daily commute. I had written a cue sheet, and didn't think we needed a map. Although we have drove to Chastain for concerts at least a half dozen times, we wanted to allow plenty of time for potential lost sections and to just have a good time. The show started at 8 and we were planning to have dinner nearby.
The weather was fabulous! Sunny, but cool and just a slight breeze. The ride ended up being great too! That Jett sure knows his way around Atlanta on the bike! His routes are always bike friendly! Again I was impressed with the low traffic and surprise bike lanes, also the nice views of the mansions in the elegant neighborhood.
We got to Chastain at 6- ahead of schedule. Before we left the house I did a quick search on nearby resturants, and there was only one. The House Radish, it looked pretty casual on the website so I didn't think anything of showing up with helmet hair, shorts and a tank top on. The customers seemed pretty country-club like, but since it is right down the street from Chastain I figured they were pretty used to people like us popping in. The staff was EXCELLENT! They were super cool, friendly and didn't bat an eye at our clothes and we never felt out of place. The food turned out to be TOP NOTCH! Expensive, but totally worth it (and I never say that)! I highly, highly recommend Horse Radish as a must-do of Atlanta cusine. I look forward to their brunch one Sunday as well. Combined with a nice ride through the area of course.
After a wonderful dinner, we rode our bikes up to Chastain Ampitheater by passing all the chaotic traffic funneling in. Chastain is always an experience, and bringing in your own food and drinks always adds to the festivities! We parked our bikes right by the front door on a handrail that was out of the way. I had my bike bag filled with two bottles of wine, cups, wine key and fresh sugar cookies I made the day before for a late night snack.
Our seats were great, center orchestra...the house pretty much filled up. After the amazing show, we lingered around finishing our wine and waiting for the drunk (soon to be) drivers to clear out.
We finally got pretty much kicked out by the staff at 11:00 and unlocked our bikes. We weaved through the drunkest of the partiers who were flagging down cabs and made our way along the North Fulton Golf Course along the sidewalk. With the (probably) drunk drivers and us being a bit tipsy we went super slow on the sidewalk, and then meandered through the dark neighborhood streets back to Peachtree. Again the neighborhood was the perfect bike route, there was very, VERY little traffic and the streets were all in great shape and had relatively adaquate lighting. We actually made it back reading our cue sheet backwards and then again decided for the sidewalks the rest of the way home. It was a very fun, relaxing and SAFE saturday night!
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