Camera review!

Soooo a few months ago I bought a new camera as a birthday gift to myself. I haven't used it too much (for the few photos I take for this blog and the baking blog, I usually just grab our smaller point-and-shoot), but we took it to Atlanta on our babymoon.

The one consistent drawback I read about this camera proved true for me, too. The complete user's manual doesn't come with the camera. It's available to download, but it is lengthy, and if you need to print it out, you're looking at killing quite the forest. Before our trip to Atlanta, I was going through the PDF'd manual, trying to find sections that I thought would be most useful and easiest to master in a short period of time. I printed out a few sections and practiced using the different settings the morning before our trip. I was no expert, but I was at least becoming more familiar with the camera's options.

One of the coolest options I found was an "Aquarium" mode. Score! I used that one a lot. I checked around some of the other options, read about how to use the video mode and made sure I had our point-and-shoot just in case I was a total failure with the new camera.

Detailed starfish photo at the aquarium. I love the way the water looks in this image.

But the camera took amazing photos. I love it. It *is* bulkier, I treat it like it is made of eggshells and I often felt like I wasn't taking sophisticated-enough photos with it, but given the fact that I had it for a few days before our trip and we were busy prepping the condo for new carpet, I didn't want to get too fancy and not be able to enjoy our trip because I was worried about mastering manual settings. I am very glad now that I didn't go with a dSLR, because I can't imagine how I'd feel not using a camera like that to its full potential, and this one has amazing options and gives me fantastic results. This camera is much better than our little point-and-shoot and has enough features to make me feel like optimistically overwhelmed at the possibilities yet adequate and capable of being a better photographer.

I played with some of the options as the carpet guys were working, but there is only so much detail you can extract from photos of a lens cap or a camera box when you're playing around. I think when I have a newborn subject to photograph I'll be able to make better use of some of the features, like blink detection, image stabilizer and color accents, and the settings that don't involve aquariums, like sunset, fireworks and portrait.

I think I used the nighttime setting for this photo. I love the colors.

The image quality is great, and I love the LCD display. I really like the pop-up flash, too, as it is easy to turn on and off and doesn't feel flimsy, which was a concern I had with some other cameras I considered.

We sat two sections up and quite a ways over from homeplate during a Braves/Reds game, but the zoom feature is amazing.

The video feature is also very cool, and I'm looking forward to using that function when Elle gets here. It is amazingly easy to use, and the plus of taking video from my digital camera is that is so much more convenient to upload than when I take video with my actual video camera. The video below looks like poor quality because compressing it was the only way I could get Blogger to upload it this year, but when I open it on my Mac and have it in full screen mode, it looks crystal clear and made me feel like I was back in that huge exhibit at the aquarium.

Babymoon!

Earlier this year, Tim and I had considered taking a trip to Arizona to visit my best friend Meghan and her husband and to see the Reds in their new spring training home. Alas, those plans quickly unraveled because my husband's place of employment didn't grant him the time off fast enough and flight prices skyrocketed out of the range of our budget.

Soon after realizing that we wouldn't be taking a spring trip, I started doing some brainstorming. We've driven through Atlanta countless times, but any past plans we've had to stop in the city have been thwarted. As I researched, I found that - conveniently - the Reds were playing the Braves in mid-May. And it was a two-game series in the middle of the week. (Read: Cheaper trip with less vacation time used than almost anything else we could have planned to a place we wanted to go anyway.)

My only wish for a trip to Atlanta? To see the Georgia Aquarium.

So with three days off, we could easily drive up, see the aquarium, catch both baseball games and drive back. And because it was a drivable destination, we could wait until a few weeks before to make definite plans (like buy tickets or book hotel rooms) and not have to worry about something happening with the pregnancy that would render it impossible for me to travel. We asked my doctor about the lengthy drive, and he said it would be fine at that point in my pregnancy as long as we stopped often to stretch my legs. (And considering how small my bladder felt on that trip, stopping often to stretch my legs wasn't the issue - it was stopping to find a bathroom.) But we waited until the appointment before our trip to get final clearance to go and make plans.

We scored a great hotel right downtown via the Priceline negotiator, and we were shocked that we didn't hit terrible traffic. I was dealing with a nasty sinus infection that had hit days earlier, but other than that, we had a great trip. The sickness mostly made sleeping well an issue and prevented me from enjoying any of the food I ate after the first day, but as long as I had a box of tissues at all times, I dealt with it.

I had solicited some recommendations on places to eat, and before we checked in to the hotel, we headed to a barbecue place called Fat Matt's.

It was delicious. The seating area was small, but the service was fast and the food was really good - Tim order half a slab of ribs, and I got a half-order of chicken and we shared it. The only downside? The heartburn I had later that night. But it was worth it!

We checked out our hotel and decided to walk around the city a bit before it got dark. We got a little turned around trying to find the Georgia Aquarium (where we were visiting the next day), but we ended up finding the aquarium *and* Centennial Olympic Park, another place I had wanted to check out. We got to see some cool fountains at night and walked back to the hotel through the Georgia Tech campus, which was really pretty. Because of the heartburn, I requested that we stop at The Varsity, another restaurant that had been recommended to us, for an F.O. (Frosted Orange).

The Varsity: This place was awesome,
and dangerously close to our hotel.

It was yummy, and the perfect thing to eat after a long walk and a meal of BBQ sauce. We headed back to hotel and watched some basketball.

The next morning, we were up early to get to the aquarium as soon as it opened. We were blessed with gorgeous weather during our trip - it wasn't too humid or hot, and it was nice and sunny for our walks. The aquarium was about a mile away from the hotel, and we took the same path through the Georgia Tech campus. And then we realized the aquarium didn't open until 10. And we thought it opened at 9. So we headed over to Centennial Olympic Park again and explored some more.

Tim in front of a park sign on our morning visit to the park.

We headed back to the aquarium at 10 and dove in. We had pre-purchased tickets using our AAA discount, so we cruised in and started checking out the five main exhibits - Cold Water Quest, Georgia Explorer, Ocean Voyager, River Scout and Tropical Diver. I loved them all, but my favorites were Tropical Diver and Ocean Voyager.

Big wall 'o sea in the Tropical Diver exhibit.

I love seeing massive amounts of tropical fish, seeing sea life that lives so close to the Florida coast and learning about the ecosystem, which is pretty much what Tropical Diver provides. Ocean Voyager had massive tanks of impressive animals - whale sharks, other sharks, rays, etc. I was blown away by the scale and beauty and calm of it all. Tim loved the Cold Water Quest because they had beluga whales.

We also had tickets to the 4D theater, so we saw a show there and bought special passes to see the Planet Shark exhibit. We didn't want to spend a ton of money on lunch in the aquarium cafeteria, so we split some food and went back to my favorite exhibits after lunch.

I really, really enjoyed the Georgia Aquarium, although I'm not sure if it is my favorite aquarium (while on the trip I counted - I think I've been to nine aquariums now). It definitely ranks up there, though.

When we had seen everything at the aquarium, we headed back to the hotel - but first, we stopped for a meal at The Varsity. My sinus infection was in full force at that point and I couldn't taste anything, so I had a burger while Tim had two burgers and some onion rings. Then we headed back to the hotel to take a quick nap before our next adventure: Navigating public transportation to get to Turner Field.

We asked a few questions and consulted a few maps, but luckily it was pretty easy to figure out. I rode the light rail system in Pittsburgh for almost a year and a half, and I've also been on the light rail in D.C., but basically all we had to do was buy our passes and follow people in Braves attire :)

We took the rail to a shuttle bus, which took us to the stadium. Then we found our seats and enjoyed the game! (Except the Reds lost. Ouch.)

View from our seats for the first game.

The seats were really good and we had a great view of the field, no one in front of us and a nice breeze. Perfect. We took the same route back to the hotel (although we got a little turned around when we came out of the light rail station, and a helpful-but-somewhat-suspicious-looking man helped us find out way back to the hotel). Tim decided he wanted to order some pizza, so we settled in for a relaxing night of watching the NBA playoffs and eating yummy food.

The next morning we had to check out of the hotel, so we packed everything up and Tim went for the car. This time we were driving to and parking at the stadium for the day game. We made it in plenty of time and went to find our seats, which were near right field and wayyyyy in the sun.

Holy sunny: View from our original seats for the second game.

It was crowded and hot, and we lasted about three and a half innings before I couldn't really take any more pregnant-woman-baking-in-the-sun. We found a nice shaded area above the third base line, got some ice cream (for Tim) and some frozen lemonade (for me) and proceeded to watch the Reds blow a six-run lead. The way they lost was quite a feat, too - a walk-off grand slam that nearly was caught by Laynce Nix. To see the two losses - and have them be quite dramatic - was not cool.

So we headed out of downtown Atlanta - around 5 p.m., mind you - and prepared to brave some fierce traffic. But really, once we got out of the immediate downtown area/game traffic, we were surprised at how well traffic was moving. (We have had HORRENDOUS experiences with Atlanta traffic in the past.)

We ended up stopping for dinner around 9 p.m. and figured we'd make it back to the condo by 1 a.m. ... except the exit we needed to take off of I-75 was closed. We could have taken the previous one, but there was no indication that *our* exit was closed. And then the next exit was closed. None of this would have been a big deal except my bladder and I had a deal with Tim that it would be emptied by 1 a.m., and we were now two exits south of where we needed to be and running out of gas. Luckily, we still managed to get home a little after 1, and I half-ran to the bathroom and all was good again.

It was a good trip - not too busy, but we got to see several things we wanted to see. We thought about trying to cram some more in to our trip, but it was supposed to be relaxing, and it was. We didn't have to rush any where, got to take naps, got to sleep, eat well and be out and about. In our books, that's a pretty good trip :)