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The Summit Skyride is a Must at Stone Mountain Park
Stone Mountain Park is a 3200 acre complex near Atlanta Georgia. It’s so big that there are two entrances. The park has numerous attractions, including two golf courses, a train ride, a riverboat ride, a campground, restaurants, a hotel, and gift shops. There are also natural attractions including waterfront access to lakes and several nature trails. The central and commanding attraction is the massive bare stone mountain that rises out of the ground, like a huge fossilized whale. And on that rock is the largest bas-relief stone carving in the world. Here’s what to know about the Summit Skyride at Stone Mountain Park: Of all the many things to do, taking it is a must at Stone Mountain Park.
You can golf, camp, take a train ride, shop, hike, and eat out at thousands of other places. What you can’t do is get up close to the side of a bare mountain and the historic and controversial sculpture on it. There are also some rare plants and organisms that you may never see anywhere else.
Stone Mountain Itself
Stone Mountain is one of the most unusual naturally occurring attractions that I’ve seen. I’ve enjoyed viewing plenty of mountains, waterfalls, geysers, oceans, etc., but to see this huge bare and barren rock formation as you’re driving along the highway is something else.
Stone Mountain is mostly quartz monzonite and granite and more than 5 miles around. There was a quarry at one part of it. It’s granite blocks were shipped all over the country and the world. It’s a monadnock, meaning, it’s a lone rock formation, not part of a range, and rises out of a mostly level surrounding area. That’s one of the reasons that it is so eye-catching.
Depressions in the rock serve as vernal pools for unusual clam shrimp and fairy shrimp as well as rare plants. Over 120 wildflowers, some very rare, grow on and around the mountain. The Stone Mountain Yellow Daisy is unique to the area. It grows in shallow patches of dirt on stone outcroppings and blooms in late summer. The photo above shows some of the pools and vegetation on the summit.
The Stone Mountain Summit Skyride
Under the Stone Mountain Summit Skyride supports looking up at the mountain.
Views of the cable apparatus that supports the tram operation up and down the mountain.
The Stone Mountain Summit Skyride is a Swiss cable car tram that whisks visitors up and down the mountain. While riding along the side and walking the top of the mountain, the Stone Mountain Georgia Skyride provides a natural and historic adventure for all ages. It’s like a biology, geology, and history lesson rolled into one.
Offseason, except when closed for annual maintenance or extreme weather conditions, it usually operates even when most other attractions are closed. You can check the Stone Mountain Calendar for operating hours.
What else to know about the Summit Skyride at Stone Mountain Park:
– The top of the mountain is uneven and mostly bare rock so those with balance issues need to be cautious. There are fences to prevent visitors from slipping down the sides.
– There is a small complex on the Summit where visitors get in and out of the cable cars. The complex includes restrooms, a snack bar, and small gift shop. I needed batteries for my camera and I was able to buy them there.
– When we visited during off season, we paid to enter the park and then bought tickets to ride the Skyride. Other ticket options may be available, depending upon time of year and any special events. Check the Stone Mountain Park website for the latest information so you won’t be disappointed. I recommend calling too, as we did, to make sure that the Skyride was running.
– You get a view like no other of the mountain and the sculpture on the side of it.
– Rather than take the Skyride, you can hike to the Summit up a one mile trail. If you do that you won’t have the same experience and won’t get a view of the bas-relief sculpture.
– There is a parking lot conveniently adjacent to the part of the park where the Summit Skyride is located. That area, called Park Central, also has other attractions and eateries.
More about Stone Mountain Park:
There is an admission fee to get in, but once inside, there are many things that are free, including nature trails, including a songbird habitat, and the Confederate Hall Historical and Environmental Education Center.
There is an 1867 Old Grist Mill that was dismantled, moved to the park, and rebuilt on a creek. It is a picturesque place to have a picnic.
An historic wooden bridge was also relocated to Stone Mountain park and connects the park to an island where visitors can explore and picnic.
Other attractions at the park are an Ante-bellum plantation and a custom-made carillon.
Prior to the Pandemic, Stone Mountain Park held many festivals and events. A Laser Show on the Memorial Lawn during the summer has been a staple for several decades. The mountain provides a great backdrop for the laser show and digital graphics of Southern and Georgia history, accompanied by music and fireworks. For current information visit the website.
The Confederate Hall Historical and Environmental Education Center
The Confederate Hall Historical and Environmental Education Center is where to learn about the geology, ecology and history of Stone Mountain and its surrounding area. It faces and has a great view of the rock carving on the side of Stone Mountain.
The building houses interactive science exhibits, classrooms, and a small theater showing historical documentaries about the Civil War, including The Battle for Georgia and “The Men Who Carved the Mountain,” which is about the creation of the confederate memorial carving. Admission is free of charge.
During the Christmas season, Stone Mountain Park creates a snow park. Workers install elevated platforms and adds man-made snow creating a temporary snow tubing area. The snow park is on the Memorial Lawn in front of the Confederate Hall, which you can make out beyond the red and white platforms.
The Carving on Stone Mountain
The sculpture on the side of Stone Mountain is the largest Confederate Monument in the world. It is a bas-relief of three leaders of the Confederacy on their horses: President Jefferson Davis and Generals Robert E. Lee and Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson. As the carving is of Confederate heroes, it is the subject of controversy. Aside from who it depicts, it is one of the larger and more unusual sculptures you may ever see. According to Wikipedia, it’s the largest bas-relief artwork in the world.
The carving measures 90 feet tall, 190 feet wide and 11 feet deep. It’s surrounding oval is cut 42 feet deep into the mountain and 400 feet above the ground. It spans 3 acres and is larger than Mount Rushmore. A man can stand up inside one of the horse’s mouths. Yet, when you see a photo of it, or from below, yo may not realize that it covers a very small portion of the side of the bare mountain that it graces. This postcard shows the carving seen from the Memorial Lawn area. There’s actually quite a distance between the top or the carving to the summit.
More about the carving
It took decades before the current carving was completed in the 1970’s. Originally sculptor Gutzon Borglum was hired in the 1915 for the project. There was a falling out in the 1920’st and he left Georgia under a cloud. His work on it was a precursor to taking on Mount Rushmore. For both projects, he relied on an Italian-American sculptor, Luigi Del Bianco, for much of the actual carving. It’s only recently that Del Bianco is credited for his skilled workmanship. There are two books about Del Bianco and a plaque honoring him at Mount Rushmore. His grandson Lou Del Bianco, researched his grandfather’s life and worked for years to get him recognition. Lou gives talks about his grandfather and his life as a stone carver which includes lots of insights into what goes into carving on the side of a mountain.
The New York Adventure Club sometimes offers a webinar for $10 about Luigi, “The Untold Story about Mount Rushmore’s Chief Carver” given by grandson Lou.
The Summit Skyride is a Must at Stone Mountain Park
I repeat this, because, although we have relatives near Atlanta and been to Stone Mountain Park a couple of times before, and seen the fantastic Laser Show, we never considered taking the tram up the mountain. It’s an entirely different place from the Rockies in Colorado, or the Great Tetons, or the White Mountains.
Perhaps it is because the mountain carving is of Confederate leaders, we had never been aware of the Park, and Stone Mountain, until our relatives made their home there. It wasn’t on our radar screen, like the Coca-Cola Museum and plantations were. Now that we know about it, it isn’t shocking that over 4 million people visit the park every year.
While you are in Georgia, do check out Noah’s Ark, an animal sanctuary in Locust Grove, Georgia. Unlike a zoo, it’s residents are rescue animals and there’s no admission or commercialization. It’s a great place to be outside with children.
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