Welcome back frenzies <3
Most people would never, ever want to escape Southern California. I am one of those people. But, when you move from your childhood home to a new place, no matter how incredible it is, your heart still longs for familiarity and comfort. I was able to fly back to Georgia for a week for my boyfriend’s graduation where I also got to see some of my very best friends. When I first arrived, one of my bffs from college (weird saying from college because it feels like I was just in college yesterday) picked me up from the airport. We got Starbucks (I have a problem, I’ll admit) (My favorite order right now is The Holiday Spice Flat White, thanks Kels) and headed to the Classic City. We arrived and ate lunch at The Place, which has super yummy southern comfort food. I was feeling gross from traveling overnight so I got a BLT on multigrain bread with a side of fruit but threw in a mimosa because hey, you only live once. Kelsie got their special of the day which was BBQ and even though I don’t like BBQ (I know, it’s a crime), her food still looked delicious.
After we finished our yummy lunch we shopped around at our favorite local boutiques that we loved during college and miss so much. Cheeky Peach, The Indigo Child, Fringe, the list goes on and on. We tried pieces on, deliberated between which pretty necklaces to add to our already oversized collection, and just enjoyed being together in our city! Super cheesy, but that’s what happens when you move across the country away from your bffs.
After shopping to our hearts content, aka until the shops closed, we headed to pick up Shamus and ubered to Creature Comforts, which is a local brewery in Athens with some incredddiibbllleeee beer. I wasn’t a huge beer fan before turning 21, but once I turned 21 and was able to test out Athens’ huge beer selection, I turned a new leaf. My personal favorite is Tropicalia and the things I would do to get some of that delicious IPA in SoCal. After Creature Comforts we were starved so we headed over to another local Athens favorite, Ted’s Most Best for some yummy food. I got their special, which was a greek type pizza situation that I got in a calzone form. Normally I get their baked goat cheese appetizer with a half size of their baked goat cheese salad because I’m lactose intolerant and I have a major thing for goat cheese. And theirs is TO DIE FOR.
After dinner we went back to the apartment and just hung out until Kelsie had to leave. Kelsie’s sweater is Free People and her necklaces are from Cheeky Peach. Kelsie left, *tears*, and that was the end of a very busy Day 1!
The next morning I had my photoshoot with The Downtown Darling, which you can read all about in one of my previous posts, linked here.
After that, Shamus and I headed to a local Athens favorite, Chili’s. JK, they’re not Athens based, but CHILI’S IS FREAKING DELICIOUS. And 2 for 22? Hello college date spot. The college budget is certainly a glamorous one. After Chili’s and some more shopping, we headed to another Athens brewery called Terrapin Beer Co. My favorite there is HI-5 IPA and it is so yummy. We hung out there for a while with Shamus’s roommate and his family and then ate some mexican food at Taqueria LaParilla following the brewery (I’m partial to Agua Linda in Athens, but sometimes I don’t get to make all of the food choices, a hard reality to accept).
Basically I ate and drank my way through Athens and I am not mad about it.
The next morning was graduation for Shamus and it was a wonderful ceremony followed by lunch at another Athens classic, Blind Pig Tavern. I got the chicken tender basket with the tenders tossed in buffalo sauce with tater tots. I was going for a clean eating this whole trip, in case you can’t tell. It was delicious and after lunch we headed back to hang out with his family. We spent the rest of the day lounging around until it was time to get ready to go out that night to celebrate their graduation. If I hadn’t already eaten enough, we grabbed some sushi from the grocery store for dinner that night before going out. We went to a few different places, Magnolia’s, 100 Proof, Allgood, and some random others. It was tons of fun reminiscing on college times and making new memories.
The next morning we got up and headed towards my home town in GA and met up with my beautiful best friend who is also my photographer! We did a super fun shoot of her family, some of her, and some of me and tried to stay dry as it drizzled rain the whole time. We went to my favorite mexican place in Georgia called Taqueria Los Hermanos, which has the BEST salsa and queso and nachos and chorizo and basically the best everything if you ask me. It’s a must when visiting Georgia! And they have an amazzzing rasberry margarita. We went back to their house and looked at photos and hung out then headed back to Athens to meet up with some of Shamus’s friends at one of my Top 5 favorite burger places ever, Clocked Diner. I got the Ring Of Fire burger with tutor tots tossed in cajun sauce and WOW so good. After we dinner, we went to one of my most favorite donut places EVER called Zombie Coffee and Donuts. They’re basically cake donuts and you can put pretty much wahtever you want on top and it’s like heaven in a ring form. We went back to hang out with his friends and had a really nice, chill evening.
We woke up the next morning, obviously hungry since we hadn’t eaten in DAYS, and headed to one of my favorite bagel places called Athens Bagel Co. For being lactose intolerant, I sure do love my cheese, especially cream cheese, and they are super generous with their cream cheese helpings (; I got an onion bagel with plain cream cheese and we also walked to Starbucks for my daily dose of Starbucks coffee.
We laid around, basically in giant food comas, until we had to leave to meet his family for, you guessed it, MORE FOOD!!! We met them at a pizza place called Big Pie in the Sky where they have a ginormous pizza called the Carnivore that takes like 15 peolpe to eat it unless you’re brave and do their challenge, which is 2 people eating it in under an hour. Safe to say, we did not participate in any challenge. After dinner we stopped by my old place of employment, Nordstrom, to visit some friends and then headed home to get some rest before I headed back west the next day.
We woke up and got Chick-Fil-A breakfast because why not go out with a bang, and then I packed up my 2 huge suitcases and we headed for Atlanta to meet up with Halleson one more time before I left. We met at Taproom Coffee where I got a pretty latte and we sat and chatted and took photos outside in the dreary but perfect weather. It was a bittersweet good bye and I miss the heck outta that girl. I will do another post on our mini shoot outside of Taproom!
All in all, it was an incredible trip and I love vacationing in my own city. Can’t wait to plan my next trip back!
‘Till next time beauties, xx Madison
Athens Food + Drink Recap
The Place
Creature Comforts
Ted’s Most Best
Walkers Pub
Terrapin
Taqueria LaParilla
Blind Pig Tavern
Clocked Diner
Zombie Coffee + Donuts
Athens Bagel Co.
