File under: Life, Travel

Back in Blighty

Right then. We’re back.

Here’s how our holiday belated honeymoon added up:

  • two weeks
  • twenty hours in the air
  • eight terrible movies
  • one thousand and thirty-seven photos
  • four locations
  • five strange beds
  • three year anniversary
  • eight hours time difference
  • 3 portions of eggs benedict
  • a dozen Diet Mountain Dews (they’re like crack)
  • 14% city hotel tax
  • two new pairs of trainers
  • 8 counties (Del Norte, Humboldt, Mendocino, Sonoma, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, San Jose)
  • 1 24-hour cold
  • 2 boxes of tissues
  • $2 to £1 (or near enough)
  • 1300 miles of driving
  • Highway 1
  • 20% tipping
  • 7 miles walking every day (average)
  • 1 former prison
  • two dozen sealions
  • 1 comp bottle of champagne from the flight crew
  • countless seals
  • 3 whales
  • 4 hailstorms
  • 1/2 an incredibly sickly slice of carrotcakecheesecake
  • half a dozen wineries
  • 100.5 KTDE (your voice on the Redwood Coast)
  • 11 hours sleep a night
  • 1 Australian out for drinks
  • 1-in-4 gradients
  • 1 Norman-Bates-like innkeeper
  • 3 brits bumped into in a bar (expats or otherwise)
  • 300′+ trees
  • 1 washeteria in a redneck town
  • 30spf sunblock
  • 8 (or possibly 9) fruity cocktails
  • A bunch of nice local microbrews (Anchor Steam, Steelhead Pale Ale, Boont Amber)
  • 1 night’s sleep lost on the way home
  • two very happy people

Storms over San Francisco

We had a fantastic time. I’m still getting over jetlag a bit and trying to shake a bug I picked up on the plane home, but tomorrow it’s back to work (and also my birthday). I’ve got all sorts of thoughts jostling in my head about our American immersion - things about travelling and culture and society and American-ness and all sorts, really - but they’ll have to wait for a bit, or at least until I’ve processed the pictures in flickr and the whole experience in my head.

Mural

In the meantime, it’s good to be back.

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