Thursday, December 15, 2011
Getting ready already
We have been home for a week and a bit from Trip 9 - California Dreamin'. We have now more or less recovered from that and are now on the run in to Christmas, but we are flying back on January 8th from Manchester to Las Vegas and already we are planning our travel arrangements. More soon.
Spring 2012 - Fun In The Sun
To read about our next trip either go to our 'Home Base' blog
or go directly to the blog page: http://roadblog12.blogspot.com
or go directly to the blog page: http://roadblog12.blogspot.com
Thursday, December 8, 2011
End Game
At San Bernardino RV Park we fell in amongst some really nice people. We have been able to negotiate to leave our trailer on a site for the month we are going to be back home, thus making our exit and re-entry that much easier as we do not have to move the trailer.
Having prepared the TT and T as best we could we entered our 'exit plan phase'.
Sunday Afternoon:
Drive to Ontario airport on Take Off (T) minus 25 hours, to pick up rental car (RC) for 24 hour period. Check
Return with both vehicles to Base (RTB).
Check In Online. Encountered first hurdle - They had changed the flight time, but didn't tell us! T would now be 19.15, not 18.00. Ramification being that landing would be at 14.10, not 12.35, making the connection for the 16.00 train at Kings Cross (KX) would be very difficult. We phone Customer Service, who apologise and suggest that we apply for any extra costs which they will possibly reimburse. Our choices are: rebook a later train (now a minumum of an additional £91, to get a train three hours later after the rush hour), go with the plan and hope that we can get to KX by 16.00. Customer Services suggest that the flight will land up to an hour early, so we go with the original plan.
Go for final meal out, as all surfaces and crockery are now clean - We choose Outback Prime Rib for me and Steak and Shrimp for Sally.
Monday:
Pack car, move trailer to a storage site.
T-7: Drive to LAX
T-4: Return rental car, shuttle to LAX
T-3.45: Bag Drop at Virgin, relax
T-3.30: Return to shuttle to retrieve Sally's Back rest, fortunately
T-0.75 Board plane
T-0: Take off on time!
T+9: Land 1 hour early (L): 1.00p.m. local time
L+45: Whizzed through Heathrow by Assistance, catch 1.48 Heathrow Express (15 min)
L+1: Arrive Paddington St.
L+1.30 Taxi to St Pancreas(SP) (20 min) (close to KX, but so much cleaner and better food, where you can sit civilized)
L+2.15: After relaxing in SP we stroll to KX and get Rail Assist to board East Coast Express (ECX) early.
L+3: ECX leaves on time at 4.00 p.m. local time: (2.22 min)
L+5.30: train 8 minutes late to Darlington. Surprisingly Assist is there to make sure we get connection: One man to get us off East Coast Express and push to other platform, 2 men waiting to board us on local train.
L+5.33: Local train to Middlesbrough (20 mins)
L+ 6: Helen and Stu meet us at Middlesbrough
L+6.10: Stop for Chinese Takeaway (CTA).
L+6.20: Reach home, relax. eat CTA and sleep.
Total journey time 22.5 hours.
We were so thankful that the plane managed to land an hour early, The Assistance was excellent and worked on every segment of the journey. It made it so much easier. We actually had an hour and a half extra to relax in St Pancras Station.
Having prepared the TT and T as best we could we entered our 'exit plan phase'.
Sunday Afternoon:
Drive to Ontario airport on Take Off (T) minus 25 hours, to pick up rental car (RC) for 24 hour period. Check
Return with both vehicles to Base (RTB).
Check In Online. Encountered first hurdle - They had changed the flight time, but didn't tell us! T would now be 19.15, not 18.00. Ramification being that landing would be at 14.10, not 12.35, making the connection for the 16.00 train at Kings Cross (KX) would be very difficult. We phone Customer Service, who apologise and suggest that we apply for any extra costs which they will possibly reimburse. Our choices are: rebook a later train (now a minumum of an additional £91, to get a train three hours later after the rush hour), go with the plan and hope that we can get to KX by 16.00. Customer Services suggest that the flight will land up to an hour early, so we go with the original plan.
Go for final meal out, as all surfaces and crockery are now clean - We choose Outback Prime Rib for me and Steak and Shrimp for Sally.
Monday:
Pack car, move trailer to a storage site.
T-7: Drive to LAX
T-4: Return rental car, shuttle to LAX
T-3.45: Bag Drop at Virgin, relax
T-3.30: Return to shuttle to retrieve Sally's Back rest, fortunately
T-0.75 Board plane
T-0: Take off on time!
T+9: Land 1 hour early (L): 1.00p.m. local time
L+45: Whizzed through Heathrow by Assistance, catch 1.48 Heathrow Express (15 min)
L+1: Arrive Paddington St.
L+1.30 Taxi to St Pancreas(SP) (20 min) (close to KX, but so much cleaner and better food, where you can sit civilized)
L+2.15: After relaxing in SP we stroll to KX and get Rail Assist to board East Coast Express (ECX) early.
L+3: ECX leaves on time at 4.00 p.m. local time: (2.22 min)
L+5.30: train 8 minutes late to Darlington. Surprisingly Assist is there to make sure we get connection: One man to get us off East Coast Express and push to other platform, 2 men waiting to board us on local train.
L+5.33: Local train to Middlesbrough (20 mins)
L+ 6: Helen and Stu meet us at Middlesbrough
L+6.10: Stop for Chinese Takeaway (CTA).
L+6.20: Reach home, relax. eat CTA and sleep.
Total journey time 22.5 hours.
We were so thankful that the plane managed to land an hour early, The Assistance was excellent and worked on every segment of the journey. It made it so much easier. We actually had an hour and a half extra to relax in St Pancras Station.
Friday, December 2, 2011
Back to Los Angeles
Friday
We have now arrived back in the Los Angeles area, after a three day drive which has taken us from the coast, on Route 101, through a vine growing region, to Paso Robles. At Paso Robles we stopped at the Fairground, we were the only people there and it was very quiet, though quite exposed as it is really a converted car park. In the evening we went out for a meal to McLintocks, which was just off the rather nice/quaint town square, where we had a plate of the daily special - Tuesday Chicken, a roasted half chicken with 'fixin's', we had one meal between us and an extra salad, which the divided into two plates. We were both full at the end of it. a great meal.
On Wednesday we drove down to the I5 from Paso Robles and then across to Lancaster. The scenery and weather now changed, approaching the I5 the ground became drier and as we rose higher the clouds started to close in. Once on the I5 we started to climb further and became enclosed in quite thick fog. When we headed East to Lancaster we cleared the fog and on looking back we could see that the road through the mountains was indeed covered with cloud. We now travelled through desert on a very straight road, in bright sunshine, but now the wind was increasing and becoming quite gusty, blowing the tumble weed and sand across the road.
In Lancaster we stayed at the Antelope Valley Fairground. Another converted car park with hookups, but OK. Lancaster is quite strange in that it seems to be huge, but with very few houses, as though someone laid out the infrastructure for a large city and no one moved there. Appearances can be deceptive, because the town is laid out on such a grand scale the several thousand people are spread quite thinly. Interesting place.
On Thursday we set out on the third part of our drive, through what I assume is the South Western part of the Mojave Desert, to reach I15 at Victorville and then drop down into San Bernardino, where we had booked a camp site for the weekend so that we can clean and make ready our rig for storage prior to flying home on Monday.
We have now arrived back in the Los Angeles area, after a three day drive which has taken us from the coast, on Route 101, through a vine growing region, to Paso Robles. At Paso Robles we stopped at the Fairground, we were the only people there and it was very quiet, though quite exposed as it is really a converted car park. In the evening we went out for a meal to McLintocks, which was just off the rather nice/quaint town square, where we had a plate of the daily special - Tuesday Chicken, a roasted half chicken with 'fixin's', we had one meal between us and an extra salad, which the divided into two plates. We were both full at the end of it. a great meal.
On Wednesday we drove down to the I5 from Paso Robles and then across to Lancaster. The scenery and weather now changed, approaching the I5 the ground became drier and as we rose higher the clouds started to close in. Once on the I5 we started to climb further and became enclosed in quite thick fog. When we headed East to Lancaster we cleared the fog and on looking back we could see that the road through the mountains was indeed covered with cloud. We now travelled through desert on a very straight road, in bright sunshine, but now the wind was increasing and becoming quite gusty, blowing the tumble weed and sand across the road.
In Lancaster we stayed at the Antelope Valley Fairground. Another converted car park with hookups, but OK. Lancaster is quite strange in that it seems to be huge, but with very few houses, as though someone laid out the infrastructure for a large city and no one moved there. Appearances can be deceptive, because the town is laid out on such a grand scale the several thousand people are spread quite thinly. Interesting place.
On Thursday we set out on the third part of our drive, through what I assume is the South Western part of the Mojave Desert, to reach I15 at Victorville and then drop down into San Bernardino, where we had booked a camp site for the weekend so that we can clean and make ready our rig for storage prior to flying home on Monday.
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