Greetings from Atlanta, Georgia everyone!  I arrived here in Georgia yesterday for the first time ever and I am loving it so far.  Today I got to explore downtown Atlanta with my friend Katja!  There is so much to do here in downtown, but we only had time to go to two places today so we went to the World of Coke & the CNN building for a tour!
I was super excited to go to World of Coke because my Mamaw & great-grandfather used to work for Coca-Cola!  Pretty cool right?  Well I think so at least.  My mamaw has an entire room in her house dedicated to her Coca-Cola collections ranging from antiques and collectables to normal bottles of Coca-Cola.  So as you can see, I’m a coke child (or grandchild you might say) and have grown up around it my whole life.  Finally getting the opportunity to see all the history behind the company was the coolest!  Secret: I’m kind of a history nerd (and a nerd in general) so I loved getting to see every detail of how Coke became Coke. 

Before entering into the actual museum, you watch a short 6 minute video.  It is a typical Coca-Cola commerical (which are the cutest!!) portraying Coca-Cola in everyday life.  I’ll be honest, I cried.  But you know me, I tear up at almost every movie.  Click Here to view a 36 second teaser of the full video. 

The museum is self guided (no official tours or tour guides) so you can go at your own pace.  There are two levels.  On the first floor there is the Vault area where the secret formula is hidden (or so they say).  I learned some very interesting facts today about Coke!  Did you know that Coca-Cola workers who help make the secret recipe only know 1/2 the recipe.  The building where the syrup is made is split in half with a wall (with no doors or windows) dividing the building.  Some people make the first 1/2 of the syrup and then send it to the other side where it is completed.  There is only one actual copy of the full recipe and it is locked up in Atlanta.  It makes total sense why the company has to go to these extreme measures to protect the recipe, but it never really occured to me until I read that today.  Back when coke first came out, people tried to imitate coke coming up with similar names and saying that it tasted the same, but no one could ever come close to making anything that tastes like Coke.  It is one a kind.  It’s the real thing😉

There is another area on the first floor called Bottle Works where you are able to see exactly the process a coke bottle goes through in the factory.  It was interesting, but you can go through that section fairly quick.  There is one more section on floor 1 called Milestones of Refreshment.  It shows even more of the history of the Coca-Cola company.  In this exhibit, there are some of the torches from the previous Olympic games and if you’re lucky (like we were today) you will get to hold a few of them!

On floor two, you will find the 4-D theater, Pop Culture Gallery, Perfect Pauses Theater, and Taste It.  The 4-D Theater was a cheesy video in my opinion, but the 4-D effects were pretty good.  The Pop Culture Gallery was another interesting area.  My favorite part of the area was the station where you can share your Coca-Cola story.  Share a childhood memory of Coke or finish the sentence “When I see a coke, I think of…”.  We did not go into the last theater due to time, but we finished off our walk by tasting Cokes from around the world!  There are 5 different stations, each with about 8 types of coke from different countries.  There are cokes from North America, Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Africa.  Some taste yummy, but some taste not so yummy!!  It is worth trying though. On the way out of the World of Coke, there is a giant gift shop with so many goodies to choose from.

Post World of Coke, we walked through the beautiful Centennial Park to get to the CNN building.  Here we went on a 50 minute tour of the CNN studios.  The tour was only $14 because we were students and we did not have to reserve the tour in advance.  The tour took us behind the scenes showing us exactly how it all works.  We were shown monitors, green screens, teleprompters, and actual office areas.  Our guide was very knowledgeable and answered every question the audience had in depth.  There are a few shops at the floor of the building and some fast food restaurants, too.  

So far, I think Georgia is pretty great.  I love love love the houses here.  They are so quaint with their random colors and wrap around porches.  Man, do I love the South.  I was also quite shocked at the fact that there is a pretty decent train system in Atlanta that takes you right to downtown.  That is how we got to downtown today and it was very good.  The subway was clean, efficient, cheap, and very safe.  

So that was my day in Peach Country!  I hope y’all are all having a great day wherever you are!  Til next time…
XOXO,

Texan On The Go