USA
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We Built This City (on food and soul)
“I’m going to show you where I grew up – and a place you should visit.” It’s an offer I can’t refuse, mainly because it’s come from the driver of the Aiport Shuttle bus and he’s taking a detour to avoid the Friday afternoon traffic. Nestling beneath the shiny corporate skyscrapers of downtown Austin is…
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Treme-ndous
The Mississippi is arguably the river that can claim more stories than any other in the world. The earliest settlers in America quickly realised its importance for establishing crops, for travel and later for trade. Today, Ol’ Man River is just as impressive – and still a busy place around the port of New Orleans.…
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I Get Around
“We opened a water park just a few miles out town,” explains Glen over a drink in the hotel courtyard, casually adding, “about five weeks before Katrina.” Glen was born in New Orleans and moved back with his wife Melissa a few years back. It’s one of the hundreds of ordinary stories about an extraordinary…
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History : Past and Present
Louis Armstrong airport is about a twenty minute drive from downtown New Orleans, and the cheapest way to get there is by using the shared van Airport Shuttle service. The driver tells me his family were from England – Exeter to be precise – but that was around 300 years ago. He’s full of facts…
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An Easier Way To The Big Easy
Heathrow has its merits. Despite being an awkward hop from Nottingham, it has scale. And when you’re flying with British Airways it also has class in the shape of Terminal 5. In the middle of a Monday it’s also relatively quiet. Except for the jazz band. But this is more than a happy coincidence, because…
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Original Oregon
There are few places where I’ve managed to encounter a city’s mayor, live band karaoke, really bad stand up comedy and a post midnight doughnut all in one evening. It started off quietly enough in the Davis Street bar, one of the huge, converted old buildings which is now embracing one of Oregon’s biggest industries…
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The right side of the tracks
Monday, and it seems that more people want to use the train today than my previous encounters with North America’s rail system. Seattle’s King Street terminal is bustling this morning with two popular services. The first is heading all the way to Los Angeles. It’s one of those grandiose double decker units, complete with an…
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Lift off
It’s certainly the most touristy thing I’ve done so far in this trip, but you can’t visit Seattle and not go up the Space Needle. Built in the early Sixties, the landmark dominates the skyline, and greets you as you arrive by that other notable sixties development, the Monorail. The guidebook tells me I can…
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Bed and border
If hardly anyone in the United States travels by train, even fewer take the Thruway buses which connect the network when the trains aren’t running. This 1130 from Vancouver to Seattle has fewer than a dozen passengers, though annoyingly one is a small child, frequently screaming loudly. The journey begins at Vancouver’s Pacific Central station,…
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Da Business
Once in a while it’s nice to treat yourself. And coming back to the UK from the States is almost always a disappointment in one way or another. So, when checking in at New Orleans and faced with a tick box to upgrade my flight to Heathrow, the temptation was just too much. From speaking…
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