Re: Atlanta: The Wrap Up and Grading
 

I did not like the food prices being raised on Friday. $2 for a bottle of water? :ahh: The food at the georgia dome/near the pits and FIRST store had outragous prices.

The westin was a nice hotel, but I thought there woiuld be breakfast other than a small Starbucks with a long line each morning. This forced me to eat the food in the Georgia dome with the expensive prices where they served the same things all day long. They only had danishes and muffins for breakfast there and I would have liked some more options for food.

Did I just miss the food in the hotel? Or was the "breakfast" in the Georgia dome the only one available (unless you went to a resturant on your way there)? :confused:

Re: Atlanta: The Wrap Up and Grading
 

I also thought the "food" prices at the Georgia dome were a bit outrageous. I paid $4 for a bottle of Coke! They did have "sausage on a biscuit" for breakfast as well as "cereal and milk". I had the sausage one day and it was nasty. Other than that, I thought Atlanta was awesome. Our hotel (Omni) was great; nice and clean and good facilities. I also felt that the Georgia Dome was kept quite sanitary, keeping in mind the number of people attending. I didn't like how you had to walk in and out of the Dome through the metal turnie/counter things. I know they wanted to see how many people came but a lot of people were just going back and forth from the pits. Other than the overpriced food and the idiot pressing the emergency stops on the escalators, Atlanta was awesome and I can't wait to go back for the '05 nats!

Re: Atlanta: The Wrap Up and Grading
 

atleast we had paper money?? :D my breakfast consisted of the krispy kreme donuts. i was satisfied ;D

Re: Atlanta: The Wrap Up and Grading
 

Yah I do have to admit the Dining Dollars were great because I never had to pay for food once and I ended up getting $40 bucks free food! (But with or without dining dollars, it was still too expensive).

Re: Atlanta: The Wrap Up and Grading
 

Note on food prices. They were to be set at round numbers. This however was not done for the first day so many thought that they raised prices. The amount of dollars that you recieved took into account the rounded out dollar figure so you recieved a higher amount of "paper dollars". As fo rthe prices I was told by the person making the arrangements that the food prices were 30% less than last year.

Re: Atlanta: The Wrap Up and Grading
 

I didn't attend the prior Championship events, but I was pleased with Atlantas hosting. I was there for an event this last summer, along with 2 other people that were at nationals this year that I know of, and 40000 other high school students. If you thought nationals were bad, imagine the underground Atlanta marta station wall to wall people. After this summer I knew Atlanta would be awesome for first. Our team handled breakfast at the hotel like we did for SVR. We have to pay now that we are back home, and its about 30 bucks for the 3 mornings all you can eat. We stayed at the Sheraton. It was one of the longest walks I believe, about 6 blocks, but our team handled it easily even without any sleep half the time. I encountered 2 panhandlers/bums the entire time and one wasn't on any area frequented by most robotics teams. I knew underground atlanta didn't have much other then restaurants, and the World of Coke is basically a large room with all u can drink Coke, and don't drink the italian stuff. The Sheraton although smaller, had a hugh atrium area with an indoor/outdoor pool that fit our entire team, 1359's team, and some random guests with small children nicely. We packed about 20 people in the hot tub at one time. The hotel overall was clean, nice, and the pool was a hugh plus. The walk to our hotel crossed about 8 different restaurants, our team contacted the Hard Rock, Micks, and some Mexican food place that i can't remember the name of when we got there wednesday evening and arranged for us to come in. Those were our dinner meals. Didn't go to the after party, because we didn't use TMS, so it would have cost us 90 bucks per person for the party, we just swam at the hotel instead. The food in the Georgia Dome was a little expensive, but not horrible considering it is an event center. The walk was slightly annoying from the pit, that could/should be changed for next year. I would have liked to have the monitors positioned better, cause our pit was on the Archimedes side of the double screen, and our division was on the other. People in Atlanta are typically nice and willing to help people out. For lunch, two of our parents went over to the CNN center, and formed up deals with the food places and had like.... 30 sandwiches made, or gyros, or cheesesteak sandwiches made up for a fair price and then we met out on the grass and had lunch. We avoided lines and probably saved some money. The Lennox mall is a good place to... shop/hang/eat although we didn't go there during the event, and i wouldn't say Atlanta closes up, they definitly have a night life, although not as much for those of us high school students/minors.