As you know, this segment of my blogs is called “Mel the Urban Explorer.” I usually go on escapades throughout the city of Atlanta to find some exciting things to do in urban areas of Metro Atlanta. However, you also know that I am a film gal so for this blog I sort of combined my film blog with this one and decided to go outside of urban territory. I can even say that this blog even incorporates my “Country and Eastern” blog because I went to visit three rural towns of Georgia. Trust me, I felt like Dorothy from the “Wizard of Oz” today. Instead of being miles away from Kansas, I was miles away from Atlanta in Senoia, Peachtree City, and Fayetteville, Georgia – lands of wonder and surprise and the future of Hollywood in Georgia.

As you may know already, Georgia is growing in terms of film and this growth is not to be taken lightly. A few years ago when I started learning more about Georgia’s film industry, we were at number 4 on the list of those states outside of California that are growing in film. Recent research showed us at number 2 only second to Louisiana. Everyone who is involved in film in this neck of the woods is very excited, including me. I will be even more excited when we become the premier destination outside of California for film and entertainment. But until then, I will show you a section of Georgia that has a high concentration of film activity and will inevitably have even more in the near future.
We will start in Senoia, Georgia, which is where the first photo above comes from. This is a restaurant that is often featured in the television Zombie tale “Walking Dead.” Here is a full shot of the restaurant.

Rolling around Senoia, you will see a proud display of this town’s heritage. Everywhere you turn, there is signage to let you know you are there.

This town seems to be proud of his history and its new film presence and reasonably so. It is a beautiful small town. Check out a few things I saw in the historic area.  Here is the town’s historical marker.

Here is a photo of the historic area.

As you can see this town supports its television presence by playing into the zombie theme.

Aside from the downtown historic district, I saw a lot of other neat things as I rode around town. This was a bonus find. I kept getting lost trying to find my way to Raleigh Studios Atlanta and turning down one street, I came across the Coweta County Fire Station.

Again while I was getting lost hither and thither, I came across this magnificent find. This is a beautiful lake where local Senoia residents can go fishing.

And of course, I finally found it – Raleigh Studios Atlanta. This is a beautiful place but I could only take a photo of the sign. Production studios are heavily protected and guarded places and you must respect their privacy; but they do give the luxury of photographing their signage. Anything beyond the signage and you may be facing some legal issues – so keep that in mind when you visit.

Well I eased on down the road literally to the next exciting town of Fayetteville, Georgia.

I mainly concentrated on the downtown historical area as you will see that I usually do in most blogs.  Here is the historical marker for Fayetteville. It is while standing at this marker that I had an epiphany moment but not in a divine way.  What I mean is  I started thinking that this particular town may eventually become a hub of a lot of film activity in Georgia. Something about it feels like Hollywood of the south.

I love their buildings that remind me of towns in Western movies.

If you follow me on most of my outings, then I know this photo probably has you thinking, “Here she goes disturbing my equilibrium again with those photos taken at weird angles.” Well how else would I have been able to show you this neat little clock tower building that houses the Fayetteville Welcome Center?

This log cabin styled building caught my eye too. Isn’t it neat?

Finally here is another studio that’s all the talk of the town in the film community.

Again I can’t emphasize it enough – respect the production studios’ wishes by limiting your cameras to where they say you can photograph which is most likely only the sign. I don’t have any qualms about taking a photo of the signage because as a screenwriter, I’m just glad they are here!!!!

Last but not least on my outing is Peachtree City. This was a bonus for me because as I was strolling around looking lost and out of place, I stumbled across a gold mine – well at least a gold mine for me.

And here is that goldmine I was talking about. It’s a gold mine for me because I am a networker, particularly when it comes to my passion of film and as I was meandering, a nice lady by the name of Sue invited me in and provided me with a wealth of information about the town. She even happened to be one of the tour guides for the Southern Hollywood Film Tour – a group that takes people around the local area and shows them where films were made such as “Joyful Noise”, “Fried Green” Tomatoes, and of course “Walking Dead.” I’m working on a segment with them for my other blog – Reel Focus Blog (part of Women in Film and Television Atlanta) so stay tuned for that sometime in late Spring. Anyway, me and Sue had a remarkable conversation which made me glad that I got out of my car and started to be a little noisy. This is one of those times where sticking your nose where its not supposed to be can lead to something good.

I walked around near the visitor’s center and I noticed an amphitheater near it where some parts of “Joyful Noise” was filmed. But what I thought was cool was this bike path nearby. I saw a lot of families out with their children enjoying their Saturday morning racing on this cool bike race track.

I saw this other lake in Peachtree City which I think is quite romantic. They have a dock nearby and an area where you can get closer to the water. Staring at this reminds me of the backdrop for that movie “Creepshow 2” with that oil blog eating humans back in the 1980s. Perhaps this place could be the backdrop for something romantic or creepy.

Peachtree City is sort of far away from the activity of Atlanta so it has its own little airport. I didn’t see any large commercial planes landing here though, however. I think it’s more for those who have their own small planes; or, perhaps it could be a springboard airport connecting other small town airports in Georgia.

Anyone in Georgia knows that when bad weather strikes, we can rely on our friends in Peachtree City to keep us up to date with developments. Here is the national weather center that we often here about either on television or on radio.

Well that concludes my exciting journey through not so urban areas near Atlanta. Make sure to follow me and I will keep you up-to-date on more cool things going on around Atlanta and around Georgia. For more photos that I did not include in this blog, check out my Pinterest page at http://www.pinterest.com/lactrodectusent/.