Big Ben's Travelogue Blog

Today I returned to work and the relative mundanity of everyday life (hence Soul II Soul in reference to their 1989 hit Back to Life.) In some ways it was good to be back, mainly for the increased opportunity for sleep (at home, not at work.)  Given this will be the final travelogue blog post (for this trip) I thought I would refer back to the first post and the list of activities that I indicated were likely and comment on hos they did or didn't come to pass: - Racing cars .  Well that one speaks for itself, the Nissan Rogue was very racy indeed.  Oh and we saw some Formula 1. - Rock concerts .  Not so sure Justin Timberlake counts as rock but his support act sort of did and Stevie Wonder surely does.  Similarly the many bars of Austin, New Orleans and Nashville offered amble live Rock opportunities.  A standout being the cover of Footloose by the band in the first bar in Nashville. - Dueling pianos .  Every night in Austin and New Orleans....

The final day of any epic trip is always a bittersweet occasion, on the one hand I was looking forward to going home and at least back to a normal sleep pattern, on the other I didn't want the holiday to end.  Back when we were booking the flights it was significantly cheaper to fly home in two stages, Miami > Boston > London.  This seemed like an excellent idea at the time but a rubbish one when it meant the final day was cut significantly shorter as a result. The first flight was at 14:00, but we hadn't been on an airboat or seen any alligators yet, surely key parts of any visit to Florida.  This meant an early start then following the rental car's sat nav to 'Everglades Safari' which was allegedly 43 minutes from the hotel.  Sadly the rental car's sat nav was set to avoid toll roads so essentially took us on a route mainly comprised of dawdling drivers and traffic lights (red ones as a rule.)  Alistair observed that it was no wonder Americans end up s...

It had to happen sooner or later, a week of surviving on a few hours of sleep a night had to have consequences.  The main consequence was 12 hours of lovely revitalising sleep last night, not even Alistair's snoring could disturb me (luckily as it remains really really loud.)  The view from the hotel room is not too shabby although it was slightly overcast today: Handy for Miami Beach Breakfast was taken at a leisurely 12:00 in a Denny's near the hotel, although not that near the hotel really isn't in that kind of 'hood.  Something I have noticed is the price of Denny's has risen as I head East.  I suspected this was the case yesterday but today it was confirmed breakfast was $1.50 more than in Austin, although the pancakes were slightly bigger so that may be why. A key task on this trip was to stock up on new underpants, I have been travelling to the US a bit less with work recently so supplies were running dangerously low.  It was decided that the best...

After a solid two hours sleep it was time to set off for Orlando and the Kennedy Space Centre.  It could have been three hours sleep but sadly I allowed Alistair to be in charge of this element of the trip and he got the time wrong by an hour.  This did allow time for a steak breakfast at the airport but I would rather have enjoyed that elusive third hour in bed.  As is the norm with taxis in the USA the car we had booked didn't bother to turn up, luckily two fellow hotel guests were headed for the airport and were only too happy for us to share their car (to be fair we may not have given them that much choice.) they had also been at the concert last night so we had a topic of conversation for the 6 minute ride. As you can see we were looking chipper despite the 4:44AM time: Early morning Having heard nothing but bad about Southwest Air I had low expectations about the flight.  However there was plenty of space and an in flight WiFi service which I used to w...

I have been waiting a few days before posting this but wanted to make sure it wan't a fluke.  I have developed a new method of sleeping which I call the Phil Collins approach.  It involves positioning at least four pillows in a semi-circle around your head, that way if you wake up in the night and are bored of your current pillow it is a short and relatively undisturbed hop to the adjacent, still fluffed, one.  It has served me well for the past three nights.  I think this approach could play a big part in my future. That said I think the main sleep advantage came from having my own bedroom far away from Alistair's snoring.  Even with the room directly opening onto the car park it was still relatively silent.  Then again sleeping at the end of the runway of a major airport would be better than the snoring.  If you ever find yourself in Jackson Tennessee I can recommend the Old Hickory Inn. The Hickory Inn - Not quite worth $35 per night I awoke...

Today was a remarkable day, chiefly as we actually left our hotel at the time we vaguely planned to.  In fact better than that, we had planned to leave at 09:00 and at precisely 8:59 the valet parking chap delivered our car.  Having seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off I had made a note of the mileage the day before and confirmed all was well. The first task of the day was to track down a key location from the Bond film Live and Let Die.  In the pre-credits scene an MI6 agent is seen in downtown New Orleans being murdered under cover of a jazz music based funeral.  The Fillet Of Sole restaurant he was staking out forms a key part of the film's plot and as luck would have it was less than a five minute drive from the hotel.  As you can see in the following comparison shots we managed to find the place: Fillet Of Soul - now closed / not a real restaurant.  Note the one guy in NOLA more tired than I was Spot the difference Having achieved this we pointe...

After yesterday night's activities not finishing until 5:30 this morning and a requirement to check out of the hotel by 11:00 limiting the opportunity to sleep I expected today to be a hard and tiring slog.  After all our strategy for beating tiredness the last few days has mainly involved drinking as much beer as possible, fine on a night out but not recommended for seeing one through a 500 mile drive.  Actually it has not been terrible and I even managed a disco nap whilst Alistair was driving. The first task of today was to swap our rental car after the first one had a problem with its windscreen, specifically what started the trip as a small chip had become a massive crack.  Sadly Hertz were only able to give us another white Nissan Rogue which is equally as rubbish as its predecessor, albeit with a complete 'screen. Nissan Rogue - in recession white With that out of the way we were able to hit the road.  Within two miles of the airport we hit our first ...