world in slow motion

Completing the circle

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 19:24:00 +0000

297 days, 19 countries and 44, 000 miles later, we're back where we started.

Our whole adventure feels like a dream already. Did we really camp on the northern most tip of Europe; watch mobile phone clips with soldiers in Siberia; bathe in volcanic waters in Japan; eat jellyfish on the slow boat to China; swim in the world's deepest lake and hike the world's deepest gorge; ride an elephant through a tributary of the Mekong; form part of a television audience in LA; smash a piñata in Mexico; climb a Mayan temple in the jungle; snorkel on the Belize Barrier Reef; drink moonshine in the moonlight and celebrate Easter in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean?

If it wasn't for the photos and this blog, I'd hardly believe it.

Like many an exotic sojourn the highlights from our trip are manifold. However, what has made our trip different has been the absence of aeroplanes and the land and sea travel adventures that we have had instead. So here, in no particular order, are my top ten World in Slow Motion journeys:

1) Sleeper train from Xi’an to Kunming, China. Forty two hours with, for most of the time, the carriage to ourselves, watching life in rural China go by: paddy fields being ploughed with water buffalo, men smoking skinny pipes, tiny coal mines, smoky factories and deep limestone ravines gnawed away by jade rivers. Ate one of the best dishes I had in China - delicious, anonymous green sprouts.

2) Getting a shout-out from Durrl the driver on the Megabus from Minneapolis to Chicago, USA.
“Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time ever in Megabus history this is your chance to come down to the front and make an announcement over the microphone. Come on down!.....We got some world travellers sitting here right behind me on the lower deck…. O, o, oooh! We’re gliding like Egyptian silk!”

3) Train from Toya-ko to Kyoto, Japan. 806 miles (about the same as London to Stockholm) in eleven hours, including the world’s longest tunnel (Seikan at 34 miles long). The connections were quick and easy, the seats flipped over when the train changed direction and the Shinkansen was slick, sleek and quick (186 mph).

4) Bed bus from Mengla, China, to Luang Prabang, Laos. Lying on a bed during daylight hours watching the concrete and tiles of China turn into the wood and mud of Laos, as the air temperature rose and the vegetation became greener and more exotic. Counting potbellied pigs was a favourite pastime.

5) Luxury bus from Guadalajara to Mexico City. There were only ‘executivo’ buses going to the station we needed so we treated ourselves to this moving lounge. Only 24 big, squashy seats on board; a coffee/tea machine; separate, clean ladies and gents loos; and personal headphones to watch a decent selection of new and art-house films. The journey was over all too quickly.

6) Crossing the Pacific Ocean on a 334 metre, 100,000 tonne cargo ship. The CMA-CGM Hugo was a beautiful ship and we were given the best cabin on board. The north North Pacific was a mess of storms forcing us to travel from Hong Kong to Long Beach through the Tropics, which meant fifteen days of sunbathing and stars. Even saw whales.

7) Copper Canyon Railway from Chihuahua to Los Mochis, Mexico. A creaky old train taking us through real bandit country: Desert, cacti, black vultures sunning on fence posts, cow skulls, cowboys rounding up cows. Broke the journey in dusty Creel to see the canyon, which rivals the Grand Canyon, and ate delicious gorditas in Divisadero.

8) Slow boat to Shanghai, China ,from Osaka, Japan. Passing through the beautiful Inland Sea and into the deep blue waters of the Sea of Japan and East China Sea, counting flying fish as we went. We met some wonderful fellow travelers and had an insight into what was to come in China from the predominantly Chinese passengers who did their laundry at 6.30am and ate with great gusto and speed.

9) Trans-Siberian Railway from Irkutsk to Vladivostok. This section of the epic west to east train journey had far more varied and beautiful scenery than the first leg: meadows, lakes and deciduous forests alongside the regular tundra, industry and cosmodromes. There were fewer spudnuts (potato donuts) available on the platforms, but we were wise to the samovar and had brought plenty of instant mashed potato.

10) Train from Hamburg to Copenhagen. Comfortable train with stunning views across flowering farmland, twinkling water and fields of wind turbines. The best bit was that the train boarded a ferry to bridge the waters between Germany and Denmark.

We’ve travelled 360 degrees around the world without leaving the earth’s surface. It feels like a historic achievement, treading in the footsteps of the great travelers of old before the aeroplane was invented. We didn’t do it in eighty days, like Phileas Fogg, but travelled considerably slower, taking time to soak up what was happening around us.

My early fears of not being able to complete the circle, because public transport to the places we wanted to go wouldn’t exist, were dispelled. It’s a big world, but the means to get around it are there. Travelling overland and sea is like a dot-to-dot puzzle, the more dots you join the clearer the picture becomes. That is what has made World in Slow Motion such a special worldwide wander and wonder.

Back in the village: very lovely

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 09:12:00 +0000

‘AT LEAST IT'S SUNNY'

–front page headline, The Sun

The tottering old man, on his way for a lunchtime pint, spots me and smiles

“Luvverly day eh?”

“Yes, beautiful”

I’m home, back in the village, back in the heart of Middle England.

Middle England, that vague word for the comfortable, the respectable, the jolly decent folk who make up a large proportion of this country .

Whatever it is my mother plunged me right back into the thick of it without delay and soon I was facing my most daunting challenge yet.

Within 24 hours I found myself in a situation far more terrifying than anything we’d encountered out on the road: tea and scones with the ladies of the village.

Drunken Russian soldiers, Thai jungles crawling with snakes and scorpions, stormy ocean crossings, Szechuan cooking…nothing compares to facing the combined might of seven ladies of Middle England.

The questions came thick and fast, I did my best to accommodate them before beating a hasty retreat.

‘Your tulips are looking lovely’ one of them cooed as I headed indoors, 'isn’t it wonderful weather we are having…’

I smiled ruefully to myself as I recalled the many hours I’d spent during the course of our trip trying to combat English stereotypes, repel the images propagated by Hugh Grant, Merchant Ivory, Jane Austen et al.

All that effort to persuade everyone, from Americans to Zimbabweans that we didn’t all live like The Vicar of Dibley and yet here I was in the most stereotypically, ludicrously, absurdly English of situations.

The village couldn’t have been any more English if it had donned a topper and sung Noel Coward.

The birds are busy nesting and the air resonates with the hum of lawnmowers, the throb of RAF helicopters on manouevres and the beautiful call of blackbirds and robins.

The friendly postie has stopped by for a natter, marigold gloves are on display in the village shop window and my mother is worrying about the church flowers.

It’s warm and sunny (yes it does shine sometimes here) and people’s gardens are looking beautiful.

Gardening – there’s something I’ve not seen much of for a while.

I’ve been stuffed with cake, crumpets and even a belated Christmas lunch, drowned in tea, and listened to my fill of serious Radio 4 programmes.

It all is – to use a very popular English expression – ‘lovely’.

But under this idyllic exterior the old place harbours problems like any other and beneath the bucolic harmony I can sense real worries, even anger.

People mutter about immigrants and house prices and the price of petrol (it’s not ‘gas’ now) and the whole country seems a bit jaded.

The recession is biting and friends tell me of people losing their jobs. Politicians and bankers seem to be held in lower esteem than ever before and, as the Chancellor presented his new budget on Wednesday the headlines screamed about the looming economic apocalypse.

Whilst grumbling has always been a national sport it’s still knocked me off balance a little; things I’m told are a lot worser than when we left.

Not what I expected. This country is after all one of the world’s largest economies and this is a village where overall affluence seems to have increased hugely since I used to lark about in its meadows and streams in my short trousers.

Has the country changed whilst we’ve been away?

Well there’s no more Jade Goody, no more Woolworths and the Coop has had a lick of paint, but other than that it doesn’t seem to have really.

There’s the same automated queuing systems when you call up any bank or utility, the same obsession with celebrities, scandal and the weather, the same stories in the Daily Telegraph, brimming with self-righteous indignation (‘Balls Smear Unit’).

And the same sense of humour, perhaps the one thing I’ve really missed.

I venture out for a stroll round the village.

'Nice day' I shout out to the Major (Ret’d)

'It’s a cracker, what'

He gets back to his strimming; I return to admiring the neat little cottages and peaking into gardens.

Next morning we take a spin up to the Berkshire Downs. It’s St George’s Day and the English are celebrating in their traditional way of marking their patron saints day…by not marking it.

There’s the odd St George’s crosses flying, a few pubs festooned in bunting but largely it passes like any other day. People don’t even have a day off workholiday.

We head out into the green, the glorious green, for England is surely the greenest place on earth. (There are advantages to being a wet country).

It’s bluebell season and we search out this natural phenomenon. Come late April / early May the floors of many woods throughout the country are turned into carpets of bright, vivid blue, like they’ve been cast adrift at sea.

Kites and buzzards wheel overhead as we park up the car and head for a likely-looking spot – a small copse at the end of a rough track.

Breaking through the undergrowth and braving waist-high nettles we’re rewarded for our efforts: the wood floor is covered in bluebells, awash with blue.

It’s as if a school of impressionists have been let loose in a Dulux factory.

A throaty pheasant calls out with alarm, woodpeckers drum intently at rotten trees and
fat woodpigeons flop lazily over the tilled fields as the first swallows announce their return in the skies above.

And it’s very, very lovely.

We stop for a pint on the way home to toast St George - and dragon slayers in general – at a nearby village pub.

Three farmers, decked out in check shirts and bodywarmers, eyed us warily from a corner as I supped my ale in the beer garden.

'Lovely weather', the landlady says.

We return to the car and head home, rolling down out of the chalk downs into the Vale of the White Horse. The view is wonderful - quite, quite perfect.

I guess 'they' are right. It is only when you take an extended leave of absence from a place that you realise quite how nice it is.

45,000 miles and still nothing can quite compare to home.

And the weather really is quite lovely…

Antwerp - London: The final leg

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 22:28:00 +0000

I woke up with a start, the cold light of dawn searing into my retinas. I stretched my legs, rubbed my eyes and uttered the first of several primeval yawns.

It was hardly surprising: the bus clock read 5.40am.

Cursing the hour I looked out the bus window.

Pubs. A post office. Pigeons.

Hmmm that’s odd – looks vaguely familiar…doesn’t look like Belgium….hadn’t I been here before? Where was I?

This was soon answered – shop signs seeming to suggest we were in some kind of place by the name of Camberwell. Camberwell…hmmm…it was starting to come back to me.

Six hours earlier, in an Antwerp backstreet we’d boarded this bus, heading for London. It seemed a remarkably short period of time to cross three countries, travelling across Flanders before dropping down into France, catching a ferry from Calais across the Straits of Dover, back to England.

We’d piled into the bus, searching out seats amongst the passengers already on board. They’d started back in Amsterdam and many were sprawled about like lifeless corpses.

A couple of students with thick Northern accents occupied the entire back seat, an large Somali family took up the middle and furtive-looking chaps in leather jackets stared miserably at us from the front.

I picked a seat at the back, next to a monosyllabic, pale-faced young Londoner. He grunted at me and went back to sleep, his bowed head edging towards my shoulder.

He looked spaced out and distant: had he indulged a little too much back in Amsterdam?

Just in case we were entertaining the notion of sleeping the dozy Dutch driver had chosen to share his choice of Belgium radio with his passengers.

‘Fame, I’m going to liiiive forever…’

Lara chose to try and overcome this by nullifying all her senses - a well-practiced and often-successful technique which involved blocking her ears and eyes with earplugs and eyemask before topping it off with a good thick hood.

She sat there, trying to block out the world around her. It only needed an orange boiler suit and she might have found herself heading out to Guantanamo Bay.

Somehow we dozed and two hours later found ourselves waking up in France. Never have I been gladder to enter the port of Calais.

We whisked through French immigration before entering a little office entitled UK Border Agency – the first of many new changes back home? – and being greeted by possibly the cheeriest bunch of immigration officials all trip.

Perhaps the chubby English blokes standing about were bored at this ungodly hour but we found them polite, friendly and genuinely interested in our trip. All hail the new border bobbies.

We joined the queue at the terminal and found ourselves amongst hundreds of our fellow countrymen. Yellow British car number plates with their bold, simple lettering, a variety of strong British regional accents, orderly queuing.

It was all vaguely familiar and each little reminder, each little rediscovery came so quickly after each other that it was almost overwhelming. We were going home. It was sinking in now.

We boarded the P&O Pride of Calais and more déjà vu hit us – this was one of the cross channel ferries we saw from the deck of the Singapore a couple of days ago as we headed up to Antwerp.

We wandered sleepily past shops, row upon row of familiar British brands on the shelves, the smooth southern tones of the Captain washing over us in the background.

‘Abroad’ was disappearing; we were leaving the foreign, the different behind. Finally, after ten months of being bumbling foreigners in distant lands we would be back amongst our own.

Tired and confused, my head spinning with it all, I lay back against a seat and fell straight asleep.

An hour later we awoke, just in time to see the white cliffs of Dover. Or at least the base of them in the dark, the clock reading 4am.

England. We were back.

Within half an hour we were rolling through the Kent countryside, green road signs and red phone boxes flashing past in the bus’s headlights.

Sleep called once more and stuck with me right through until Camberwell.

Pubs. A post office. Pigeons. We were back in London.

There it was out there in all its glory – Oval tube station, the cricket ground and the Alec Stewart Gate, Vauxhall and the railway arches, the Thames and the Houses of Parliament.

The city looked smart, moneyed, grand. I felt emotional, until that was I found myself shivering on the cold, empty streets of Victoria.

London, where it all started all those months ago, and now where it all finishes.

The circle is complete.

How to...get from Belgium to England

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 15:19:00 +0000

There are, of course, many ways to travel between Europe’s cities and across the English Channel, including train, ferry and bus. For us, with it being Easter week and without advance purchase, the Eurolines bus was our most economical option.

Eurolines connects city centres in about twenty-four European countries. After the mammoth bus journeys of Mexico and Laos a paltry seven hours between Antwerp and London no longer seemed an obstacle. At an equally paltry 46 Euros, the price was just too tempting to turn down.

The bus arrived early in Antwerp, but was already stuffed full of slumbering bodies and Amsterdam casualties, making inserting ourselves into the legroom-deficient seats a little challenging.

We had opted for the overnight bus departing Antwerp at 23:30 (the other service leaves at midday) and had resigned ourselves to a sleepless night. After a couple of hours the bus stops in Calais at French immigration. Here you disembark and shuffle into French immigration and out again and then into British immigration next door. The new UK Border Agency was a jolly, dapper bunch; it was nice to be welcomed home by fresh-faced chaps in crisp, navy uniforms.

You then wait on the bus until it drives onto the ferry to Dover. You have to get off the bus for the hour and a half ferry crossing across the English Channel. Time enough to settle down for a sleep, or get something to eat or drink. Make sure you remember how to get back to the bus, for once boarding is called the bus doesn’t wait for stragglers.

Then it’s just another couple of hours from Dover to Victoria Coach Station in Central London from where onward buses are plentiful.

Parsnips, bicycles and knitting: Antwerp

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 09:06:00 +0000

Fully laden with our gear we sheltered from the rain, hunched under a sagging tarpaulin as a group of large, heavy-set Belgium stevedores puffed up the ladder.

It was time to leave the Rickmers Singapore and step on our first European soil for nine months.

The weather was foul but the stevedores didn’t seem to notice as they boarded the ship. Sporting dirty old orange boiler suits and grimy helmets, each had a pudgy, weatherbeaten face, a smoldering dog-end poking out from it, clamped between yellowing teeth.

They looked like miners setting off to face down the Maggie Thatcher in the 1980s, and we let them pass before it was our turn to totter down the slippery ladder to the waiting taxi below.

The cab was soon speeding us away from the quay, weaving between piles of split timbers, rotting ropes and all the other detritus of the dockside.

A large crane swung low, its cargo swooping in front of us causing the cabbie to swerve. Health and safety didn’t seem to be of great importance around here.

Neither did security, as we zipped about the enormous port apparently at will before finally exiting onto a highway, no barrier, no officials, no anything.

I looked back at the forest of cranes receding into the distance, the mountains of heavy containers, the little trucks with their flashing lights and the little workers in their dayglo jackets scuttling about under the heavy sky.

Perhaps China didn’t have it all – this port was just as big as those we’d seen back in Yantian and Hong Kong.

It's vital to Belgium – the country wouldn’t exist without Antwerp we were told by a local – and to Europe as a whole.

Along with Rotterdam, just over the Dutch border, and Hamburg, this port is one of Europes’s arteries, a lifeline between the continent and the rest of the planet.

Heading into town, soaking in new sights and sounds, we started to adjust once more to new surroundings.

There were red car number plates, imposing and timeworn buildings, strange and unpronounceable Flemish words.

The grid-patterned streets on the map have been replaced by a mess of wonky angles and confusing dead-ends; the broad, confident American voices have been usurped by a odd combination of European tongues.

There’s Flemish, heavy, awkward-sounding and, well phlegmy; Dutch, similarly impenetrable and unwelcoming; French, language of their Walloon compatriots and even English, a reminder that England lies just over the water.

Even people’s faces seem to be different, and far more interesting too. There’s not so many flat round faces here, instead there’s more angles, more dark shapes under the eyes.

Faces look more lived-in, as if they have been outdoors more, weathering the elements on their bicycles rather than opting for the air-conditioned comfort of a large SUV.

Perhaps the greatest difference though only became apparent when we spoke to people. I was amazed by the difference in attitudes and the general outlook which people seemed to hold.

We were back amongst ancient European enmities, built upon centuries of fractious relationships between tribes, kingdoms and nation states.

It didn’t take long to hear what Belgiums thought of the Dutch (and vice versa), nor did it take much persuasion to learn what the average Flemish Belgian made of their Walloon neighbours.

After two months in the US, that great melting pot of cultures where everyone pulls together under one flag it seemed very strange, almost petty.

There was little of that hearty American welcome here either, the smiley, friendly can-I-help-you American service was replaced by haughtiness, in some places almost barely disguised dislike.

Perhaps it was our dishevelled appearances after ten days at sea and ten months on the road, but I’ve never visited a town where more waiters turned their noses up at us.

At least we found a warm welcome with our couchsurfing hosts, Walter and Vera, an entertaining Belgium couple who are keen on cycling and absolutely obsessed with knitting.

Whilst the former hobby was no great surprise in a country such as this the latter was more curious.

Wool lay around the place in great heaps, there were huge scarfs galore and we couldn’t leave without stuffing several of their products into our backpacks.

What is it about wool? Surely it can’t be very practical in all this rain.

I wondered about this as Walter lent me a bike and peddled to their nearby allotment in search of dinner.

Their plot was muddy, given a good soaking in a recent downpour, and I enthusiastically joined him in harvesting parsnips.

Walter told me Belgians consider parsnips to be rather old-fashioned. I was shocked – surely not, how could they attach such an appellation to the mighty, immortal parsnip, the King of the vegetable world?

Parsnips, bicycles, allotments: It all felt strangely like home.

The next morning we found that the miserable drizzle had given way to beautiful sunny weather.

We rode the tram into town and made for the huge cathedral, standing proud in the centre. It’s a massive edifice, which took two hundred year to build, funded entirely by voluntary donation, I was told.

Inside the vast vaulted interior rang with sombre organ music; visitors and the faithful spoke in low voices and admired the Rubens hanging above the altar.

A local lad, Peter Paul, along with other Flemish masters (surely this is the name of a darts tournament?) cropped up several times in our visits to various churches and cathedrals.

I tried my best but found them all a bit grim. Give me one of the many fine Belgium comics or graphic novels anyday.

A couple of hours later we found ourselves at the Groot Markt, an impressive square surrounded by fine mercantile buildings all squashed together.

I craned my neck up at their crow-stepped steps, topped off with golden statues denoting their specific trade.

They couldn’t speak louder about how vital the port is to Antwerp, a city built on trade. “Without the port”, Walter told us, “Antwerp would not exist.’

And it would be considerably duller as well. The port has given the city, alongside many other things, a very interesting ethnic mix.

Besides the Flems and the Walloons, there’s a Chinatown (like in many ports), plus a sizeable community of Orthodox Jews (many here for the diamond business) and more recent immigrants, such as Moroccans and Congolese (a former colony).

All this sightseeing had given us a thirst and it seemed a fine time to sample the local fare.

This being Belgium we were keen to try their famous beers and soon we were supping on bollekes (those wide-bottom Belgian beer glasses) of De Koninck, one of the many local ales.

A large stag party of Dutch fellows larked about in the square, apparently touring the hostelries on scooters – it all seemed very European.

Suitably oiled up we stopped by a chip stand for another Belgium speciality – pommes frites, deep-fried twice (to give them an added crispiness) and drowned in mayonnaise.

I don’t know who thought of this idea but it works a treat. Can’t see it catching on back home though.

Maybe we should try it with parsnips…

Philadelphia - Antwerp: Crossing the Atlantic - Ship's Log

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 21:18:00 +0000

Monday 6th April, Delaware River, Pennsylvania, USA

We bid farewell to Philadelphia, ‘City of Brotherly Love’. I don’t know about brothers but the part of town through which we humped our massive packs in order to reach the Tioga Marine Terminal didn’t show a lot of love on its grim, rain-streaked streets. A kindly local called a taxi for us, fearing we might get ‘sticked‘.

Down at the docks we finally reached her - the Rickmers Singapore, our home for the next eight days.

She was anchored at rather dilapidated berth, where we negotiated our way through puddles, broken crates and piles of discarded strapping lines in order to reach her ladder.

I made way for a burly man who was descending the gangway brandishing a chainsaw before I climbed up the slippery steps. A smiling Sri Lankan chap checked our IDs at the top before a tall thin Romanian fellow – the Second Officer - showed us to our quarters.

We’ve a modest-sized cabin with en-suite bathroom, complete with writing desk, TV and DVD, sofa and the bible in High German. Not bad for a week’s voyage, and a welcome rest stop after months of constant travel.

The Singapore is significantly smaller than the Hugo (our vessel across the Pacific), 194 metres long, 28 metres wide and weighing in at 30,000 tdw. This is enough however to propel her right around the world, calling in at ports across the globe.

She doesn’t seem very heavily laden at present; perhaps it’s the global recession. Indeed her decks seem rather empty with cargo strapped down almost hap-hazardly on top of the holds in front of us.

Four large cranes stare down onto these decks whilst to the stern sit crew’s living quarters and the bridge piled up on top of each other.

We use the afternoon to explore our new surroundings, discovering a laundry, galley and a lounge, Tea’s Maid on the side, Wilbur Smiths on the shelves, framed jigsaws (windmills and ocelots) on the wall.

Dinner, as seems customary on cargo ships, is early: 5.30. There are other passengers – quite a nice change, after having the Hugo to ourselves. They make an interesting bunch, rather like a cast of misfits from a Miss Marple novel.

There’s a jovial Dutchman called Henk who’s sporting a Bob Monkhouse tan and bushy eyebrows, and Christoph, your archetypal stolid German, not saying much and watching you keenly through shiny eyes. Both have been on board since December - a fact I find hard to grasp - happily pootling around the world and ship-spotting en route.

We’re also joined by two ladies: Martha is an Alaskan who’s flown back to her birthplace of Philadelphia purely to catch this ship, before flying home immediately on reaching Antwerp; and Sylvia hails from Chicago, grey-haired and very chatty she’s also just joining us for the Atlantic crossing.

Somewhat fatigued by the exertions of recent weeks I’m content to listen to their adventures as we eat solid East European fare from the Lazy Suzie in the middle of the table.

Later we take to the deck outside and watch the crew cast off as we head out into the Delaware River. We pass dilapidated old ships, disused power stations and overgrown berths where fishermen gather. It’s an abject scene of decay and past splendours. Hong Kong this ain’t.

Accompanied by our pilot like a faithful little lapdog we head purposefully downriver, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to starboard, Camden, New Jersey to port (Camden: all this way and I still haven’t escaped).

Philadelphia slips away against a deep red sunset and we bid farewell to Uncle Sam. Thanks America; you’ve been fun.

Tuesday 7th April 2009, 38°26’N, 71°21W Heading 89°

We’re now on the open seas once more. The Delaware took ten hours to navigate to the mouth of the ocean; we entered the Atlantic at 3am, awoken by the increased swell.

They say it takes a few days to find your sealegs; for Lara’s sake I hope it’s quicker than that - she has spent the day looking decidedly green around the gills as the Singapore rocks ceaselessly in the swell.

It’s only three metres but, given the Singapore’s size and cargo this is still enough to through us around a bit, whether rolling about in bed (steady now…) or sliding back and forth on one’s chair in the mess.

Mess - it’s a strange name for a dining room, but it seemed rather appropriate today as our food slid around on our plates, particular when Simon, the steward, produced a large steaming tureen of asparagus soup.

Sylvia, joining us on board back in Philly, is also feeling under the weather. She entered the mess room somewhat unsteadily and soon hastily returned to her room having only nibbled the edges of her ham and spuds.

We tried to right ourselves with an invigorating blast of Atlantic air, stepping out onto the deck just below the bridge. The sea looked restless and impatient, white caps all around.

We wrapped ourselves up against the cool wind and reminded ourselves of previous seafarers. This wouldn’t have troubled our ancestors, sailing in their little wooden boats in the opposite direction. Time to stiffen one’s upper lip.

They were soon a-quivering however as we were given a brief tour of the ship’s safety facilities. The third officer - a Filopino - and a deckhand in a boiler suit and a rather fetching Beckham-esque hair band showed us around in a disturbingly lacksidasical manner.

They brushed over Lara’s questions but brought our immersion suits - enormous orange rubber outfits which, stretched out on the floor liked like gingerbread men. Would we really fancy a dip in one of those?

Our other option seems to be the ‘freefall’ lifeboat, an small, antiquarian vessel rusting away outside our porthole. It sits perched at an angle, at the top of a short set of rails, rather like an aquatic rocket, ready for action.

The crewmen were kind enough to show us inside and I immediately wished they hadn’t, with rows of tiny seats set for bracing oneself at the impact of hitting the water from on high.

Things weren’t much more reassuring on the bridge, where the dead-eyed Second Officer dispassionately surveyed the rows of instruments around him and pointed to a nearby storm causing all the swell.

Lara nervously eyed a button above the charts: ‘dead man push button’. Was this a Bond movie?

He told us about the cargo aboard: machine tools, steel plates, trucks and perhaps the odd luxury yacht, bound for Dubai. Looking down from the bridge it didn’t look exactly overcrowded - was this the impact of the global economic downtown? Sure, he replied, going on to tell us that larger container ships had been hit harder, unable to sail for lack of business.

Maersk, the largest line in the world, has apparently sixty such vessels currently idling, whilst the Singapore itself has been affected, missing stops in Kobe and Yokohama where there simply isn‘t anything to transport.

I thought back to our friends on the Hugo and wondered whether they were affected. An awful lot seems to have changed since we sailed with them four months ago, laden down with 6,500 containers.

Wednesday 8th April, 38°27’N, 63°13’W Heading 90°

The clocks went forward over the night - one hour less sleep, one hour closer to home. We hardly slept much anyway, thrown around as we were all night by the heavy motion of the boat.

It’s still choppy outside, lending our surroundings a strange air, as if we are sharing our cabin with a family of poltergeists. Cupboard doors opened and closed during the night, the shower curtain kept opening and closing as I washed and we are constantly having to catch items sliding off the table and desk.

Whilst this constant rocking motion might be interesting for a while - rather like weightlessness might to an astronaut in space - it is starting to turn to discomfort and irritation. Lara spent most of the day groaning and staring at the horizon, willing her seasickness to disappear.

The amount of half-eaten food that Simon is collecting from our plates is increasing as well, though perhaps that’s to do with the quality of the meals. What is it with shipping lines and the vast quantity of meat and stodge they seem to feed their crew? Is there some warehouse somewhere churning out this stuff, like a kind of maritime equivalent of school meals?

I took my heavy copy of Moby Dick up on deck and sought out a dusty old deckchair from the neglected bar. Soon a little bird came and settled nearby - a swallow-like creature I’d observed before flitting between the ship’s cranes.

A passing migrant or a ship’s pet, it probably one of a whole menagerie of creatures these ships unwittingly carry between nations, both up above and in the ballast tanks below.

Our course has changed - bad weather south of Nova Scotia has compelled the captain to steer a course which will pass just north of the Azores - another isolated group of islands we didn’t expect to see during the course of our global circumnavigation.

America is now far behind; looking at the charts the closest land is now Bermuda, though thankfully I think we’re still quite some way from the infamous Bermuda Triangle. Or perhaps that’s where that bird is from…

Thursday 9th April, 38°43’N, 54°33’W Heading 90°

Maunday Thursday. I know idea what Maundy means but it looks pretty Maundy outside: foggy and wet, with drizzle drenching the decks and confining us indoors all door.

It made us pretty lethargic as a result, where we just seemed to sit and stuff ourselves with meat (every meal seems to be heavily meat-based), read or watch pirated DVDs.

On the way to lunch the Chief Officer stopped us in the gangway. He looked more dishevelled than usual, sporting just a crumpled t-shirt and boxer shorts, and wore a bemused expressed on his face.

“Pliz”, he said, “How is do you say greeting in English at Easter?”

“Happy Easter”, Lara replied.

“Sank you”, he smiled, and wandered off, tucking his t-shirt into his boxer shorts. Was he making cards?

Sylvia hasn’t been seen now for 2½ days, confined to her room apparently by seasickness. Perhaps she’ll improve tomorrow - the seas seem to have calmed down a bit.

Friday 10th April, 39° 12’N, 45° 25’W Heading 90°

Good Friday, and a number of denominations to cater to amongst the Singapore multinational occupants. Being good Catholics those Filipinos amongst the crew who can have taken the day off, confining themselves to their cabins.

The Romanian officers, on the other hand, have to wait: following the Orthodox Church they celebrate a week later than Christians, a few days after we’ve disembarked in Antwerp. That leaves the passengers, nominally Christians, who have been promised a special meal on Sunday and even champagne.

Religion and food aside I wanted to see what lay below the waters we were traversing. Up on the bridge I consulted the charts to find that apparently we’ve just crossed the New England Seamounts (whatever they are) and are now passing over the somewhat eerie sounding Sohm Abyssal Plain. I also noticed that we are on the edge of the Gulf Stream - perhaps that’ll speed us up a bit.

I also discovered our route has been altered again; we’re now heading right for the Portuguese coast, before turning north up past Cape Finistere and crossing the Bay of Biscay. The Second Officer made a long face at the mention of this notorious stretch of water.

Resolving then to make the most of the calm weather whilst we can we walked up to the bow, stepping carefully over piles of rusted chains and heaps of half-empty paint pots en route. I admired the vessel’s livery as we walked - a handsome combination of green and yellow, with red trim painted around moving parts.

Reaching the bow we entered another world, away from the constant throb of the engine. I leant against a capstan and adjusted my senses: brilliant sunshine, warm air and just the sound of the wind in whistling around the forecastle above us and the waves breaking on the sides below.
Bliss.

After all the hussle and bussle of the US, I lost myself momentarily as I gazed out ahead of us at the endless succession of deep blue waves, their peaks sprinkled with white spray. It felt as if I were entering a new, unexplored world, like my forefathers before me.

At dinner the missing passenger, Sylvia, reappeared after 3½ days of absence. Gently nibbling on a piece of bread she explained that she’d been laid low by a stomach bug, surviving on packets of chicken soup and reading a number of books. The current one is a Jeffrey Archer novel. No wonder she felt rough.

Yet another hour forward on the clocks today and we‘ve noticed how much later the sun is setting into the sea. It‘s the third clock change in as many days; we‘re now only two hours behind the UK time-wise, yet still thousands of miles away.

Saturday 11th April, 39° 40’N, 36° 25’W Heading 90°

We had an emergency drill today and thanks to the Captain forewarning us at breakfast Lara had everything ready an hour before the bell sounded. With our lifejackets, immersion bags and safety helmets already at hand we were up on the bridge, our muster station, before you could say ‘abandon ship’.

No so our fellow passengers however, who’d chosen to lie in rather than make breakfast. The Captain looked unduly concerned, casually smoking a cigarette, the smoke masking his heavy eyelids as Christoph tottered along, his twinkling eyes wearing a vacant expression beneath a plastic helmet.

Sylvia then puffed up the stairs, all of a fluster “h..h…how do I get this on” she asked, smothered beneath her thick, bright orange lifejacket. The crew set about helping her when finally Henk arrived, equally bewildered, brandishing a lifejacket but no helmet or immersion suit.

It was like a scene from Dad’s Army, as they fussed around and the Captain resignedly dismissed them. He later told Lara what a pain he found taking passengers on board.

Back down outside our cabin on Deck C, the crew and officers played about with the lifeboat, a grimy orange craft with a passing resemblance to Thunderbird 4.

Rather like the legendary lifesaver this craft perched on a ramp pointing at an angle into the sea behind us, as our very own marionettes tried to get its engine to work. At last the poor beast let out a protesting splutter, a puff of blue smoke and then a rattling whine, like a horse on its last legs.

Suitably reassured that this escape pod was primed and ready for action its tormentors turn it off, shut its doors and wandered away.

Let’s hope we don’t have to use it. There’s a big storm brewing in the Bay of Biscay and we’re having to sit and wait it out off the Portuguese coast - even this crew don’t want to risk six metre swell.

The worst food yet at dinner - some kind of rolled meat, of possibly bovine origin, combined with ham and a gherkin in the middle and slopping around in an orangey-brown sauce. Never had the stale bread looked more tempting.

Never mind; things should look up on the gastronomic side tomorrow, with the promise of an Easter barbeque.

Sunday 12th April, 40°00’N, 28°13’W Heading 90°

Easter Sunday. Party Time in the ‘Singapore Bar’ on the pilot deck.

The Captain had pulled out all the stops, laying out the works: tablecloths were neatly laid out, hand painted eggs in each person‘s place; the fridge was filled to capacity with beer, wine and champagne and the barbeque was fired up out on deck.

In the absence of a lift someone had set up a long rope and pulley which led down directly to the back door of the galley, a Heath Robinson style affair with which Simon, the steward gamely struggled, trying to haul up all the food.

It took him several loads to raise this banquet to the pilot deck but soon enough meat was being thrown onto the barbeque to sustain the whole of the Texas: lamb chops, chicken wings, fatty hunks of pork and a fish the size of a killer whale.

Officers, crew and passengers soon set to work devouring this carnicopia, along with garlic bread, a massive cauldron of rice and some Filipino speciality fish.

As the Azores passed by to the south we entered the European sphere for the first time in eight months. It seemed an appropriate moment to raise a glass of champagne. Then one of beer. Then one of wine. Happy Easter.

Soon the crew fired up the karaoke machine and the golden oldies started pouring out, just like back on the Hugo. What is it with Filipino sailors and ancient, soppy love songs?

After the eighty-ninth rendition of an Engelbert Humperdinck classic I was driven to change the CD yet, searching in vain, all I could find was Phil Collins.

There was nothing for it and soon Phil and his mulleted chums were booming out in the background, playing live to an enraptured German audience circa 1991 as back in the present passengers and crew emptied the fridge of Tsingtao, a Chinese lager which tasted suspiciously watery.

They were charming company. There was a Chinese fellow - a cadet who couldn’t tell us why he’d taken to the high seas - along with two shy Sri Lankan cadets who scuttled off at the first opportunity, and a whole gaggle of jolly Filipinos.

They were able seamen, oilers, electricians, the cook, the steward and the bosun, the latter of whom presented me with my latest ‘local’ hat - a Rickmers Line baseball cap.

It was, I’m sure you’ll appreciate, a great meeting of cultures from which we all emerged greatly enriched and enlightened as to the workings of other nations.

Well I did learn one thing at least: Tsingtao, according to one of the crew, stands for This Stuff Is No Good Try Another One. I couldn’t agree more.

Monday 13th April, 41°31’N, 19°35’W Heading 70°

Another disturbed night’s sleep, thanks to the big swell outside. At times it seemed so big and pronounced it felt like there were sea monsters outside playing keepy-uppy with the ship.

We rolled backwards and forth in time with the waves, the ship rattling around us like an old man with bronchitis. Things slipped along the table and the desk, cupboard doors groaned and so did we.

As daylight broke I looked out of our porthole to take a look for myself. Huge waves were rolling in from the North West, lifting us up as they rolled underneath us and dropping us abruptly as they headed on towards Africa.

We were like a cork in a bathtub, Henk said; the Captain just laughed. He seems to take a mischievous pleasure in our discomfort.

Sylvia showed us her secret weapon against sea sickness, rolling up her sleeve to reveal a rather whizzy watch-like gadget which looked like it had come straight out of The Goonies. “It gives me a small electric shock every few seconds”, she said, going on to explain that somehow it helped to nullify the motion sickness.

It’s hard to do much in our wobbly world; you cannot stare at a screen for more than an hour at best; we’re constantly catching food and glasses of water slipping off the table and even trying to walk around makes you look like an old drunk negotiating his way though the park.

Part of the reason for all this movement is the lack of cargo on board - the ship’s only 35% full (though that’s not unusual for the US-Europe leg of its route) and what scrap iron, machine parts and other assortments are being carried do not weigh enough to counteract the strength of the waves.

We’re all looking forward to reaching dry land now. Cape Finisterre should appear on the horizon tomorrow, and with it the first sight of land - and European soil. Not a moment too soon.

Tuesday 14th April, 43°32’N, 11°00’W Heading 70°

We finally saw another boat today, after a week of solitary sailing. Civilisation was close! As the day wore on and we approached Cape Finistere we saw more ships, oil tankers and cargo vessels heading for Spain or north up to Biscay. Even a light aircraft passed overhead.

After the rather bare void of the last few days the charts are suddenly crammed with features once more, coastlines and rocks, lighthouses and loose buoys and those squiggly lines denoted underwater cables.

The swell was still lively as we rounded the Cape and gathered for dinner. Spaghetti Bolognese and spring rolls; an interesting combination but a wise idea in these conditions?

The sun was still shining as we returned to the deck, our higher latitude is beginning to show. I’m beginning to look forward to the long sunny evenings back home.

England’s getting closer still - we’re back on GMT time and I now no longer have to open my battered old map more than one time. She sits there up above us, warm and welcoming.

We returned to the bridge and surveyed our next moves, all mapped out ahead of us out into the Bay of Biscay. The Captain’s decided on a series of long, drawn-out zig zag manoeuvres - an effort to counteract the rolling leviathans coming in from the West.

Soon the ship was swung around towards them, the waves breaking near the bow, and we started pitching rather than rolling, rocking up and down like a slowly nodding donkey.

Up three metres, down three metres, my stomach following a couple of seconds later. It’s going to make for an interesting night.

Wednesday 15th April, 047°55’N, 006°30’W

Awoke from the usual rolling pin slumber just as we sailed past Britanny. Another clear fine day - perhaps we’ll spot the coast of England today.

The Captain didn’t share our enthusiasm, or our optimism, the heavy brown rings under his eyes spoke of a sleepless night spent traversing the Atlantic rollers now thankfully behind us. He growled as we approached the charts so we made our excuses and quickly left.

It didn’t dent our excitement though - Lara was in a particular chippy mood as she tried to find English radio stations on the small stereo in our cabin. There was nothing but static on the airwaves but outside the activity was starting to crank up as the horizon started to fill with boats of all kinds: oil tankers, cargo ships, fishing boats and even a warship.

‘One of yours’ the Second Officer said nodding his head towards it ‘HMS Brocklesby’. I looked at the screen of boat recognition thingy and so it was. The first sign that we were on the edge of entering our homeland.

Gulls swung by to take a peek at our cargo and a massive cruise ship appeared on the horizon, bound for Southampton no doubt, bringing Terry and June back from the Caribbean.

We had entered the English Channel now and I walked up to the bow to stretch my legs, bumping into one of the crew, all splattered in paint. They always seem to be painting, though it seems to be a losing battle, like tackling some kind of maritime Forth Bridge.

The air had become colder and I could now see my own breath as I leaned against the bow and admired the long smooth waves. Should get a decent night’s kip at last tonight.

Five strange shapes appeared on the horizon through the low cloud: sharp masts piercing the sky, gunmetal grey bodies, moving in single file with great purpose. More navy vessels. Were we at war with France?

The fog was starting to fall as we gathered for dinner; England was running true to the stereotype, much to the amusement of our fellow diners. Another greasy fish platter later we returned to the deck and found ourselves in the middle of a real pea souper, visibility down to twenty metres at best.

Up on the bridge the navigator stared nervously at the radar screen, watching the yellow dots move slowly along the shipping lanes. A colleague peered out of the window and voices from other boats crackled over the airwaves in broken English. No-one wants a prang in the middle of the Channel.

The radar screen had also shown Jersey and Guernsey, just a few miles to starboard. Our first sight of Blighty. We hurried to our cabin and tried the radio again: we were met by a cacophony of southern English.

I scrolled through FM: ‘You’re listening to Duncan Warren on BBC Radio Devon…an RSPB reserve on the Isle of Sheppey to try to record a curlew….of the people that you’ve worked with on this record, Keith Richards must have stood out for many…we remember the man in the red fez, Tommy Cooper…it’s Handel week here on Radio Three…’

I finally settled on Radio Four and the soothing background natter of Midweek. I could imagine the scene back home, kettle on, budgie chirping, neighbour at the door to see if we’d like some of their potatoes…Mmmm Home - I could almost smell.

My reverie was broken by the Ten O’Clock pips, followed by the news. French fishermen were protesting again, apparently and blocking channel ports. Maybe we won’t be home so soon after all…

Thursday 16th April, 51°22’N, 02° 30’W

Awoke to the sight of France to starboard, or at least a vague blueish blur on the horizon. No England though, despite the fog finally lifting.

At last, after breakfast we gained the first peek of our homeland - the white cliffs of Kent sat above the glassy calm waters. Lara leaped excitedly about the bridge: “Look! It’s Dover!” Well Dungeness to be precise. Not quite to exciting.

We continued along the busy northbound channel, staying alert to the cross-channel ferries plying their way through the traffic.

It was starting to drizzle and it was all feeling too much like home. There was only one thing left to do and I rummaged around in my pocket to find a piece of equipment I’d hardly touched since leaving home- my mobile. Time to call the family.

“Hello Dad, I’m in the middle of the Channel”

“Clement Freud’s died!” he said.

“Right OK, well we’ll see you in a few days”

The phone reception - and England - soon disappeared behind a bank of fog and we carried on up towards Belgium and Holland.

We partook in luncheon, all excited about the pending arrival in Antwerp. Henk and Christoph had been at sea for four and a hour months, Sylvia had somehow survived the sharks, rocks, hurricanes she had feared and Martha was itching to try out one of the bikes rumoured to be stashed aboard.

We didn’t have long to wait. Soon the engines dropped and a pilot came aboard, our first of the day (one for the sea, one for the river and one for the harbour). We were heading into the River Schelde, gateway to Antwerp.

Soon the Belgium coastline appeared, first a faint grey outline, then a long dirty smudge before finally turning into a solid dark silhouette. It was like walking past a series of those indeterminate Flemish paintings, blimey those painters must have been bored.

A while longer and the sea pilot left us to be replaced by the river pilot. We could see both sides of the River Schelde now - houses, factories, gaggles of wind turbines, a cluster of dock cranes - and not a hillock between them. Flat as the proverbial Dutch pancake (for this was Holland now, not Belgium).

Henk proudly pointed out the landmarks of his motherland but it was difficult to get excited: aluminium smelting plants, chemical refineries, nuclear power stations lined up along the waterfront under a grey, miserable sky.

We passed the Dow chemical plant and the starboard side changed from Holland to Belgium. Tankers streamed past us on their way out to sea, leaving slug trails in the churned up water behind them.

Ever the accommodating host, Henk poured a wee aperitif as a jolly little tug boat ran up alongside us and we headed down to dinner.

Perhaps it was the cold chips and mushy prawns but we were all eager to get back on deck as the Singapore neared the massive docklands ahead of us

We watched the tugs slowly and delicately guide the Singapore through a set of locks and drank in the view: cranes and gantries presided over an enormous industrial landscape: oil refineries, rail yards, warehouses, mountains of containers and quaysides the length of several football fields.

Most stood empty, perhaps a reflection of the global downturn in trade. Certainly Antwerp has felt it, with business down 20% at the moment. A gigantic container ship stood empty, its waterline well above the murky waters of the dock.

We were being gently coaxed into a berth next to it. Many feet beneath us little men in yellow hats ran about catching ropes and securing them to the quayside, whilst forklifts chugged about, their lights flashing.

There was a faint bump.

Land.

Stillness.

We’d arrived.

Rocking and rolling on the MV Rickmers Singapore

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 09:45:00 +0000

“Don’t worry, those ships are so big you won’t feel a thing!” Well Dad, I’m feeling every movement of this one. We are rocking and rolling our way across the Atlantic Ocean.

The MV Rickmers Singapore is a much smaller ship than our Pacific vessel, the CMA-CGM Hugo , at a mere 193 metres and 30,000 dead weight tonnage in comparison to 334m and 101,000 tdw, and boy does it make a difference.

I’m no ocean expert, but looking out from the porthole the waves look about the same as the Pacific to me. Yesterday there was a three metre swell. We got up to a five metre swell on the Hugo. So why do I feel so dizzy and queasy on this crossing?

It must be because she is a smaller ship in length and breadth and is carrying a lighter load. Indeed, there’s not a lot of cargo to see from the deck, she's only thirty percent full. The shipping industry has been hit hard by the global economic crisis. Apparently there is some ‘general cargo’ in the hold below (steel plates, machines, yachts) but I can only see some precariously lashed old wooden planks and a rusty metal tub of a river dredger from Louisiana.

In my turbulent rock and roll sleep I have had plenty of time to come to understand the finer points of the Singapore’s moves on the ocean. In my delirium I categorised these moves as follows:

The rattle: Default background movement whenever the engine is running. Causes doors and fittings to rattle continuously. Often not noticeable over the ship’s other moves. On it’s own, for example when being piloted up a river, can gently rock you to sleep as on a train.

The roll: This is the standard ship move, rocking gently from side to side. There is a sliding scale of roll, like a marine Richter scale, which requires various levels of falling-over prevention, from the wide leg stance (the higher the scale of roll, the wider the stance) to the grab (especially useful in the shower).

The rolley roll: This is a horizontal version of ‘the roll’, usually experienced in bed, and involves a whole body roll from one side to the other, often knocking into your loved one on route. Can cause sleep loss and a sore back.

The poltergeist: This occurs at the higher end of the scale of roll and can cause things to fall off shelves, cutlery and food to slide off the plate and cupboard doors to open.

The phat air: This one is more of a pitch and fall than a roll. The ship suddenly feels light, it sounds like the engine has come out of the water and that the boat is flying. It then reconnects with the water with a thud. It lurches your stomach and brain into the air at the same time, giving a momentary head-rush followed by light-headedness and nausea.

The washing machine: Is a combination off ‘the roll’ and ‘the phat air’. It starts off as a roll, then develops into a weightless phat air followed by another roll to complete a 360° revolution, taking your stomach with it and leaving you feeling all washed up.

The fact that I am able to look at words on a computer screen to write this is an vast improvement on my condition yesterday. Yesterday mainly consisted of staring at the horizon, reading a book in-between, lying down to watch a film and lining my stomach to help prevent nausea. The Atlantic forecast is peppered with STORMS (always written in capitals on the chart), which we will have to dodge. I hope today’s improvement means that I’m finding my sea legs and will be able to dance the merry MV Rickmers Singapore dance all the way to Antwerp.

‘Huntin’ bucks and drivin’ trucks’ - So Long, Uncle Sam

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:57:00 +0000

American lad: "I like the way you roll your r's"
Scottish lassie: "Why thank you, it must be my high heels"

(As told by an elderly American gentleman)

A deep red sun set behind the skyscrapers of downtown Philadelphia as the good ship M/V Rickmers Singapore sailed past, heading down the Delaware River and out to sea. We were leaving the US.

I stood out on deck and thought back to the last few months during which we’ve travelled across this huge country, from the coast of California to the docks of Philadelphia.

It’s taken us over 5,500 miles, through seventeen different states, from the Tex-Mex border to New England, from the Deep South to the Midwest.

When we first arrived I was slightly apprehensive, recalling the disappointments of my previous visit in 2001. In particular I remembered the dominance of the corporates, the chains who seem to have taken over many a place, steamrollering over the local features and quirks which give a town or region it’s own identity, the differences which that add up to make it unique, distinct and of particular interest to the visitor.

Riding the Greyhound along the interstate it was easy to think that the whole nation had succumbed to this, the view dominated by an endless procession of chain motels and identikit burger chains. It could have been anywhere, Maine, Missouri or New Mexico. Same, same, same.

Yet off the highway it was a very different story. For there is not one America, of course, there are many, and exploring the variety on offer, discovering these different worlds with their own distinct identities has been a great pleasure, full of adventure and surprises.

We have wondered at amazing landscapes, from the saguaro-studded deserts of Arizona to the frozen lakes of Minnesota, from the mountains of Tennessee to the swamps of Louisiana.

We’ve walked in pristine national parks bursting with biodiversity; we’ve seen wild turkeys, eagles and beavers; and visited both the start and the end of the Mississippi, one of the great rivers of the world.

We’ve been wowed by the cities, from the French quarter of New Orleans to the East Village of New York, the fine skyscrapers of Chicago to the history streets of Boston. We’ve watched Ibsen in Minneapolis and viewed Monet in Chicago; we’ve hung with hipsters in Austin and hobos in Nashville.

We’ve partied at Mardi Gras and slept in Liz Taylor’s old Hollywood home; we’ve drunk moonshine with rednecks and basked in homemade hot tubs under the stars.

We’ve ridden the Greyhound and the lonesome railroad; we’ve sped in a Porsche down in Texas, and paddled a canoe in North Carolina.

We’re taken a musical odyssey and found great sounds galore, from street jazz in New Orleans to blues in Chicago. There was zydeco in Jackson and country in Nashville, rock ‘n’ roll in Memphis and mountain music in the Smokies. We found polka in Minneapolis and Motown in Detroit; visited Elvis’s Graceland home and found Johnny Cash‘s last resting place.

We’ve tried burgers and fries, hash browns and links; kolaches, knish and Vietnamese pho; beignets and gumbo, po-boys and crawfish; collard greens and cornbread, black-eyed peas and BBQ ribs.

And there were ramps and catfish, walleye and wild rice; clam chowder, lobster bisque and buffalo wings; Philly cheese steaks, doughnut holes and pretzels; food from a dumpster and acres of pizza.

We’ve washed it down with a wide range of beers, many local, all delicious. We supped Dogfish in Boston, Dead Guy in LA, Honkers in Chicago, Summit in Minnesota, Lone Star in Texas; Abita in Louisiana; Yazoo in Nashville, Yards in Philadelphia...

We’ve lived through a thousand films, the quintessentially American: paper bags for your ’groceries’; steam escaping from vents in city streets; stoops and fire escapes on brownstone buildings; bow-tied academics on Harvard campus; white picket fences and red hip roof barn; state troopers and police cruisers; huge firetrucks and burly heroes; yellow traffic lights hanging on wires; ‘city limits’ signs on the edge of town; neat clapboard houses with a basketball hoop in the front yard; workshirts with name badges on; people with the ‘Jr’ suffix; retro-style diners…

But it was the people of course, which stick in the memory. There’s been the good, the bad and the quite clearly mad.

Thanks to our common language, our shared history and perhaps most of all the wonders of couch surfing, we have been able to get closer to Americans than people in other countries and nearer to finding out what makes this huge country tick.

We’ve stayed with nurses and hipsters, Spanish surgeons and Argentinean biochemists, musicians and teachers, students and stock market traders.

They’ve put us up everywhere, from bordello-themed rooms down in New Orleans to log cabins high in the mountains; from terraced houses out in the suburbs to crash pads in the middle of downtown. We’ve slept on couches and mattresses, floors and even a massage table.

We’ve made friends with strangers who’ve welcomed us to their town, memorable characters such as Wers-leh ‘White Lightnin’ the blues guitarist’, ‘Durl’ the bus driver MC and ‘Mow-reece’ the tram driver, who just digged my boots.

They’ve come from all backgrounds: rich and poor, vegan and carnivore, Democrat and Republican (‘you‘re liberal?! Get outta my house!’). There’s been hippies and hawks, rednecks and poets, veterans and protestors, gay, straight, black, white and all shades in between.

We’ve met Mexican labourers and Chinese chefs, Baptist preachers and Vietnamese microbiologists, tatooed ex-cons and Senegalese cabbies, Native American croupiers and Cajun waiters, drugstore cowboys and Puerto Rican plumbers, whooping frat boys and rednecks in Dodge Rams, ‘huntin’ bucks and drivin’ trucks’, flying the Southern Cross.

Given this range of backgrounds it should be hard to define what being an American is - you could ask them and they’d never be short of an answer. Perhaps therein lies the actual answer, for we found that Americans always have questions and are never too shy to express their own opinions.

There’s little English reticence here, and perhaps a greater certainty in their beliefs. Opinions are often more polarised and on controversial issues it seems never the twain shall meet: abortion, same-sex marriage, the right to bear arms...

I found the latter particularly difficult to understand: on several occasions I was shocked to discover the nice, sane person we were travelling or staying with was packing a piece. ‘Because I need to protect myself,’ I was told. From what? Other people with guns?

I just bit my tongue. Coming from a mild, rather phlegmatic country I find it hard to comprehend such a mentality. There are some issues I guess where we will have to agree to disagree.

There were benefits to being English here though and after several months of enjoying American’s most generous hospitality I can no longer argue that the ‘special relationship’ is purely one-way. We have often been quite overwhelmed by people’s kindness where people would go out of their way to help or to offer advice to someone from ‘the old country‘.

Many a time a local would prick up their ears upon hearing our English accents and soon the questions would start flowing, from the usual about the royals, the weather and the Beckhams, to those about the UK economy, their favourite British bands and how I sounded like Hugh Grant.

I learnt a great deal from these little encounters, and gained a real insight into people’s everyday lives, the lives that make up America. They seemed to enjoy this too, such as the fellow in a Mississippi sub shop who insisted on stumping me my meal in exchange for a natter.

And here I would sway between loving and loathing, buzzing on the good points but perplexed by the bad.

There’s still things there I find hard to understand: an obsession with the big and the energy-intensive; the gross disparities between rich and poor; a blind obedience to the flag and an unquestioning reverence for ‘patriots’; a poor public transport infrastructure (in some places non-existent); rampant obesity and the fast food culture...

But one thing stood out here above all else here: religion. It seems that in America the zealots shout louder. I lost count of the number of signs I saw warning that we were ‘all going to hell’ or the amount of insane rants I heard on the radio.

There’s a sizeable portion in this country who subscribe to this, and are not afraid to show themselves. We came across them throughout the land.

Back in New Orleans they stood out in Bourbon Street, amidst the maelstrom of drunks and debauchery with their hellfire grimaces and their placards of sinners: ‘sports nuts’, ‘pencil neck weak kneed gutless men’, ‘rebellious women’, ‘witches’, ‘pot smoking little devils’ and, bizarrely ‘used car dealers’. Come on now, you can’t condemn Frank Butcher…

It all left me aghast and disturbed. How did this happen? ‘Well what did we expect?’ one American said to me, ‘after all you sent over all the puritans‘.

He had a point, and I guess for every Thomas Paine and William Penn there must have been a boatload of religious nutters seeking a new land where they could express their free opinion (or empty their guns into armadillos).

Back then it was a land of opportunity and today it still struck me as such - a land where, if you go for it, you really can ‘make it’. The ‘American dream’ lives on, and millions still come here in search of a better life.

It’s a ‘can-do’ culture where people work hard and seem less likely to say ‘no’. It never took us much effort to enter a new place and find someone who could fix our laptop or give us a ride to another town.

Standards of living seem generally higher and for many life is comfortable. Or should I say was, until the economic bubble burst.
Perhaps they grew too comfortable and complacent as the world’s top dog; certainly many are now learning the hard way that economic fortunes can go down as well as up.

Can they turn this around? Of course they can, and they’ve got a nice fresh young chap at the top who they hope can do just this. Returning to the US, just after Obama took power we felt a
palpable wave of relief amongst the people we met.

‘Hope‘. It's a good slogan for the US.

I hope to return myself one day. Keep the cheesesteaks warm.

We are sailing (again)

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:25:00 +0000

We're heading back out onto the water, this time sailing across the Atlantic, from Philadelphia in the US of A to Antwerp in Belgium.

Our route retraces (albeit in reverse) that made by William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania, as we head down the Delaware River, passing between Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on one side and Camden, New Jersey on the other, and out into the Atlantic.

And that'll be it for our America leg. Out of the New World and back to the Old. It's going to be quite a change, but then we will have time to adjust as our ship takes eight days to cross 'the pond'.

Our home for the next week will be the Rickmers Singapore, a mighty vessel carrying cargo around the world. You can follow our progress across the Atlantic via Rickmer's ship tracker here.

Those US visit ‘attainment goals’ - the results

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 12:11:00 +0000

Remember those ‘attainment goals’ I set myself when we first landed on US soil back in December? Well here’s the results:

Goal: To meet someone called Chuck or Randy (particularly if their name also includes the suffix ‘Jr’ )

Not met really, though I did hear of many. A friend also knows at least two people called Hank. Who are women.

Goal: To eat a Corndog

Not met. I’m sorry. Friends were happy to chow down on this bizarre hunk of fat on a stick but I just couldn’t do it…

Goal: Visit a High School and look inside the students’ lockers

Not met, and wisely so, given the stories I heard about High Schools.

Go to a live recording of a chat show

Achieved? Yes - visited recording of the Jimmy Kimmel Show in LA. Instantly forgettable. Why did I agree to this in the first place?

Watch an Ice Hockey match

Not met, due to the extortionately high price of a trip to watch the Minnesota Wild. However I did better than this and attended the Roller Derby in St Paul. A great evening out.

Visit a space centre

Not met - Houston had a problem, namely the amount of traffic (and our tight schedule to reach New Orleans).

Get admired for my accent and asked if I'm from 'Scotsland' / Denmark etc

Easily surpassed. Our accents drew attention and often admiration on countless occasions, particularly in the south.

Australian tops the charts as the nationality I was most mistaken for. Others included Irish, Dutch and even more bizarrely, Ukrainian.

Persuade someone I am Prince William’s cousin

Not achieved. But I did persuade someone that the Queen regularly pesters me, inviting me round for tea.

Collect bizarre questions about my home country, e.g: ’Do you still drive a horse and carriage?’

Achieved? Yes plenty, though even more Americans seemed more interested to hear about the present state of the UK’s economy.

Hear some Mississippi blues, preferably on a rickety old porch in the rain

Not achieved exactly, but I like to think I managed far better when I met Frank and his 1932 steel guitar up in the Great Smoky Mountains. I’ve never heard the blues like that before…

Hear something referred to as ‘aloadabaloney’

Sadly not. But I did collect a great deal of interesting new expressions I’d never come across before. “I wouldn’t take you to a dawg fight…”

Eat pizza in ‘Noo York Cidy’

Tick. Pizza in the village - one dollar a slice. However the great Chicago’s deep pan pizza vs. New York thin crust debate has still to be settled.

Buy a ten gallon hat

Not met. But perhaps I went one better, returning home the proud bearer of a genuine mountain man’s hat, a hillbilly headpiece from Civil War days.

Meet a stressed-out, coffee-guzzling cop like the fat one off ‘NYPD Blues’
Not met. They were all too relaxed, somewhat disturbingly. Nor did I get hold of one of the collectible playing cards with their name and face on - something I was told all cops have.

Go to Mardi Gras in New Orleans

Met. And I will return.

The U.S. East Coast: Too close to home for comfort

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 11:44:00 +0000

Our plan to minimise culture shock by travelling slowly is working. With just three weeks to go before we arrive back in the UK we arrived on the Eastern seaboard in Boston and glimpsed the ocean over which our adventure ends.

Perhaps understandably therefore, I felt a bit blue in Boston. Boston felt too familiar, too much like a city in England. After months of daily novelty and stimulation I wasn’t ready for the Britishness of Boston. Perhaps it was the rain, the squat brick buildings, the street names (Gloucester Street, Hereford Street) and the fact that people say, “Cheers!” It was a gentle reminder of what lay on the other side of the Atlantic.

Boston’s history is fascinating, again connecting us to home. It was the site of the infamous Boston Tea Party, when in 1773 Americans infuriated by rising levels of unrepresentational tax being enforced by Britain, rebelled by throwing 342 chests of tea into the sea (what a waste!). It was a provocative move that eventually led to war with the British, following which America declared its independence from the colony in 1776. No wonder then that Boston retains memories of its British past. But I’m sorry Boston, this time you are just too close to home for comfort.

New York City was next - surely I would find the stimulation I craved here. Of course, it didn’t fail, how could it. But we did meet with April’s showers. Rain is a spoiler, especially when you have left your umbrella in a hostel in Hoi An, Vietnam. It dampened our plans for wide roving and forced us to slow down and re-evaluate. So we huddled in the Bowery Poetry Café and then set off for a tour of Grand Central station, the Comfort Diner and the United Nations headquarters.

One thing was for sure, I didn’t want to hang around our hostel - the Whitehouse Hostel on Bowery. This place used to be a 50 cent a night flophouse for newly arrived immigrants. A few of these residents remain, living in the same squalid, cramped conditions. The upper floors serve as the hostel where conditions are equally squalid and cramped, but now cost $34 a night. With drunk, lost men wandering about, people having, “F*** you!” “No, no, no, f*** you!” fights in the small hours and the nocturnal dephlegmations (and who know what else) audible to all, it was a cruel comedown from the joys and hospitality of friends and Couchsurfing. Good job the hostel was in a great neighbourhood where an evening’s stroll takes you passed multiple hipster filled bars, fascinator wearing theatre goers and a film shoot and even provides some Gastrophonic Stimulation .

Despite the glamour and the grime, New York City just wasn’t as awesome as I remembered from my previous bumpkin visits. As a former Londoner, I couldn’t help but draw comparisons between the cities, for there are many. People rush around with the same focussed expression on their faces, the fashions are similar, the shops are similar, the international feel is familiar and it’s full of Brits - more than we’ve come across since leaving home last summer. Another reminder that we are getting closer to home.

We wanted to leave North America on a ship from Montreal to Liverpool, but the line was fully booked. Instead we opted for Philadelphia to Antwerp. Philly had never been on our original itinerary so I was pleasantly surprised by, and enjoyed, the city. Our fellow Megabus companions proudly pointed out all the ‘must see’ sights of Philadelphia - Independence Hall, Liberty Bell, Penn’s Landing - as we drove to the drop-off point. There was far too much to see in one day, but one day was all we had.

As home to one of the forefathers, William Penn, and once the second biggest city in the British Empire, areas of Philly have a decidedly British feel to them. The large, red-brick houses in the Society Hill area remind me of parts of West London and the streets in the suburb of Manayunk are reminiscent of a small, Welsh town. Indeed, Philadelphia used to be called New Wales and there are many Welsh place names remaining, such as Cynwyd and Radnor. There are reminders of the colonial past throughout the city - Unions Jacks pub and British Imperial Cleaners, for example. Philadelphia was also the home of great thinkers and activists. It was here that the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution were written, signed and first publicly read.

For me it was the perfect place to leave from for Europe. We were to take a similar route to the fore fathers (albeit in in reverse) across the Atlantic Ocean.

I wonder if I would have found the East Coast cities more exciting had we headed west, instead of east, on our trip, if these had been our first ports of call. I believe I would. Although my enthusiasm for Boston, New York City and Philadelphia suffered as a result of visiting them last on our trip, they definitely helped me prepare for coming home. They felt a lot more British than many places in the US and reminded me of what lay ahead on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. As a result, I feel that the return to Britain will be less of a shock. Now I have a week on the ocean to ponder this and come to terms with the fact that our worldwide wander without wings is drawing to a close.

The Great American Diner

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 12:11:00 +0000

USA, Day two. I was excited. And hungry. Time to find the Great American Diner.

This was one of the quintessential American experiences I’d been looking forward to - part of the good ol’ America eulogised in films and modern literature. The authentic America, unique and untouched by modern chains and their homogenising tendency.

Influenced by a hundred movies, books and magazines I had a vision in my head of what my ultimate diner would be: a fifties-style restaurant, intimate and noisy, crammed with ravenous customers, the back-to-back tables lined up along windows lit up by neon signs.

Smiling waitresses would patrol the black-and-white tiled floor, chewing bubblegum and offering endless coffee refills, whilst behind them on the red vinyl-topped seats along the chrome-fronted counter locals would plop themselves for sustenance: a lardy trucker scoffing down scones and gravy; a gaggle of peanut-butter kids slurping noisily on milkshakes, perhaps even a harassed-looking cop stopping by for a gallon of coffee.

The jukebox would be on, pumping out Elvis and Jerry Lee and out in the car park a gang of brylcreemed bikers would pull up on their Harleys…

My stomach rumbled and I came back to New Orleans.

My mouth was salivating like Pavolov's dog by now and I approached the reception in our hotel and asked the friendly chap behind the counter if he could recommend anywhere good to eat.

“How about I send you to MacDonalds?”, he replied. Without a hint of irony.

Stunned and starving we wandered through the soulless streets of the Central Business District, resolving to enter into the first diner-looking place we came across. Shortly one came up ahead - ‘Krystal’ - surely it would be ok.

We couldn’t have been further from the truth.

From behind the counter stony-faced staff stared fiercely back at us, clearly loathing both their job and their unfortunate patrons.

We munched on rubbery chicken nuggets and starchy chips, observing the schizophrenic woman nearby who was jabbering away to herself about the swingers club which is apparently opening opposite.

Looking up at the wall I was amazed to discover that this emporium of misery was not alone but indeed one of chain, each one offering an identical experience. Synthetic. Plastic. Soul-destroying.

Time to start again. America can’t all be like this, there must be my diner out there!

I resolved there and then to scour this land in search of it, my mission to hunt down and devour the finest food they could offer in a bid to create my own hit parade of American diners.

Tom’s top ten American diners

1) Louis’s café, Baton Rouge, Louisiana

In a scruffy part of town, some way out from downtown lies this gem of a diner. It was everything I hoped for and more - the good old American diner in all its glory.

There were red leather and chrome stools lined up along the counter, just as they should be. Behind it a couple of two cooks busied themselves over steaming pans behind and a large flat hotplate piled high with streaming hash browns.

One of them, a dozy fellow in a Mickey Mouse hat threw more onions on, muttering to me ‘only a few months and I’ll be getting’ me a proper jawb’ while his colleague - a gruff old timer with a deep cajun drawl - hurried frantically between pans to keep up with the orders. He wore a Louis’s café t-shirt, the owners face staring out from behind the grease, along with the slogan ‘Warrior. Statesman. Frycook.’

Black and white checkered tiles covered the floor, where back-to-back benches were arranged against the windows, above them hung neon signs for American beers and the café’s sign, reflecting in the puddles of water gathered on the swampy ground outside .

Back inside a skinny young waitress with large hoop earrings took our order. A Chicken breast sandwich with crispy bacon, salad, three cheeses and chicken, served on a po-boy (grilled French baguette) with hash browns (chunks of potato fried with spring onions).

I washed it down with tea and copious free refills and admired the scene all around me: lively, happy, families, swathed in beads, heading home after Mardi Gras parades.

I’d had hit the jackpot first time! Could anywhere else better this?

2) Mama Hamil’s Southern Cooking, Jackson, Mississippi

Welcomes don’t come any warmer than those at Mama Hamil’s. Perhaps it was because we were foreign and they all wanted to dig our accents but then everyone else seemed to leave with a smile as well.

It must have been the food. This is southern hospitality at its finest: the best ‘country cooking’ and the best service around.

We were enthusiastically greeted and introduced to the head chef, the entire staff seemed to come and introduce themselves before a place was reverently cleared for the matriarch herself.

Mama Hamil was the deep south personified - god-fearing, polite and hugely hospitable - and beside herself that she had customers ‘all the way from ingerland’. Her voice was wonderful and sing-song in that Mississippi manner and she regailed us with stories from the area and her own trip to London.

We tucked into a buffet that’d vanquished an army of Mongols. There was a a huge spread of vegetables and meats, all of which the staff insisted we tried.

I munched my way through fried okra, butter beans, black-eyed peas, boiled sweet potato, turnip greens, sweet corn, rutabaga, BBQ ribs, pork hunks and meatloaf. Then, as my stomach started to protest I was steered towards the puddings - well it would be rude to refuse. So I tried just three: banana pudding, bread pudding and peach cobbler, all sweet and delicious.

Finally, feeling like Mr Creosote , the grotesque Monty Python character who little explodes from overeating I had to refuse kind’s Mama’s offer of ‘just another piece of pie’ and call it a day. We bid our farewells and left with big smiles and a complimentary bottle of Mama’s special BBQ sauce.

3) Arcade restaurant, South Main St, Memphis, Tennessee

This famous old diner has been going for some time and over the years has become a much-loved institution.

It stands at the southern end of Main Street, an area which was once buzzing back in the sixties, before falling victim to the inner-city decay which characterised Memphis in the seventies.

Now with the regeneration of the area and situated just around the corner from the Civil Rights Museum the Arcade is starting swinging once more as people come back to the area.

It’s popular with locals and tourists alike and we joined the queue waiting for a table as our trolley driver stopped by at the counter for coffee.

Elvis used to be a regular here back in the day and the place has featured in a plethora of movies including ‘Walk the Line’; ‘Mystery Train’; ‘Great Balls of Fire’; ‘21 Grams’ and ‘The Firm.’

It still retains much of its fifties-style ambience whilst the décor also hints at the owner’s Greek background, with photos of busy moustached chaps on the wall and a light Mediterranean feel.

The chow was certainly marvellous and I highly recommend the ‘Number One Breakfast’, a veritable feast featuring biscuits (scones), gravy (not the British version: a thick, creamy white sauce), bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs, hash browns.

Plus they brewed the finest cuppa I found in the country - worth travelling some distance for.

4) Mickey’s Diner, St Paul, Minnesota

Mickey’s is one of the few old dining cars still running. Founded in 1939 it’s on the National Register of Historic Places and the big corporations have found themselves having to build around it.

It stands there defiantly, a cream and red cabin anomalous amongst the tall sleek modern buildings, holding out against the tide of sameness that seems to sweep all before it.

Inside Mickey’s is small and cosy, with little elbow room between you and your fellow diners within its narrow confines. Customers squeezed up along the counter while we squashed around a small table, fiddling with the mini-jukebox which each table boosted though none seemed to work.

It seemed overwhelmingly popular - with a queue of waiting customers patiently stood against wall - and has played host to the famous, from featuring in Easy Rider, to feeding the Beach Boys, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Meryl Streep.

The gruff though humorous waitress baffled me with range of egg options that only an American can offer and soon I was tucking into a delicious feast described as an ‘All American breakfast’: two sausages (round slices), two eggs and potatoes O’Brien (an an enormous pile of hash brown potatoes, onions and green peppers).

We left, making room for some long-suffering people in the queue. Well worth the wait.

5) City Café Diner, Chattanooga, Tennessee

Open 24 hours, Chattanoogans are lucky to have this place, located right in the heart of downtown. It’s one of those serendipitous places that you only chance across by accident or - in our case - on the recommendation of a cabbie.

Outside the frontage is draped in star and stripes, inside it’s the full works. Jukebox pumping out rock music, neon lights, busy kitchen, happy customers and, somewhat strangely, purple seat covers.

The attentive waitress kept the drinks flowing as we poured over the large menu. Seeing I was hungry she helpfully suggested the ‘Hobo’s Banquet’.

A fine choice: homemade fries with American cheese melted on top, fried eggs piled on top of that, and top off with gravy (of the American, white sauce, variety). Biscuits (scones) accompanied this, along with a side of Canadian bacon, just for good measure.

A very welcome place for this little hobo.

6) Lou Mitchell’s restaurant, Chicago, Illinois

Another place which seems to be a bit of a local institution. It’s certainly got a venerable history, being founded back in 1923.

Situated just around the corner from Union Station, on a busy avenue, it proudly its status with large flashing signs.

It’s a larger, busy affair inside, tables and chairs, with a few set around several mini-serving counters. We opted for the latter amongst the coffee-and-a-paper locals.

Customers are welcomed at the door and each given a doughnut hole. Ladies and kids also get a mini box of Hershey’s duds. Nice touch.

My fry-up came served in a skillet (saucepan) - it was more presentable than it sounds and the sausage and eggs slipped down a treat.

Not as filling as I’d hoped though for that price. Perhaps it’s the cost of the ingredients, most of which seem to be organic. Organic diners - whatever next?

7) Leo’s Diner, Cambridge, Massachusetts

A modest little place which belies its grand surroundings, situated as it is just off the Harvard campus.

Leo’s is a decent little place for lunch, albeit one where many people seem to call in for takeout rather than linger.

Inside it’s all sit-up stools and yellow vinyl counters, pictures of famous patrons plastered all over the wall, from the rubber-faced Rolling Stones and Carlos Valderrama, the Colombian footballer with the electric shock hair, to local boys Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.

A busy little moustachioed man in a beret beavered away quietly and efficiently behind the counter, calling us up to the counter to collect our food. No bubble-gum chewing waitress here.

There was something else missing as well: noise. This was a curiously quiet diner, perhaps the studious atmosphere over the road has rubbed off it - I spotted at least two Harvard students in earnest discussion over their fry-up.

As for the food? Well it was worth the weight, with a generous thick omelette stuffed with bacon and broccoli, complemented nicely by thick fries and buttered toast.

Leo’s - a greasy spoon to oil that large brain of yours.

8) Comfort Diner, New York City, Manhattan, New York

Situated on East 45th Street this place is in a great location for refuelling after burning the credit card on Fifth Avenue. It’s in the heart of Manhattan - Grand Central, the Chrysler Building and the UN are all nearby.

Inside it looked like an upmarket Burger King: booths and tables and stools around the serving counter. The jukebox played a fine selection of Motown and Rock & Roll hits; the staff seemed, not unusually for the US, all Mexican.

The menu also offered a slightly classier (and pricier) selection than the average diner.

The general ambience seemed to suffer from lack of natural lighting giving the place a slightly cramped feel. This was Manhattan after all.

We took a booth near the door and ordered the buffalo burgers. They proved to be mighty filling, coming in a toasted bap with salad, coleslaw and sweet potato fries. Look out for their own mustard too, a mild yet tasty concoction, coming in their own labelled jars.

A cosy, albeit slightly sterile, place to come on a cold, wet day.

9) Miss Syracuse Diner, Syracuse, New York

Another dining cabin and one surely not known to the outside world. Downtown seemed empty, almost abandoned as we made our way here on a cold, wet Sunday morning. Perhaps that’s why it was so quiet.

And perhaps that’s why it felt more homely and hospitable. The staff seemed on first-name terms with many of the customers who were clearly regulars.

Small but perfectly formed inside, the cabin was filled by booths along the window, a couple of small tables in the corner and a kitchen out back, watched over by a gangly youth.

The local radio station garbled away as the overly-attentive waitress took our order and kept returning every couple of minutes to apologise for the ‘delay‘.

It was worth the wait and soon I was digging into links (sausages), fries (cubed potatoes) and onions, two eggs (over easy) plus toast, tea and juice.

The real American deal, Syracuse-style.

10) The Filling Station Café, Bryson City, North Carolina

Not a diner by any stretch of the imagination but still worth squeezing in due to its distinct character and great service.

The owner turned out to be a New Yorker, a ’half back’(i.e: he’d moved to Florida only to soon get disillusioned with the place, move again and end up half-way home, here in North Carolina).

He turned out to have an interesting story and proceeded to tell us it as he shouted our orders to his staff.

We’d gone through the motoring-themed menu chalked up on the wall - ‘Dipstick’, ‘Timing belt’, ‘Filler Up’ - etc before settling on the Cuban, a mighty sarnie I’d heard about back in the bar across the way (I’d be given specific instructions on how to order it).

Anyway it was brimming with meat, cheese and salad and certainly delicious. Well worth a little detour - you never know you might get a free chocolate cookie…

Guns, beerlube and Jesus: Roadside adverts

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 12:11:00 +0000

Something’s got to relieve the pain of travelling by Greyhound in the US - for me it was the roadside advertisements.

There was a multitude of great advertisements which helped me to pass the time, making me gasp, chuckle or even howl out in amazement.

These massive great hoardings dominate the interstate landscape, interrupting your view and towering over chain motels, fast food outlets and anything else that has the misfortune to be backed up against these great highways.

Like so much in the States anything goes and - if you’ve got the money - it seems you can hire these hoardings; securing your own personal patch on which to try and flog your wares to the captive motorist.

The following few should give a flavour of what‘s out there…

“Nobody’s perfect - that’s why you need plastic surgery” - Texas

“We sue lawyers.” - Texas

“What can I build for you?” - Texas

“Get the trucking job you deserve” - Texas

“18 wheeler wreck? 1-800 Lawsuit” - Texas

“Cowboy. Your all -American dealer” - Texas

‘www.myhurricaneikeclaim.com. 888-IKE-CLAIM-4U’ - Louisiana

‘Experiencing Jesus Again’ - Louisiana

‘Give us your gun and we’ll give you $1,000’ - New Orleans, Louisiana

‘Our business stinks, but it’s picking up’ - rubbish truck, New Orleans, Louisiana

‘Get your hunting and fishing licence today. Call 1-800-GOHUNT’ - Mississippi

‘Tennessee - where Elvis lives’ - Tennessee

‘Abstinence works’ (Sponsored by the Girl Scouts) - Tennessee

“You can have Jesus forever. Call 1-800-NEEDHIM’ - North Carolina

“Hell is truth seen to late [sic]” - Church sign, North Carolina

‘Naughty adult shop - home of the famous beer lube’ - truck/shop, Wisconsin

“Depression can be dangerous. See your doctor” - Minnesota

“Been rear-ended?” - Minnesota

“Abortion is a death in the family” - Minnesota

“Congress has gone to hell” - Minnesota

‘Prison area - do not pick up hitchhikers’ - Michigan

‘We’re happy to sell to gunmen and terrorists’ - Boston, Massachusetts

‘Coming soon - Spring, and Jesus’ - New York State

How to…travel by public transport around the USA

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 15:41:00 +0000

The USA is an enormous country where the car is king. Travelling around by public transport is not the norm and even most guidebooks assume you are driving everywhere. Gathering information about public transport has been time consuming, so to save you the hassle here‘s what we found out.

Buses
It is possible to get around most of the US on the bus, although in comparison to Mexico the bus system is far behind. Greyhound has elicited groans for years, and yes it is grim, but thankfully some better buses, such as Megabus, are starting to challenge their stranglehold.

If you’re first in the queue for the bright blue double-decker Megabus you can secure a table and four chairs in front of a video screen, and if you’re lucky they will be playing films. The seats are comfy with leg room and the onboard toilet is useable. Despite the better quality the prices are often cheaper than Greyhound. We met a woman who had bought a return from Chicago to Detroit (a five and a half hour journey) for $2.50. Buy in advance and you can get a real bargain. They keep their prices low by offering a no-frills service; you can only buy tickets on-line (you get a reservation code that you show upon boarding), you have to put your bags in the hold yourself and they have no bus stations (only bus stops by the side of the road). The only disadvantages that we found are that the service only serves the north/northeast of the country and if the weather is bad you have to wait for the bus in the rain.

The Megabus drivers are great entertainment, each seemingly running their bus in the manner they seem fit. Our Chicago to Minneapolis driver made the rules of the journey clear to its mainly springbreak passengers,
“No chewing gum loudly - no smacking or cracking. Gentlemen please raise the toilet seat and put it down again. Don’t play music loudly - that’s what headphones are for.”

On the other hand Durrl (spelt Darryl on his name badge), our Minneapolis to Chicago driver, was a one man entertainment machine. He was playing his personal collection of DVDs (“I thought the kids might like Iron Man”) and was genuinely sorry when the DVD kept skipping over the rutted roads of the Mid-West. He grinned back over his shoulder, while battling to keep the bus upright in strong winds and rain, until he got the thumbs up from us that the volume was fine. As Blades of Glory skipped itself to the end Darryl changed tack and got on the PA system,
“Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time ever in Megabus history this is your chance to come down to the front and make an announcement over the microphone. Come on down!” No-one budged so Darryl continued,
“We got a beautiful girl upstairs on her way to become America’s Next Top Model and we got some world travellers sitting here right behind me on the lower deck.” A shout-out on the Megabus - it doesn’t get much classier than that! And on he whittered congratulating people for the size of their phone or the food they were eating until finally some passengers came down the stairs and grabbed the mike,
“I’d like to say thank you to the driver for getting us here safely and to say happy birthday to my nieces for Thursday.” A round of applause. Durrl liked that and came back with an Eddie Murphy style,
“O, o, oooh! We’re gliding like Egyptian silk!” This man clearly enjoys his job and made the eight hour bus journey so much shorter. Public transport has never been such fun.

There are, apparently, a few bus companies travelling between one city’s Chinatown to the next (various websites, just google ‘Chinabus‘), but again only serves the northeast at present. The buses are, apparently, of about the same standard as the Greyhound, but are cheaper. Boston bus station has a particularly good array of bus companies serving different destinations.

When all else fails there is the Greyhound. It does connect to most cities in the US and is often cheaper than taking the train. We didn’t find it a dangerous experience, just a depressing one, with some of the worst customer service we’ve encountered on our trip. However, it works and we used it extensively between Texas and Ohio. Check for deals online and, if you can, book ahead because when you book more than three days in advance your travel partner gets a half-price ticket. You need to arrive at the Greyhound station an hour before departure to pick-up tickets (you just get a reservation code online) or to purchase tickets. They never seem to sell out, and if a bus is full they just put on another one for the same journey.

When you’ve bought your ticket put your bags in the queue by the departure gate - you want to be one of the first on the bus so you can pick good seats (we prefer near the front and as far away from smelly people as possible). You and your hand luggage may be subject to an airport style security check and frisk, as was the case in Memphis, so keep penknives, scissors, nail files etc. in your backpack for the hold and not in your hand luggage. Greyhound buses are fairly standard coaches but lack the comfort and movies of the Mexican buses, so take your own entertainment.

Both the Megabus and the Greyhound stop every few hours for a loo and food break. Greyhound seems to have a close relationship with fastfood chains, whereas the Megabus usually stops at a service centre where you can make your own choice.

Trains
Travelling by train is definitely our preferred method of public transport in the US. The seats are comfy with plenty of legroom, there are plug sockets so you can work on your laptop, there’s a dining car and the toilets are acceptable. They are better than British trains in terms of comfort, although delays are also not unusual.

The view from the train is often much better than the soulless, corporate chain lined interstates that the buses favour. The train can take you through farmland and forests and alongside rivers and lakes.

Amtrak runs the trains in the States. You can buy tickets on line or at the station, with online sales offering the best deals. There are weekly ‘hot deals’ and if you are planning to travel extensively during a two or three week period, a rail pass could be a good option.

Turn up 30 minutes to an hour early to collect your tickets (if purchased online) and wait to be directed, or sometimes escorted, to the train. The waiting areas in the stations are generally more comfortable than those for buses.

The only drawbacks for us have been that Amtrak does not operate services across the whole country and only in the northeast does the service seem to be frequent.

Travelling around the States on public transport is perfectly possible, provides a great insight into parts of America you might not otherwise encounter and can even be great fun. If only there was a Durrl on every train and bus!

Welcome to Canada, from Tim Horton

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 15:58:00 +0000

“Who is Tim Horton?” I asked the immigration official at the Detroit-Windsor border.

I’d never heard of the chap and yet, within a minute of arriving in Canada I was being shepherded towards him by a pleasant young lady with a maple leaf on her uniform.

We’d just stepped off the ‘tunnel bus’, a vehicle which carried us under the Detroit River and across the US-Canada border.

It was only going to be the briefest of encounters with Canada (heading as we were to see friends in Ontario) but time enough, we hoped, to notice and appreciate some of the differences which Canadians seem so quick to stress between their homeland and the US.

Every Canadian we have met during our travels so far has seem anxious to put considerable distance between themselves and their cousins to the south. Without fail every item of baggage they carry seemed to be clearly emblazoned with the maple leaf flag.

I guess it for the benefit for ignorant non-North Americans like myself. Canadian and American, I’d struggled to tell them apart, the only clue being the accent which usually I didn’t pick up on. They spoke the same language, drove the same cars, ate the same food, indeed they seemed so inextricably entwined, did the differences Canadians friends had stressed to me really start with a simple hop over the border?

It started promisingly. There was none of the stony-faced procedures and paranoia in crossing the border here. Just patient smiles, efficient service and an explanation that Mr Horton was a popular purveyor of coffee beans and bagels.

We left the building and entered the bright sunshine enveloping Windsor, Ontario. Windsor…it seemed to ring a bell. Wasn’t it familiar?

I bought sandwiches from Tim Horton’s and glanced at the new currently. There was a imperious looking-lady stamped on the five dollar bill and her regal visage also gazed out from the dollar ‘loon’. Hadn’t I see her before?

Outside the Maple Leaf flag fluttered in the breeze, alongside the flag of Ontario. Something stared back at me from a corner of the latter’s design: diagonal crosses of red, white and blue.

It was coming to me now. Britain! That funny old place where I used to live. The Queen! The Union Jack! Had I taken a wrong turn somewhere?

It became more confusing as we caught our ride and headed north. We passed Charing Cross Road, another city called London, Aldershot, Chatham-Kent and Tilbury. There was Essex county, Middlesex and even Oxford.

I spotted a sign to Leamington ‘ Tomato-growing capital of Ontario’ and another for ‘Dorchester-on-Thames Golf Club’.

This was getting too much. Way back in the olden days, when the British arrived to nick yet another large chunk of land that wasn’t theirs couldn’t they have at least displayed more imagination?

Fancy coming all this way, braving storms and harsh elements, hostile locals and moose attacks, and then naming an their exciting new discovery after a nondescript town in the commuter belt.

I was still wondering about this when we passed yet another Tim Horton’s. That makes it at least fifteen by now in under two hours. These Canadians must really love their coffee.

Just who was this Tim Horton fellow? It sounded rather nondescript a name for a coffee empire magnate, perhaps more like the scrawny kid whom fellow pupils would try to set on fire with a bunsen burner during chemistry lessons.

I soon found out that he was a former hockey player, a sport which I am reliably informed in Canada rivals the world’s major religions.

This helped to explain the other names which weren’t derived from a leafy Surrey suburb. Wayne Gretzky Parkway for instance.

Though many of the names were familiar, the locals had an odd way of pronouncing them. The broad accents of Chicago and Detroit were now well behind us and we found ourselves adjusting our lugholes to a decidedly Scottish-inflected manner of pronunciation, with plenty of ‘oots’, ‘aboots’ bouncing around, coupled with the uniquely Canadian mannerism of adding an ’eh’ at the end of every sentence.

The night closed in and I endeavoured to keep myself awake. It had been twelve hours since we’d left Chicago.

“What are you planning to do tonight”, I asked our ride.

“I dunno. Probably drink beer and throw axes in the back yard.”

Half an hour passed and the Niagara Escarpment rose up before us and soon we were in the streets of Hamilton, home of our friends Doug and Linda, and part of the large urban sprawl (fondly referred to by locals as the ‘golden horseshoe’) stretching around the south-western edges of Lake Ontario up to Toronto.

The next morning we ventured down to the lake itself, one of the five famous ‘Great Lakes’. Across the waters steam rose from one of the large steel mills on which the city’s economy is based. Another stood inactive, work recently stopped as the demand for steel plummeted. Down in Detroit they are not building as many cars as usual.

We headed up Queen Elizabeth Way and into Toronto (or ‘Tron-oh’ as the locals seem to call it). We ate a curry and watched Critical Mass cycling past HMV, Lush and the Black Bull pub.

It could have been London. We had to try something different, something which we wouldn‘t find back home, something local, something Canadian.

“How about wine tasting”, Linda suggested.

Canadian wine. I learn something every day.

Soon we were passing between vineyards, the bright sun blazing down on the cold earth, before pulling up at a smart modern building, all crisp stark lines.

The company Prius stood in a reserved spot out front, smooth jazz played inside. Slender men in designer glasses and tight black tops moved with suitable sang-froid amidst the minimalist décor, polishing glasses and laying out breadsticks. Tim Horton’s this was not.

We were impressed by the sustainable features of the building and soon umming and ahhing over the tasting notes: their wines were ’not the least austere’, offered ‘great fruit parity’ and came ‘buttressed by beautiful acid’.

Oz Clarkeisms aside they did offer something I’d never encountered before: ‘ice wine’. This local speciality involves picking ripe grapes when frozen, yielding less water, the same amount of sugar and a more highly-concentrated juice. The result: a much sweeter wine, which comes in smaller bottles.

Suitably tanked up we headed for the town of Niagara-on-the-Lake, just down the road from the famous falls themselves. Amongst the fine nineteenth century buildings stood the Prince of Wales Hotel, The Angel Inn, the Royal George Theatre…(and no Tim Horton‘s). Oh dear: it was all getting too British again.

I couldn‘t help but be drawn to a shop called ‘Taste of Britain.’

Welsh tea towels, DVDs of The Vicar of Dibley, Midsomer Murders and Only Fools and Horses, and a collection of foodstuffs that wouldn’t disgrace our village shop back home. There was Marmite and Typhoo, Cadbury’s Fruit & Nut and Bisto granules, Branston pickle and Lyle’s Golden Syrup, Yorkshire tea…

Yorkshire tea! A week ago I wouldn’t have been able to control myself, my body yearning for a decent brew. Yet now , staring down the barrel of our impending return to Blighty my enthusiasm was somewhat dampened.

Lara, on the other hand was dancing with delight, nostalgia and excitement sweeping her up into a giddy dance on the spot: “They’ve got salt and vinegar crisps! Ooooh!” she squealed as I dragged her outside.

Back in the street my nose sensed the heady waft of bacon sandwiches, my ears picked up the sound of clinking china and from somewhere, I could swear, drifted the solemn tones of a Radio Four announcer.

Was this Canada or the Cotswolds?

It was all too much, too soon: we had to get back to the US.

It wasn’t far - over the river in fact. Just turn left at the falls.

Ten minutes up the road the magnificent Niagara Falls thundered in a roar of mist and spray. Large chunks of ice still clung to the sides whilst on the Canadian side the skyline was pitted by a strange assortment of ugly towers.

There was the usual range of ‘amusements’ somehow deemed essential complements to a natural attraction in North America: Guinness World of Records, Hard Rock Café and of course a sprinkling of casinos.

We shivered before the huge horseshoe falls, marvelled at the sheer volume of water plunging over the ledge and our friend Doug was robbed by a fortune-telling Gypsy (ok it was a plastic one in a machine but one that the Daily Express would surely wind itself up about nevertheless).

It was time to leave. We headed for the rainbow (bridge, that is, not the one hanging down below in the mist) and the joyous queue at the US border. Linda was nervous: she loathes crossing into the US.

“I could do with a cuppa before going there”, she said “Shall we go to Tim Horton’s?”

World in Slow Motion - Best Travelogue 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 02:09:00 +0000

We won!! After two months of nominations, voting and judging panels, those lovely folks at Lonely Planet have declared World in Slow Motion the winners of the Best Travelogue Award.

Many thanks to all of you who gave us your support and votes.

For those of you interested in the technicalities, we came second in the public vote (with a whopping 1,189 votes - more than the winner in some categories), scoring 7/10 points, and first in the judges decision, scoring 10/10 points, giving us a grand total of 17/20 points. Click here to see the final scores and winners in other categories.

We're so pleased that people out there like this blog and are dead chuffed for our work to be recognised; it makes for a nice ending to our trip.

There are just three weeks until we're back in the land of tea and crumpets. But before then there are plenty more stories to tell...

Thanks again.
Lara and Tom

Back in Minnesota

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 15:58:00 +0000

After nearly nine months on the road, coming back to Minneapolis, where I lived from 2002-2003, is the closest that I have come to feeling at home for quite some time. It is also a gentle reminder that our homecoming is just around the corner.

With less than a month remaining, the end of our trip is in sight. Our sailing date from Philadelphia to Antwerp has been brought forward by nine days so we have had to change our itinerary and prepare ourselves for our return. Over the past few weeks Mission Mississippi has taken us from the deep south to the extreme north of the United States, from the mouth of the Mississippi in New Orleans to its source in Lake Itasca; from crazy Mardi Gras parties to the frozen wilderness of northern Minnesota and everything in between. For me, Minnesota is the beginning of the end, time to start preparing myself for the ‘real world'.

Minnesota has an extreme climate which reflects on people’s personalities. It fluctuates between -20 and +40 ° C between the seasons of winter and road-mending (the locals favourite joke). We arrived on the warmest day of the year so far, when Minnesotans were bemoaning the long hard winter and preparing themselves for the frivolities of spring and summer. In the Twin Cities (of Minneapolis and St Paul) the snow had melted and people were starting to thaw out - the streets and bars were full and coats were open. However, in the north of the state the snow was still thick, people were huddled inside and you could walk on the frozen water of the lakes.

We noticed that people didn’t seem quite so fascinated by us Brits in Minnesota, as very few random strangers had commented on our accents or inquired as to who we were and what we were doing, in contrast to the warm reception we had received in the southern states. I don’t think it’s because people are any less friendly, for they are, but they are just more reserved and perhaps think it rude to ask. The difference is much like that in Europe between the austere Finns and the gregarious Spanish. Perhaps that is why I am drawn to Minnesota so much - it does remind me of Scandinavia, my mother‘s homeland. It is known as the state of 10,000 lakes, is covered in silver birch and pine forests and people go to their cabins in summer. Indeed many of the settlers in Minnesota came from Scandinavia.

I also hold the climate partly responsible for the three pillars of Minneapolis/St Paul culture - theatre, heavy drinking and politics. The cold drives you indoors to drink, think, talk and create. Minneapolis has the biggest theatre scene in the U.S., after New York City, including the annual Fringe performing arts festival. The Twin Cities can also be politically outspoken, as recently demonstrated by graffiti outside the National Republican Convention. The array of liquor stores and funky bars is testament to the drinking culture.

It is strange to return to a former life, one that has been carrying on in parallel in my absence. It is like visiting history. Minneapolis looks the same - my favourite liquor store, coffee shop, bars, the Wedge supermarket - and most of my friends are still here. Even more remarkably people still remember me and have been incredibly nice (and not just Minnesota nice) to us - buying us drinks and dinners, taking us to diners, housing us, entertaining us at the roller derby and theatre and mending our increasingly temperamental laptop.

Minneapolis doesn’t look as aesthetically exciting as, say, Chicago, and isn’t a major tourist destination, but underneath it is full of quirky and fun places to explore. It has an interesting mix of Germanic/Scandinavian settlers, resettled Hmong and Vietnamese, Mexicans and more recently Somalis. It makes for a fantastic array of restaurants. It is also one of the more progressive cities I have been to in the States. People cycle (even in the below freezing winters it has one of the highest commuter cyclist rate in the States), shop at co-ops supporting local agriculture and the gay scene is blooming. It is also a hotbed of not-for-profit organisations, such as my former workplace, the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, where we gave a presentation and a radio interview that will be available at Radio Sustain next week. People in the States have been some of the most interested in our trip so far - it really seems to spark the imagination in a country that is waking up to the realities of climate change.

We’ve been crazily busy in the Twin Cities as I tried to fit a year’s memories into one week so there has been little space for reflection. Now on the eve of our departure from Minneapolis I’m starting to reminisce, about our trip around the world in slow motion and about previous departures from places I love. It’s going to be hard going home. Minnesota has been a wonderful trip back in time and has also provided a gentle insight into what is to come back in Blighty.

Turning thirty at the roller derby

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 18:34:00 +0000

“It’s springtime!“ boomed the commentator at the Minnesota RollerGirls roller derby. An exciting time for Minnesotans as they come out of frozen hibernation and a big day for me as the first day of spring is my birthday.

The Legendary Roy Wilkins Auditorium in downtown Saint Paul was full of thousands of roller derby fans revved up on springtime warmth and ready to cheer on the Minnesota RollerGirls. I had no idea what to expect. Then the lights started flashing, the music started blaring, the blue-haired commentator started shouting and out skated (roller skates, not blades) the Rockits and the Garda Belts. Two teams of feisty women in florescent minidresses and brightly coloured, pattered pantyhose (a much more fun word than tights!).

Roller derby has been reclaimed and revamped from the ashes of its 1970’s predecessor. As the programme clarifies, ’Hair pulling, punching, etc. went the way of macramé and satin jackets.’ That said, roller derby is still a full-on contact sport. Ten women (five from each team) are on the circular track at the same time - two jammers, six blockers and two pivots. The pivots lead the pack around the track while the jammers try to make their way through the blockers to the front. Points are scored when the jammer passes members of the opposite team. Blocking tactics are pretty ferocious - pushing, shoving and pulling are all par for the course, with girls going flying off the track into the audience, crashing down on their knees, belly and bum. We winced when Dudezilla, co-captain of the Rockits, collided with two others and had to sit out the rest of the show.

The best part of watching ten women whizz around a roller rink isn’t their short dresses (although Tom may disagree), but their names. All players have an alter ego that the commentators clearly enjoy: There’s Harmony Killerbruise, Flora Flipabitch, Venus Thightrap and the crowd’s favourite, Suzie Smashbox, which was chanted around the auditorium. My favourite is Chinese Takeout, my former flatmate, now an Atomic Bombshell celebrity. These girls really are superstars around town - you can buy their player cards, people queue up for autographs and they get recognised when out on the tiles. They do it all for love not money - training three times a week, competing in tournaments and volunteering in the community - for all the money raised from ticket sales, sponsorship and merchandise goes to charity.

When it’s all over Wet Spot, the janitorial artist, does a final lap of the track cleaning up spilt beer and firing T-shirts into the crowd through an automatic drainpipe.

Fun as the roller derby was, we shunned the official after party in favour of my favourite bar in Minneapolis - Nye’s Polonaise Room. Nye’s is an eccentric bar with an eclectic crowd. It’s all heavy velvet, thick carpets and candle light. White-haired locals sat around a piano and crooned karaoke oldies; hipsters laughed and sipped martinis; a transvestite chatted up the doorman and through the double doors in the polka bar the (self-proclaimed) world’s most dangerous polka band was in full swing. An old man alternated between growling down a microphone and playing the trumpet while his large-kneed partner remained seated playing the accordion. People young and old did bad dancing in front.

I’m not sure what women of my age are supposed to be doing - having a successful career, buying houses, making babies perhaps? - but right now I am having fun doing random things in strange parts of the world.

How to…travel on the cheap in the United States of America

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 16:52:00 +0000

Travelling without spending in the States requires a mixture of kindness and knowledge. Kindness on the part of generous people in America and knowledge based on conversations and experiences along the way. Here are our tips for travelling on the cheap in the U.S. of A:

Accommodation:
Couch surfing rocks. This international network of nice people allows you to search for free beds in people’s homes across the U.S. (and the world). You get to meet and live with the locals in exchange for good conversation and the odd beer. We have stayed with some incredible people from musicians and comedians to hipsters and surgeons. Accommodation varies from a pile of blankets on the sitting room floor to a B&B style private room.

Being friendly and meeting people. It‘s amazing how far a smile and a British accent goes in the States. We‘ve met people on beaches and in cars (fellow ridesharers) who have kindly invited us to their homes. Americans are so much more willing than the British to go out of their way for a stranger, giving us lifts across hundreds of miles and buying us meals. We’ve been bowled over.

Travel:
Craig’s List rideshare gets you where you want to go, as long as you can be flexible with the dates. Simply google Craig’s List in the area you’re staying about a week before you want to leave and post an advert in the rideshare section. We were very successful in the southwest, but not so successful in the south. Since petrol is so cheap in the States, splitting fuel costs nearly always works out cheaper than taking public transport, although it‘s not as good for your carbon footprint. You also get to meet some great people who sometimes are prepared to take the slow route to show you the sites and the best places to eat.

Greyhound special deals. The Greyhound is miserable - not dangerous, just depressing. Avoid if you can, but if you must then check their ‘Hotdeals’ for cheap tickets. Booking more than three days in advance allows the person travelling with you to get a half price ‘companion’ ticket.

Megabus has reached the States and is cheaper than Greyhound. Service is limited mainly to the northeast, but it’s expanding all the time. Chinabus takes you from one city’s China town to another and is again cheaper than the Greyhound, although service is more limited (mainly northeast).

Amtrak is more expensive than the bus, but you can get some great deals. The rail pass could work out if you are planning to travel extensively during a two or three week period. The website also offers ‘hot deals’ which can be cheaper than the Greyhound on certain routes. The trains are very comfortable so sleeping on them overnight is possible, thus saving money on accommodation.

Food and drink:
Tap water is potable, so refill your bottle. Restaurants are usually more than happy to oblige.

Happy hour. Most bars offer deals during ’happy hour(s)’ on drinks and food. It’s always worth asking before placing your order.

All-you-can eat buffets. Some restaurants, especially those serving southern cookin’ and pizza, have lunchtime and/or dinner buffets where you eat as much as you can for a reasonable price. Like Mama Hamils lunchtime feast for just $8. You’ll be full for the day.

Giveaways. Look out for free events serving free food in the local entertainment news (like the street gig and hotdogs we found in Nashville). Products are sometimes being promoted on the streets so keep walking by in different disguises to stock up on free samples.

Supermarket tasters. Some supermarkets leave out delicious and plentiful tasters, which can mount up to a sizeable meal. Costco gives away loads of food, although you will need to go in with a member. Treasure Island in Chicago is also generous.

Free breakfasts at Holiday Inn. Apparently it’s easy enough to walk in with a confident stride and help yourself, although we haven’t tried this ourselves.

Dumpster diving is a popular food shopping experience in some parts of the country. Again, we haven’t done it ourselves, but are led to believe that there are rich pickings to be had for free in the skips out the back of supermarkets. Post-midnight is prime diving time. Here you will find trays of pasta sauce where maybe one jar broke and soiled (but didn’t spoil) the rest; out of date bread, crisps and other dry goods that will last forever; dented tins of food etc. If you’re prepared to wash your find you can stock up for weeks.

Fun:
Free music. Check out local entertainment listings (usually in a free mag) for free gigs and events.

Museums often have a free or discounted entry day each week. Have a look on their websites and plan accordingly.

Other stuff:
Clothes. Travelling through the U.S.A.’s many climatic zones requires many changes of clothes. So if you get caught short in a snowstorm, as we were, head to the local thrift (second hand) store for bargains galore.

Internet. Libraries offer free use of computers and Internet for up to two hours. Most cities also offer free wifi hotspots in cafes, bars and public places. Useful if you’re travelling with a laptop. Google ‘free wifi hotspots’ to find the nearest places.

This is how we have survived a month in the States on our last few pounds and the tumbling exchange rate. It takes a little more time and effort but has greatly enhanced our experience and understanding of this enormous country. However, don’t take it too far or you could end up being mistaken for a hobo.

It takes a train to laugh, it takes a Greyhound to cry

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 18:06:00 +0000

We left our sunny, idyllic retreat in the North Carolina mountains and headed north, destination Chicago. Back to the real world. People, traffic, roads...and the dreaded Greyhound bus.

I braced myself as we entered Knoxville's Greyhound terminal, knowing what to expect. The waiting room presented a depressingly predictable picture: grim-faced broken people looking forlornly into their future through a miasma of poverty, anger, body odour and rubbery takeaways.

They were the same sad characters of previous encounters: the heavily tattooed thug, just out of chokey; the struggling young mother, cursing at her unruly child; the lost, lonely Mexican, hunched up beneath his cream plastic cowboy hat; the red-eyed hobo, two weeks shy of a bathtub; the sullen scrawny redneck, desperately drawing on his last Marlboro...

Over at the counter the same miserable, monosyllabic staff moved slowly behind the counter, scowling at this pitiful ragtag of humanity. From high up on a wall the same old scare stories screamed out from Fox News, where hysterical reporters brought news of an 'Alabama bloodbath'.

These places must surely be some of the most miserable places in this great country. If there is a hell then surely the condemned travel there by Greyhound. Not then, the kind of place you wanted to spend a minute more than necessary. And tonight the bus was late.

The passengers were becoming restless. A slightly unhinged-looking hick standing nearby huffed heavily and said loudly to no-one in particular 'Call George and have him order me a boddle of Ger-ray Goose.'

I shared his irritation. We had a connection to make in Cincinnati and, whilst we had left ourselves an hour and twenty minues to makes the two miles between train and bus stations, we were starting to wonder whether that was enough.

Half an hour ticked by, 45 minutes, then an hour. Finally our carriage arrived.

The driver, a squat little man sporting an ill-fitting jacket which flapped around him like a penguin with sudden weight-loss, could offer like reassurance that he would make up any of the time lost. He snarled at us from under his ragged smear of a moustache: 'what were you thinking of, only leaving that amount of time to make your connection?'

I was gobsmaked. I still can't find the words to describe such a service. So instead I'll leave it to Tanis, a friend of our back in the mountains: 'It is pitiful, lowbrow, and ultimately chavish.'

An hour late, we boarded the bus and headed out into the gathering darkness, chugging up the Interstate and over the Kentucky border. We passed large brown tourism signs for horse racing, the state's famous 'bourbon alley' and even for a local restaurant, 'Colonel Sanders Cafe - KFC birthplace.'

Sadly no local delicacies for us, as we headed on to the town of London, pulling in at a Burger King. Different London, same plastic restaurant, same cardboard food. Once more we were prisoners of the Greyhound and the Interstate: dull, lifeless, predictable.

Except for one thing: this being Kentucky the god-botherers were also in evidence. The Ten Commandments hung from in a frame over the counter; leaflets at every table asked 'Do you know for certain that you will have eternal life?'

Keep eatin' them burgers...

Back out on the road the religious zeal continued. 'Jesus can turn March madness into pure gladness' a church sign proclaimed. Clearly the 'buckle of bible belt', which we had been told we were entering upon arrival back in Nashville, is rather large indeed.

It provided little comfort to us in our current predicament - time was against us. The air temperature was dropping (38F / 3C); our anxiety was rising. Would we make it?

An hour later the traffic started to thicken and the sky suddenly lit up with the glare of a million lights: Cincinnati, our transfer point. The bus rolled downhill towards downtown, crossing the Ohio River, the state boundary between Kentucky and Ohio.

An historical faultline along which the nation was divided during the Civil War it also marked a transitional point for us - we were leaving the South behind and entering the North. I had little time to ponder the significance of this before our bus pulled into the terminal. 45 minutes late.

The empty streets of Cincinnati were soon speeding past us as our taxi headed to the train station. Our friendly Senegalese cabbie gave us a potted history of the city's background before we pulled up before an impressive but decidedly empty-looking building. Dim lights shone from inside but not a soul moved.

'Are you sure this is the train station?', Lara asked nervously.

We heaved our bags out, entered a cavernous entrance hall and gasped in the gloom. It was a fabulous art deco interior, replete with marble pillars, ornate lettering and huge murals depicting stages of the region's development.

This was bizarre. All this grandness and yet no people. A landlubbing Marie Celeste where time had stood still and people had moved on. It was a museum (quite literally), not a train station.

Finally - right at the back - we found it: a modest little sign pointing to closed door 'Amtrak.' We walked through, entering a small art deco waiting room and a completely different travel experience. A friendly fellow behind the counter was only too happy to serve us and the other handful of passengers who sat around on handsome wooden benches.

Sensing our bemusement he outlined the history of the station. We were sitting, he assured us, in a station that once saw 200 trains a day (400 during World War II), a key stop on the rail lines heading east and west. Today that service has been radically reduced. To just one. Six days a week.

I was gobsmacked. How could this be? The railroads, once the glory of America, the vital arteries which opened up the West, traversing mountains and deserts and defying Indian attacks in order to carry freight, passengers and freighthopping banjo players, now reduced to this. One train a day? It wasn’t even a skeleton service.

Despite this ignominious decline, our Amtrak employee obviously took pride in his work, recounting the sad story of the railways as he personally escorted the small group of passengers down onto the platform.

We shivered in the cold as he told us of the establishment of Amtrak, the back in 1971, created out of the nationalisation of the private rail companies. As he told it, the company was deliberately neglected by a government which had decided that rail had no future, hoping the passenger service would simply wither and die.

The next year, 1972, Cincinnati station saw its platforms reduced from twelve to one. The future looked bleak and the line itself would probably have disappeared if it weren’t for the determined efforts of an influential Senator from West Virginia.

Today the service still runs, leaving New York and chugging slowly westwards, arriving at Cincinnati at 1am, not ideal for the locals but thereby allowing said Senator to appreciate his beloved West Virginia countryside during daylight hours. A small price to pay surely for preserving this vital public service.

It was a small train as well, composed of only three passenger carriages, a dining carriage and a sleeper. The ever-helpful staff escorted us to our seats and we sank back into the huge, comfortable seats, luxuriating in our acres of space, two seats apiece - a decent mini-bed for the rest of the night.

The onboard atmosphere couldn’t have been more different to the Greyhound and its paranoia, pent-up aggression and hopelessness. It was friendly, relaxed and surprisingly jolly at such an hour.

Train and bus: they couldn't be more different experiences in the US, yet another example of the great extremes which characterise this country.

I found myself wondering how could this supremely wealthy nation, rippling with massive economic muscles, swaggering with technological might, could have such a poor public transport system.

They had built the railroads through hostile terrain and opened up the West, erected lovingly-designed buildings and inspired many a romantic song but then somehow they abandoned them, convinced that rail had had its day and roads were the answer.

Was it down to the American love of cars and the power of the auto industry? Did it stem from a personality trait buried deep within the American pysche? The desire to be independent, free from government intervention, the master of their own destiny? Or is the country simply too big to cross quickly by train?

I still didn’t have the answer as I woke up hours later, the bright winter sunshine crowbaring open my heavy eyelids and flooding my vision with the flat icy cornfields of Indiana. They stretched on morosely for mile after mile, the relentless monotony broken up only by clumps of bare trees, chunky red barns and grain silos, dark shadows against the swirling snow.

The scenery was't the only thing to have changed during the night; the accents were noticeably different too, the drawl of the mountains now supplanted by a nasal twang. ‘Howyoodoin’?’, a lady enthusiastically greeted us. The intonation was unmistakable - we could only be drawing in to one place: Chicago.

Soon the small towns gave way to one long urban sprawl, the sidings crowded in on both sides and we drew in to ’the Windy City’.

Chicago. The hub of the country’s railway network, a city that grew upon the iron road, its astonishing population boom driven by the expansion of the railways and the industry that followed it.

Another train station echoing to former glories, and a huge, grand waiting hall straight out of The Untouchables (which indeed it was). I felt I were back in a museum again rather than the nerve centre of a modern, fully functioning public transport network.

Entering the street outside the station looked rather an anomaly, squeezed under the towering, sleek skyscrapers, hidden away like an embarrassing old uncle. It was light years from Japan, even aged in comparison to home. Would they ever catch up?

Back on the Cincinnati platform we’d been assured there was a chink of link at the end of this long, dark tunnel: Amtrak enjoyed its highest-ever passenger numbers last year and President Obama has already announced more investment in train services.

Is this the first step towards a resurgence of the railroad? On behalf of all Americans who don't own a car I truly hope so: as our experiences have shown it takes a train to laugh, it takes a Greyhound to cry*.

*With thanks to Bob Dylan

Moonshine in the mountain moonlight

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 23:55:00 +0000

"Howoooll!" went the hillbillies as they gazed up at the full moon. Glug went the moonshine as it slipped down their throats. This was the sunset/moonrise scene atop a fire tower overlooking the Great Smokey Mountains on the North Carolina section of the Appa lachian Trail.

After three weeks of travelling between America's sprawling southern cities - Austin, New Orleans, Jackson, Memphis, Nashville and Chattanooga - we finally escaped into the wild, travelling up into the North Carolina mountains. Wesser Creek is a totally different world, the kind of place that Davy Crockett might have lived and just over the hill from where Cold Mountain was set.

We were late to the rendezvous point, but no matter, for our hillbilly chum was happily entertaining the passing Jehovah Witnesses with his banjo playing. Loaded up with our Couchsurfing host's tie-die, the roads started to narrow, the rivers started to proliferate and the scenery turned to trees and mountains. Fresh air!

Isaac and Tanis, befriended over run and banjos on a Belize beach, live in an 1850's wood cabin high up on a hillside in a forest next to a creek. It was the warmest day of the year here, so far, and spring fever was in the air. The earth was warming, taking a relieved breath and letting the melting snow gently seep in and transpire out. Daffodils were budding and wood anemones were blooming. The red cardinals were chirruping and the wild turkeys gobbling (while remaining mysteriously hidden).

Infected by nature's stirrings - everything was waking up - we quickly packed up the car and went camping. Lake Fontana's dammed water level provided a sandy campsite on the lake bottom. We paddled out to our secret cove and spent a night under the spring sky around a campfire listening to some of the world's finest banjo music. The Freight Hoppers reside in North Carolina and keep the spirit of old time music alive.

An hour's canoe paddle across the lake, in the company of a beaver slapping his flat tail on the water's surface, is Hazel Creek. This former thriving timber town was evacuated in the 1940's in preparation for a reservoir for which the waters never rose. The trees have now grown back and all that remains are a few stone walls and almost a thousand graves. It's a spooky negative of a bygone era.

Back at the cabin, tired and dirty, we set a fire burning underneath a large metal horse-trough filled with spring water. Within a couple of hours the water was hot and we could sit outside underneath a star spangled sky and soak in this hillbilly hot tub, taking in the mountain air and calls of the tree frogs.

We were treated to a mountain feast of fresh river-caught fish, corn bread, fried potatoes and ramps. The latter are potent roots of wild onions that have been known to get children sent home from school for the lingering odour they leave on the diner's breath and pores. They taste damn good though.

It's a mighty fine life in the mountains. The purpose of being is to have fun and appreciate the natural world. People go slow and enjoy. Suits World in Slow Motion travellers just fine! So the rest of our stay revolved around sampling local ales, walking up mountains and through forests, listening to the banjo and looking out for the evasive wild turkeys.

Tom couldn't have been happier, jamming with a local banjo ace and being presented with his hat as a memento. And I couldn't have been happier when we finally spotted a rafter of wild turkeys and howled at the moon.

The rain and the cold were about to set in when we left Wesser Creek, so we left with our magical memories intact. It'll be another few weeks before the folk of North Carolina will be able to camp out under the stars and howl at the moon again. I do believe that the turkeys have set in for the season though.

Mission Mississippi: A step too far?

noreply@blogger.com (Lara) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 05:28:00 +0000

"Are you guys homeless too?" asked a camouflage clad hobo with a split lip. I began to wonder if our frugal wanderings had gone a step too far.

Eating a packed lunch on a bench in our new cold weather thrift store clothes with Tom's burgeoning beard, perhaps we did have more in common with the bums on the benches around us than we realised.

I immediately scoffed "No," in response to the hobo's question, but then thought about it and, technically, yes we are homeless. We live out of a bag, we eat a free lunch where we can get it (a hotdog from a free music show in Nashville on this particular day), we use free internet at the library (incidentally Nashville must have the most intellectual hobos in the world given the numbers in the city library), we buy our clothes in the second hand (thrift) store, we don't have a car and instead ride the Greyhound and we surf couches. It's a fine line.

I don't want to look like a bum, so on that day I swore to smarten myself up, or at least choose a different bench on which to eat lunch.

My promise to self didn't take long to break when we met our Couchsurfing host for the evening who took us home for a dumpster dinner. Josh hasn't bought food from a supermarket since February 14th 2007 (a fussy girlfriend apparently). Instead he dumpster dives. In the middle of the night he pops round the back of the neighbourhood grocery store (the larger the better) and goes 'shopping' in the skips.

I've heard of freegans before and thoroughly applaud their cause. There is far too much waste in the world. People in the UK and the US throw away about one quarter of their food each year. However, when presented with a cooked from frozen burger on an out-of-date bun with green beans, all of which you know have been rolling around the bottom of a filthy skip, it does make swallowing a little hard. Gulp. We ate it though and we were fine. Josh reports no illness whatsoever from his three years of dumpster diving.

So yes, we're on a really tight budget, but no, I don't want to be a hobo. Perhaps it's time to dip into the overdraft, instead of the dumpster, after all.

The deep South - A musical odyssey

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 19:35:00 +0000

‘I’m going to Jackson, I’m going to mess around. I’m going to Jackson, look out Jackson town.’

- Johnny Cash and June Carter

“Are we going to Jackson just because of Johnny Cash?”, Lara asked?

No, I replied. But I had to admit that he was at least a partial motivation for it.

The state capital of Mississippi lay on our route, the second stop on our musical odyssey through the Deep South.

Leaving behind the jazz of New Orleans we headed for the blues of the Mississippi delta. And not without some trepidation.

Back in The Big Easy Fox News had screamed at us about a recent jailbreak in South East Mississippi: ‘Lookout folks - it’s lockdown in the county!’, a worried-looking chap with a large microphone reported excitedly, ‘these guys are bad and dangerous!’

Prisoners on the run in Mississippi; I was sure I’d heard that somewhere before.

Back on the road the string of Mardi Gras beads led all the way up through Louisiana and across the border, seeping into Mississippi gas stations, cars and the roadside diner where we pulled up for dinner.

Sat amongst red-eyed revellers I looked up from my BBQ pork po-boy to catch the new President’s address to Congress. Somewhat boy-like himself, Barack Obama gave a confident address, commanding the attention of the house and even a few of my fellow diners.

Again I sensed the renewed wave of optimism, one which has appeared since our brief visit in December, and to which people are drawn, desperate for a candle in the gathering economic darkness.

It‘s particularly interesting to witness the first few days of the first black President’s administration unfold here in the south, a region forever associated with the horrors of racial discrimination and still struggling, many believe, to fully shake off its hangover.

Entering the state capital of Jackson we look out for the visible effects of the unofficial segregation we've heard about, where the racial divide often seems to replicated economically.

Tied intimately to this are crime patterns and our host, the delightful Lizzie, stakes her town’s claim to the apparently much-vaunted crown of ‘crime capital of the US’ (Americans seem as obsessed with this as the British are with house prices), but it doesn’t wash with us.

If our part of town is anything to go by it seemed a pleasant enough place - letterboxes at the end of drives, basketball hoops in driveways, BBQs on lawns - and populated with perhaps the friendliest locals we have encountered all trip.

Once again our accents went down a treat, provoking gentle curiosity and kindness at every turn.

As an aspiring young musician Lizzie soon introduces us to the local music scene - it’s not the delta blues but we do catch a blistering performance of zydeco music,a Louisiana speciality.

Every Jacksonian under the age of 30 seems to be busily engaged in making their own albums and we soon find ourselves in Lizzie’s own recording studio, contributing suitably plummy English accents to an her self-penned anthem ‘Happy Minutes’.

With the infuriatingly-catchy lyrics still whizzing around my head I remember Johnny Cash and - now being in Jackson - I ask around about the 'Jackson' song.

No-one seems sure - it's more likely to be Jackson, Tennessee, Cash's home for many years.

More curious American words enter my homemade and burgeoning American English dictionary. Round these parts everything seems to be described either ‘awesome’ or ‘big ass’.

I’m not the first to notice that for many Americans, in Basil Fawlty’s words “It’s all about bottoms, isn’t it?”

Leaving Lizzie to another jamming session we headed north and soon I found my feelings for this land turning once more from admiration and love to irritation and loathing.

Without our own set of wheels we were prisoners of the pitiful public transport system. In these parts, this meant there was only one option - the Greyhound and its regular helping of stony-faced staff and ‘no soliciting’ signs, the unwashed and the unwanted.

It pained me even more to stick to the interstate, speeding right past the towns of the delta, the breeding ground of the blues and a place I’d been eagerly anticipating for many months. Better luck in Memphis.

I glared out the grimy window, the flat unrelenting landscape only broken up by bulbous water towers and roadside hoardings advertising for medical centres (most of them baptist), the latest Willie Nelson concert and one naming and shaming two grim-faced fellows for ‘convicted sex crimes against children’.

Public lynching may be a thing of the past but here the stocks still seem to remain.

The blue skies were gone by now, their place taken by dark swollen clouds which turned to cold drizzle as we stopped in another anonymous town for a short break.

Our amply-proportioned fellow passengers piled out and waddled over to a nearby restaurant out to restock with fried crawfish and fries.

Friday night Fish and chips, Southern style.

A lone Mexican alighted amongst them, his cream plastic cowboy hat shining out like a beacon and bringing a smile to our faces, a reminder of the millinery delights south of the border.

Down in Mexico he wouldn’t stand out from the crowd but here he looked lost and alone, adrift from his homeland in search of a better income.

An hour up the interstate the Tennessee flag fluttered in the strengthening breeze and Memphis hove into view.

Home of the Blues, Soul and Rock ‘N’ Roll, surely here we would find our much-sought after live music here.

After a vain attempt to catch the blues in the raw form, unadulterated, deep down and dirty, at a small venue out in the suburbs we slid through the snowy roads back into town, driven to the juke joints of Beale St.

Once hallowed haunt of blues artists they now seem a hollowed-out core, commercial operations catering for the Hard Rock café crowd and offering watered-down fare.

The picture was the same the next day at the legendary Sun studios, where Jerry, Johnny and Elvis cut their first records - and at Graceland, the gloriously over-the-top home of the latter.

With their music still ringing in our ears we headed on once more to another great music city lying to the west - Nashville.

Another Greyhound. Another stony-faced, round woman on the desk. More pungent passengers and hopeless hobos.

Their spirit crushed, our fellow passengers sat morosely in the waiting room, drawing back into the hoods of their loose-fitting leisurewear some kind of proxy amniotic fluid.

Gordon Brown’s weary face stared out from CNN, his drawn features a stark contrast to those of the sprightly new US President. The coverage showed them talking earnestly over coffee and tilting their heads behind large dais at a press conference.

The rolling newsbar brought the latest economic woes: Northern Rock loses billions in the UK since being nationalised; Ford sales have plummet 48% in the US. Barrack and Gordon stood shoulder to shoulder: these problems are ‘global’.

An hour later we were heading west and, if the large roadside hoardings we passed were anything to go by the lands we were entering are even more redneck: gun and knife shows, fishing appliances and baptist pastors staring out from their lofty perches.

We stopped briefly at an old bus station in a town called Jackson. Is this the town Johnny sang about? There was no time to find out, as our fellow passengers hastily stubbed out their cigarettes on the tarmac and we continued.

The snow remained on the ground as we headed east and we found ourselves amongst low hills, the first since Mexico.

The generously-built lady next to me tucked into a meal of fried chicken and corn bread and we passed a large tour truck painted in the Stars and Stripes, ‘Freedom and Family Tour’ emblazoned boldly across it.

Country music. We had to be nearing Nashville, ’the music city’ .

I couldn’t help listening to Bob Dylan‘s ‘Nashville Skyline’ in anticipation.

Half an hour later the aforementioned skyline itself gleamed at us, the smart towers of downtown glinting orange in the sunset.

The streets looked smarter, the atmosphere more austere in comparison to Memphis. Everywhere I looked I saw a church - we were, as our couchsurfing host, Jason, put it ’in the buckle of the bible belt’.

Together with his wife, Tamee, he has counted 17 churches between his house and the café where we dined: baptist, evangelical, church of god, seventh day adventist to name a few.

Such is their popularity that the police have to come out to direct traffic on Sundays.

To the backdrop of live music (cajun, once again) our conversation turned to the musical delights of this city.

Not only the home of country, there’s hillybilly here, and rockabilly, and in the engrossing Country Music Hall of Fame we read all about them.

Dolly Parton, Hank Williams, Jimmie Rodgers, Merle Haggard, they all crooned at out us from video screens, replete in their cowboy hats and rhinestone jackets.

The streets outside rang to the sound of the fiddle and the southern drawl, drifting out from venues on Broadway and even loudspeakers at road junctions.

Yet to me one voice stood out from them all: the deep, sonorous sound which sends an earthquake through me every time I hear it.

“Hello, I’m Johnny Cash”

And so it was that we found ourselves in a cemetery, after dark, in the small town of Hendersonville.

With the help of Jason’s whizzy iPhone (every American seems to have one - cricked necks and arthritic fingers must be a big problem here) we located the grave of the Man in Black.

He lay next to his wife, the love of his life, both graves etched with passages from the bible. It was a modest plot on a small grassy slope, overlooking people’s backyards, a couple of gas stations and a hotel.

I stood and looked at the final resting place of my musical hero. Jackson to Hendersonville.
Mission complete.

But the musical odyssey continues. We‘re making for the mountains. There‘s a man waiting for us there, and he‘s brandishing a banjo…

Elvis.com: Taking Care of Business

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 19:35:00 +0000

"Nothing really affected me until I heard Elvis" - John Lennon

We boarded a plane today, something I never thought I’d be doing on our travels around the world without flying.

This was no commercial airliner though, and indeed it was going nowhere, parked up on a piece of tarmac just off a busy highway.

Clearly the former owner had been a person of some means: this jet was blinged to the max. There were lush thick sofas, leather seats, a double bed, gold seat belt clips, even gold leaf basins in the toilets.

But then this wasn’t any old plane: this was the Lisa Marie, and this wasn't any old owner - this was the former plane of none other than the King of Rock ‘N’ Roll, Elvis Presley.

And whilst the Lisa Marie may once have flown through the clouds, taking Elvis on tour or indulging him in spontaneous missions (taking his dog to a vet in Boston, visiting Denver for peanut butter sandwiches, visiting the Rockies for half an hour to show his daughter snow) today she was going nowhere, parked up on a piece of tarmac just off a busy highway.

She stands as a dusty display in an outdoor museum, just one of the many exhibitions at his old stomping ground, now a pilgrimage site for his legions of adoring fans, the Mecca of rock and roll: Graceland.

Welcome to elvis.com : Taking Care of Business.

TCB. Elvis’s favourite acronym was emblazoned on the back of the Lisa Marie and his other jet, Hound Dog II, on his cars, throughout his house and even on his clothes.

It seemed rather a naff slogan for such a cool cat, surely more befitting of a small-town haulage company rather than a man who could make girls swoon with a single shake of his hips.

Indeed the slogan seems more pertinent since ‘The King’s’ death, Elvis bequeathing us not only a great musical legacy but a whole retail park dedicated to his memory.

For the dedicated Elvis fan the dollars start flying out of your pocket the minute you turn into Elvis Presley Boulevard.

If you've time on your hands (and at Graceland you need it) you can stay at Heartbreak Hotel (situated on Lonely St, naturally) or park up your RV (those enormous bloated caravans Americans seem to insist on taking with them, as it they’re anticipating an alien invasion) on the campsite behind.

The house is, of course, the big draw and Elvis's former manor perches on the top of a grassy slope opposite the visitor centre, accessible only by shuttle bus.

The visitor is shepherded straight through the front door of the building, more a large house than a great mansion and straight into the Presley family’s inner sanctum for a voyeuristic glimpse into their private, intimate, lives.

It felt strange to walk through their rooms, inappropriate - almost ghoulish - to intrude into their world, handing over fistfuls of dollars for a thrilling peek at how the family lived, commenting on the furniture and the crockery, staring at the framed photos of beaming parents and happy children.

I couldn’t help being aghast at the ludicrous décor of course, frozen as it is in a weird 1970s timewarp, a decade notorious for bypassing all acceptable boundaries of taste.

Not one to be outdone Elvis smashed past these boundaries with great zeal, choosing to decorate each room to its own individual theme.

The visitor moves between these rooms rather like contestants did between zones in the Channel Four game show The Crystal Maze.

There was the TV room (black, white and yellow colour scheme, mirrored walls and ceiling, and a bank of three TVs for simultaneous viewing - an idea borrowed from President Johnson, apparently); the pool room (thick, heavy material from floor to ceiling, like a dingy bordello) and the lounge (a ‘jungle’ room, complete with slippery leather furniture, indoor waterfall and thick, green shagpile from floor to ceiling.

A fellow visitor standing next to me couldn’t help but be impressed: “I gottasay, boy, he’s classy!”

We proceeded to the raquetball room, one a playground for Elvis and friends, now lined with rows of platinum discs and, inside glass cabinets some of his legendary costumes: sequined jumpsuits with massive lapels, tight at the crotch, flared at the ankle and split down to the belly.

From the screens on the wall the King struts about in such costumes, the final word in bad taste.

This coverage of his later live shows showed a decidedly pudgy Elvis, sporting the kind of sideburns you’d expect find in a zoo behind bars, gyrating before adoring fans and sweating heavily through innumerable Las Vegas shows.

The mawkishness cranks up another notch still when we come to the ‘meditation garden’, the final resting place of the King himself. Private family graves; public shrine.

In front of a tinkling fountain, his grave, between those of his family lies festooned in flowers and toys, limp star and stripes and notes of heartfelt professions of adoration.

Fans still flock here from far and wide. One enormous wreath on display was sent from the ‘United Elvis Presley Society Belgium' (United? Was there a split into factions, I wondered? Perhaps a divide along ethnic lines, the Flems disapproving of the Walloons interpretation of Blue Suede Shoes).

Away from the house there was more of course: an exhibition dedicated to Elvis’s many films, another to his many cars, and one entirely about his days in the draft.

The latter provided a particularly fascinating insight into the Elvis phenomenon.

When they heard that E.A Presley was due to be drafted the various branches of the armed services vied for his services.

One glance at the images of the impossibly handsome young batchelor - already a pin-up for many -willingly doing his duty and its clear why they would have been keen to have him in their ranks.

The propaganda value alone during this time of the Cold War must have been almost incalculable.

A grinning Elvis poses happily whilst having his head shaved at an Arkansas boot camp, a rugged Elvis in military fatigues tinkles with his tank deep in the Bavarian woods. Soviet propagandists must have been green with envy.

Yet even a hardened, cynical military general cannot have calculated the value of Elvis once he’d passed to other side. Beyond the grave Elvis is still generating millions of dollars.

The merchandise stands wall-to-wall, at the exit of each exhibition and in every shop in between them. There’s Elvis posters, pens and steering wheel covers, keyrings, CDs and films, t-shirts, ringtones and playing cards, dolls, monopoly and karaoke sets...

But it doesn’t stop here: for the more ambitious there’s an opportunity to let Elvis into just about every corner of your life.

You can get married at Graceland’s ‘Chapel in the Woods’ or listen to Elvis every minute of the day on Elvis Radio.

Indeed if you have the money there seems to be no limit.

Fancy a go on Elvis’s pool table? All yours for $100, with a certificate of authenticity and a Polaroid of the moment thrown in.

Or perhaps you’d like to splash out on a replica Elvis jumpsuit, complete with buttons and sequins. Yours for only $3,300.

Elvis might have passed away some 25 years ago but the tills are still ringing. The King is dead, long live Elvis®.

When the shy boy from Tupelo, Mississippi strolled in through the doors of Sun Studios back in 1953 he didn’t know he’d be launching a music career that would define a generation and change
the world.

Such was his popularity that when he died, aged only 42, in August 1977 hundreds of thousands turned out to see his casket.

As we chowed down in the ‘Chrome Grille’ café (sat in a Cadillac, of course) I munched metaphorically over the Elvis phenomenon and couldn’t help drawing a parallel between Elvis and the United States.

Big, brash and lovable; thrilling, exciting and new.

Extravagant, excessive and greedy; tacky, tasteless and wasteful.

Could he have appeared in anywhere else other than the United States?

Like him or not, even today Elvis retains his legions of devoted fans. Indeed he seems as popular as ever, a simple search for him on google returning 52,600,000 results.

And whilst people still come to Graceland, streaming through the gates in their hundreds of thousands every year, his songs will keep spinning and the tills will keep ringing.

The King is dead, long live Elvis®. U-huh.

Midnight Cowboy in Memphis

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 00:02:00 +0000

Memphis. The city that brought the world blues, soul and rock ‘n’ roll.

Home to Graceland, the legendary mansion of Elvis Presley, and Sun and Stax studios, the recording studios which introduced us to the King of Rock 'n' Roll along with other greats such as Johnny Cash, Little Richard, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison, Isaac Hayes…

My ears were salivating at the thought of it all.

That is if they weren’t dropping off. It was cold - very cold - and my great floppy lugholes were bearing the brunt of it.

I was starting to bitterly regret the run-in I had with a rather enthusiastic barber back in Guatemala and wondered what on earth was going on with the weather in this country.

The day before we’d been in Jackson, Mississippi, where the sun was shining and the thermometer was reading 25°C (77°). We had been wearing t-shirts and sunglasses as we caught the Greyhound out of town, passing on the way an electronic billboard flashing a tornado warning.

And yet four hours later up the interstate, as we alighted at Memphis, Tennessee we were greeted by the kind of icy blasts you’d encounter in the depths of winter back home.

The thermometer had plunged to a meagre 3°C (38°F), and it was falling fast.

The rain was beginning to turn to hail and by the time we’d reached our new lodgings the promise of snow hung in the air.

As I stood shivering on the doorstep of our couchsurfing host, cursing the holes in my shoes I realised I couldn’t put it off any longer: the music would have to wait, it was time to go clothes shopping.

I loathe this mundane activity and was looking forward to it with a looming sense of desperation when the door opened and our host, a strapping Argentinian biochemist named Adolfo, opened it.

“Hi you must be Tom and Lara; would you like a beer?”

Things got even better as pizza was produced and Aaron, a fellow Memphis couchsurfing host, schoolteacher and fount of local knowledge, offered to give us a lift to the city’s finest thrift stores.

As we rode out there the next day he gave us the lowdown on the city. He seemed keen to tell us about the crime rate - the second worst in the US apparently. Lots of murders, crack, shootings, the lot.

I’d heard it all before. Austin, New Orleans, Jackson, and now here. The words wafted over me as I ruminated on this apparent obsession of Americans with crime.

It seems to be almost a source of local pride, each city hotly contesting for the sacred title of ‘most dangerous city in America’.

This baffles me given the number of cops there are over here. With all these fine fellows patrolling the street it's a wonder there's any crime at all.

You almost can't move in this country for bulky men in immaculately pressed uniforms and gleaming cruisers, officers of the law from the sheriff's department, the city police, state troopers and other assorted agencies.

It's almost as confusing as the number of radio stations here, all four letter acronyms beginning - now we're east of the Mississippi - with a W.

Still, looking out the window, it was easy to believe Memphis’s claim, the sprawling blocks of low-rise buildings growing progressively shabbier the further we headed out of downtown.

A sign hung outside a launderette, reading: ‘Jesus is Lord. Starch Pants’ (if that won’t make you wash your smalls, nothing will); another, outside a fried chicken outlet, offered ‘legs and thighs. Spicy’, suitably sited next door to a strip club.

We were approaching our destination, the suburb of Nutbush, and two large thrift stores, purveyors of used clothing to the poor, the unemployed and cash-strapped backpackers.

Inside the Disabled Americans Thrift Store, browsers perused pungent old clothing and cast-offs whilst a jumpy-looking cop with closely cropped hair scanned them with beedy eyes, his hand twitching on his belt.

Our accents were soon - once again - attracting considerable attention. Was I from Ireland? a heavily bearded customer with steamed-up glasses asked me, another - a heavily tattooed lady with a tough Tennessee twang - complimented my English tones - ‘your accent is beautiful.’

Gosh, I liked this town already.

And it got better when I reached the racks, the store proving, along with its neighbour next door, a veritable treasure trove of high-quality clothing for the aspiring yet budget-conscious cowboy.

It is always our aim to try and appreciate a country from a local's point of view; as part of this, I indulge, when the chance presents itself to indulge in another Tintinesque tendency and take the 'Thompson and Thomson' approach.

The hapless Scotland Yard detectives, faithful companions to the boy reporter, always like to adopt the traditional costume.

Here in Memphis that meant only one thing and soon I was striding out into our new wintery world with a brand new uniform. This consisted of the following:

One pair of cowboy boots - $10
One pair of jeans - $5
One thick corduroy jacket $5
One heavy check shirt - $3

Combined with my Mexican cowboy hat I thought I cut a fine figure, ready to blend in perfectly with the locals around me.

Striding down the street on my two inch heels I thought I looked like Jon Voight in Midnight Cowboy; Lara reckoned more like Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain. Better steer clear of the rainbow flags for a while.

By now the snow was falling thick and fast, it was starting to get dark and there was little sign of a bus.

A shopkeeper had kindly looked up bus times for us, one of her customers had even offered us a lift and now we met yet another friendly local who offered us a ride.

‘Mah name’s Werr-sleh. People call me White Lightnin’. Wow - a bona fide musician, and a guitarist to boot. He reminded me of the purpose of our visit to Memphis - to seek out the blues - and we thanked him for his club recommendation, Wild Bills, a place we’d already heard of

White Lightin’ had another piece of useful advice: ‘You’re in Nutbush, maaaan - this is the hood’.

Time to go. A bus finally hove into view and we hopped aboard this skeleton service, the air inside so cold we could see our own breath, the seat cushions soaking wet from the leaking roof.

Once more I wondered what one would do without a car in a town like Memphis, marooned like a stranded sailor in an ocean of concrete.

We made to downtown and the one saving grace of the city’s public transport system - the Main Street Trolley.

This lovingly-kept line runs old trams which come complete with varnished wooden benches, odd knobs and levers. Ours also came with a friendly driver called ‘Mow-reece’ who complimented me on my new garb.

As the tram rumbled gently over the heavy rails I relaxed into its warm, comforting embrace reflected on the fine people of this city and the south in general. Once again the South had impressed us: the warmth of its welcome, the friendliness of its people; the kindness of strangers.

Half an hour later, as we kicked the snow off our boots back at our lodgings and brewed a restorative cuppa the news came through that we were in the middle of the heaviest snowfall for forty years, some parts of West Tennessee receiving up to a foot of snow.

We were back to survivalist shows back more. Snow-bound and stranded in the deep south: would Tom and Lara survive?

Stayed tuned and find out next week only on WISM.