Raven's Roads
Living an interesting life: the travels and musings
of motorcycling author Linda R. Moore

Sep 22, 2005

29 Hours

Filed in Britain 2005 (2), Travel

Hour 0
07:00 US, 15:00 UK
Alarm went off

Hours 1-2
07:00-09:00
15:00-17:00
Got dressed, washed, fiddled with packing, saying farewells. AmberLee picked me up.

Hour 3
09:00-10:00
17:00-18:00
Travel to SFO, heavy traffic

Hour 4
10:00-11:00
18:00-19:00
Check in, security, emailing

Hour 5
11:00-12:00
19:00-20:00
Settling onto plane, take off - wheee! Eyeball flattening accelaration

Hours 6-7
12:00-14:00
20:00-22:00
Amusing myself by looking out of window, lunch, oh look - Nevada!

Hours 7-12
22:00-04:00
Switched watch to UK time
Multiple snacks, brief cat naps, puzzles, reading. It’s dark out.

Hour 13
04:00-05:00
Breakfast, chat with seat-mate, a political author on a European book/lecture tour, talking about history and travel plans

Hour 14
05:00-06:00
The sun rises and bathes the wing pink. Glimpses of lights - Manchester, Birmingham, Morecambe. We arrive ahead of schedule, then have to go into a holding pattern

Hour 15
06:00-07:00
Immigration and passport control (long queue); my bag is one of the first to come round the carrousel

Hour 16
07:00-08:00
Walking to terminal 1. Holy moley! I thought there was a bus? It’s MILES!
Extreme foot pain sets in, exhaustion hits

Hour 17
08:00-09:00
Settling into terminal 1 departures, breakfast of champions: molten Aero bar and vanilla Coke. The sugar and caffeine doesn’t touch my tiredness now.

Hours 18-19
09:00-11:00
Limping around lounge, filtering onto second plane - an Airbus A320 (the other was a Boeng 777)

Hour 20
11:00-12:00
Watching a line of planes take off until we finally get our takeoff cue

Hour 21
12:00-01:00
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Scotland is so PRETTY! :: heartsing ::

Hour 22
13:00-14:00
Yay! Lots of people waving at me at Inverness! I am reunited with parents, SIL, and 4-year-old niece who is as cute as a button in her little red dress - and remembers me. Which in itself makes coming back 2x a year worth the effort.
:: heartsing some more ::
Pick up bags
Feel 100% better now that I can hand over all responsibility for my travel arrangements to others

Hour 23
14:00-15:00
Drop off SIL and niece, hug brother, fail to absorb any information.
Settle in at Culbokie, hand out presents.
Light lunch

Hours 24-25
15:00-17:00
Unpacking, fiddling with mobile phone, examining Book Crossing treasures, thinking about organising stuff and realising that it might be good to wait until I’ve had a bit more sleep
Realisation that I’m much too old for this ;-)

Hours 25-28
17:00-20:00
Pottering around, fading
Mr. Brain has long since departed

Hour 29
20:00
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

(Of course, I’m now wide awake and hungry at 04:22…)