We had our IBRD event at Stone Mountain Park outside Atlanta, a civil war battle ground. Stone Mountain is the largest exposed piece of granite in the world. It even reaches to north and central Georgia and into Tennessee. You can be a couple hundred miles away from Stone Mountain looking at a large, grassy field or someone's front yard, then all of a sudden, out of nowhere there's this large rock protruding in the middle of it. Not much landscaping you can do around it.
We ran/hiked about 6 miles, 60% trails and 40% concrete/asphalt. Everything was beautiful. It was a beautiful day. We covered nearly every possible terrain and texture from wooden trails with dirt, gravel, large patches of pine straw, sand, boulders, ginormous granite slabs, moss, bridges and streams to the roughest concrete you've ever felt and some nice asphalt. There was a quarry there that none of us had visited before, which was quite interesting in that it told the history (as does the other museums around the mountain) of Stone Mountain's quarry: who built it, how long it took to carve out the famous civil war carving on the side of the mountain, how much granite weighs, how much was excavated, how large the rock is, where the granite has been placed (as in monuments and post offices and such), etc., etc. But for a barefooter (and even a minimalist), the textures under foot were quite enjoyable, as the quarry used them in every possible way imaginable: natural, smooth, brick, sand, gravel, etc. The concrete sidewalks we ran on were apparently made with the granite leftovers from the mountain's quarry, not smoooth at all, and they were sharp! A nemisis for this barefoot runner coming out of hibernation, but next vist, I hope to conquer it!
A fun note: A large group of visitors to the park asked us if we were really going to run barefoot, and I answered, "Of course! Haven't you heard? It's International Barefoot Running Day!" Ha!
The largest high relief sculpture in the world, the Confederate Memorial Carving, depicts three Confederate heroes of the Civil War, President Jefferson Davis and Generals Robert E. Lee and Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson. The entire carved surface measures three-acres, larger than a football field. The carving of the three men towers 400 feet above the ground, measures 90 by 190 feet, and is recessed 42 feet into the mountain. The deepest point of the carving is at Lee's elbow, which is 12 feet to the mountain's surface.
Greg is our photographer and took this first shot with his professional camera using a tripod. The others were taken with his cell phone/PDA. Very good quality stuff here. Thank you Greg!
Greg, Rex, TJ, Terry, and Tom (Terry is wearing the orginal, first BRS shirt ever made by Cameron for Georgia! The back is very cool too!)
We ran/hiked about 6 miles, 60% trails and 40% concrete/asphalt. Everything was beautiful. It was a beautiful day. We covered nearly every possible terrain and texture from wooden trails with dirt, gravel, large patches of pine straw, sand, boulders, ginormous granite slabs, moss, bridges and streams to the roughest concrete you've ever felt and some nice asphalt. There was a quarry there that none of us had visited before, which was quite interesting in that it told the history (as does the other museums around the mountain) of Stone Mountain's quarry: who built it, how long it took to carve out the famous civil war carving on the side of the mountain, how much granite weighs, how much was excavated, how large the rock is, where the granite has been placed (as in monuments and post offices and such), etc., etc. But for a barefooter (and even a minimalist), the textures under foot were quite enjoyable, as the quarry used them in every possible way imaginable: natural, smooth, brick, sand, gravel, etc. The concrete sidewalks we ran on were apparently made with the granite leftovers from the mountain's quarry, not smoooth at all, and they were sharp! A nemisis for this barefoot runner coming out of hibernation, but next vist, I hope to conquer it!
A fun note: A large group of visitors to the park asked us if we were really going to run barefoot, and I answered, "Of course! Haven't you heard? It's International Barefoot Running Day!" Ha!
Greg is our photographer and took this first shot with his professional camera using a tripod. The others were taken with his cell phone/PDA. Very good quality stuff here. Thank you Greg!
Greg, Rex, TJ, Terry, and Tom (Terry is wearing the orginal, first BRS shirt ever made by Cameron for Georgia! The back is very cool too!)
