I had never heard of Stone Mountain, GA before we started planning this trip, but it was a place Mark wanted to see.  It just so happened that I have another friend I had never met before who lives on the opposite side of Atlanta and he and his wife were free to meet us tonight.  Here are today’s pictures:

Our campground is actually right inside the park.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas everywhere we go!

Stone Mountain from our campground

The view from our site

I walked up a few sites from ours and got down on the beach.

From the beach, I got a really clear shot of Stone Mountain

Through my telephoto, I could see that the mountain really does appear to be made of stone.

The sun was beginning to go down.

Peeking through the trees

I had contacted John Greaves III, my second published author from my days as a freelance editor.  He told us he and his wife, Naomi, would meet us at a Liberian restaurant in Stone Mountain.  I have emailed him often, spoken with him a couple times on the phone, but this was our first face to face meeting.

John and Naomi with us at the Liberian restaurant. (This shot was taken with Mark’s little camera.)

John is from Liberia and his wife is from Puerto Rico.  They have three teenaged boys and a ten-month-old baby girl.  Besides work, John also coaches kids.  Naomi is the person at the hospital who can help people without insurance get covered before their hospital bills start coming.  She was particularly interested in how we get medical coverage around the country.  Besides that, John previously interviewed us for a story he was hoping to sell to a magazine.  He had told her some of our stories so she asked us all kinds of questions.  They are Christians and really great people.  We enjoyed the food and the fellowship!

It was evening by the time we got back to our campsite.  We had a whole different view of Stone Mountain at night:

The tower at the top has been turned into a lighted tree that reflects in the water.

A closeup of the “tree”

Some Christmas lights from a camper across the way from us reflected in the water