Here comes bod!

Got the train out of King st station – it ws delayed by about 30 minutes because apparently somebody forgot to refuel the train… we then missed our slot and hgot stuck behind a freight train for a few minutes – apparently they have priority on the lines – this doesn’t bode well for the more congested industrial heartlands around Pitsburg and Cleveland.

The train trip was great – I spent most of it in the ‘Bistro ar’ chewing the fat with a photographer and an architecture professor – it was great they loved the pictures of the library – so I’ve got another couple of contacts.

There was snow alongside the tracks from Tacoma to Vancouver – I finally got to see the Tacoma Narrows bridge – not the original, for obvious reasons and got a good view of the parallel span being built to expand the capacity of the deck.

Portland Union station was exactly whta I wanted a train station wo look like, i.e. with the dropped platform, having to cross the tracks and the whole turn-of the century charm that you get in places like Bakers street and St. Pancreas.

I met this girl in the station, she gave me a heads-up on the city – apparently there are hidden beavers and remenants of the cow parade to look out for – am also keen to get a look at the bridges and the highway. There are some hot springs that she recommended as well as a hidden bridge somewhere – she’d been there, loved it and bought the t-shirt (I have a photo to prove it) – apparently the bridge connects three islands with spans merging between all three – sounds cool, but the hot springs might be better.

Am going to get my bearings and try and get hold of Chris and Julie, then it’s sushi, sangrias and strippers — wahey!

Well I’m here – finally…

I had a mad dash yesterday – down to London to get my Amtrak pass from Trailfinders (b***ds took over an hour to process my simple request and had the gall to bolt on 33% service charge – well, at least I got my moneys worth), over to Birmingha to pick up travel money from Steve and back via Tesco.

Sarah and Karl are going to Spike sit – he should be fine, he likes their dog Max.

Anyway I was well and truly knackered this morning – I tried to stay awake, but failed completely – I issed the 3am flight link coach to the airport, so I had to catch the 5:45 coach to London Victoria.

True to form and bang on cue there was a pile-up on the M1, which delayed us by half an hour – just enough time for us to catch the start of rush hour traffic through central London. I like the congestion charge, but it’s had an unfortunate side effect – whereas before the city was full of cars of all shapes and sizes, post-congestion charge London if full of big cars – Jaguars and Mercs, cars which previously would have avoided the traffic jams like the plague.

Anyway, after another twenty minutes of stop-start driving we managed to lurch into the station.

The Gatwick Express was a plesant suprise – Like a can of Ronseal wood stain, it’s does exactly what it says on the tin, and at £13 for a one-way ticket costs roughly the same.

I bought a new back pack for my trip and it is stuffed to the gills with chocolate and random sweets (I figured that ‘candy’ would be an effective way to bribe people and have lots of it) it weighs a tonne and is packed solid. Which is probably the reason that I was pulled out of the check-in queue to have my bag inspected. It took me over an hour to pack the fecking thing this morning – he managed to empty it in under a minute, leaving him plenty of time to consider why I had four toffee crisps, three plastic soldiers, two boxes of chalk and a book about Sol LeWitt.

He said that it was a random luggage inspection, but, well this kind of thing always happens – perhaps I have the face of a terrorist – maybe I should have shaved this morning.

He was genial enough – wearing an American flag, but speaking with a thick Russian accent, an irony that escaped me at the time – I was under threat of being moved elsewhere, packed or not, as I was holding up the line – more bearded ethnic types.

I then had to justify my trip and explain to four different people that I didn’t have any pre-booked accomodation as I was planning to explore the country by train – the american woman drew herself up to her full height (about 6’2″) and told me that that was a ridiculous story – I produced my rail pass with a flourish and she wandered off muttering.

This is possibly the last year that some of the Amtrak trains will be running, the company is running under a tight financial regime and is facing stiff competition from freight companies. I tried explaining to them that this was ‘a last chance to see’, but only the British people bought it.

I need an address for my time in the states, but I’m going to be bouncing around all over the place, am going to try them with the place I’m planning on staying at tonight – with a little luck, that will work – I doubt criminal masterminds spend much time at the ‘green tortoise’ in Seattle.

Had I spent an extra £7 on the train ticket I would have been given a ‘security express’ card and would have bypassed having to repack my underwear in public – I guess criminal masterminds also fly ‘coach’.

Anyway – they’ve just called my flight, will post more when I get to Charlotte.