Washington Didn't Compute

Washington DC was the first stop in the USA for our recent 13 day trip to the US, it was a strange place that is hard to describe but since we flew there I'll give it a try.

Norngirl is getting her feet wet with that as well as even posting some of our photos and as we were together the entire trip except for one day, I'm going to approach these posts from a slightly different angle though no doubt we'll overlap, even with the pictures in some cases.

So if you'd like to read what we did on our first day in Washington from Norngirl's perspective: Welcome to DC: Day 1.

This is my memory of the day:

We woke up far too early. I sat in Belfast City Airport with a black tea in one hand and twitter in the other. Norngirl and I are tetchy in the mornings and so we were both waking up on a mixture of caffeine and trying not to annoy each other though I kinda failed by a combination of not listening and at other times being too manic when talking about Irish League football. Ah well.

We eventually boarded and after a quick but comfortable BMI flight with a quick read of a complimentary paper or two (wow though, how much do real papers suck compared to the Web, it's been a while since I read one - even the cartoons and sports sections sucked) we were looking out of the plane window at a sunrise filled with vibrant hues of Red and Orange over London.
Touch down soon followed and we collected our bags, switched terminals and before too long had boarded our Virgin Atlantic flight to Washington.

I'm not one to usually plug companies but I love flights on Virgin Atlantic planes that have been recently kitted out with the on demand entertainment systems, combined with the free sky bar it makes the flight something I look forward to as much as some days of our holidays.
On this flight I managed to squeeze in 3 and a 1/2 movies (reviews to follow separately at some point). Sadly there wasn't much to see out of the window as a big blanket of low cloud was seemingly covering most of the coast.

As you can imagine the time flew by and before I knew it we had reached our destination but before we'd even reached the terminal building, I couldn't help but notice what a bizarre little layout they have at Dulles International Airport.

You see the majority of gates appear to be in rectangular buildings completely seperated by aprons from the main terminal building so no walkways between them, just some monster truck sized passenger vehicles called a Mobile Lounge.

This was the first time I'd seen let alone ridden in one of these things. It was a comfortable ride but they're weird looking things, like something from a Gerry Anderson show such as Thunderbirds or Captain Scarlet. Norngirl had decided at this point that it was as if we'd landed on a moon base. Which made us laugh even more when we reached the main terminal building after our lounge had docked and we entered a room with swirly modern art hanging from the wall and ceiling. We'd seemingly landed in another world. It soon seemed all too familiar though as we stood in the queue at immigration.

Once through the airport we were boiling, it was cold and wet outside but that didn't stop me asking Norngirl to get me an iced tea whilst she bought her coffee.
Carrying bags whilst wearing a thermal coat... you get the picture, I was boiling.

We got the bus into Washington DC and got off at L'Enfant Plaza. The bus we wanted was sign-posted on the bus stop we got off the 5a at but the one that was already there let someone on but we didn't have change and needed exact change according to the signs so went to get some and that bus had driven away by the time we got back. We then watched the bus we needed pull up and it's driver had a smoke outside the bus. We waited for it to pull up to the stop, it did, didn't open it's doors and drove off. We were stood in the rain thinking 'Riiiiight'. After a while we decided we needed to make a move. So we headed to see if there was anyone alive in this city. The place was totally dead except for the other lost tourists and we were carrying our bags and feeling very tired. Eventually after watching another bus we kinda assumed that the bus did a loop and maybe that the signposted stop was just an alighting stop and not one for boarding... though as a tourist how you're meant to know this deserts me.

So yeah, we eventually found a stop at 7th and SW Maryland Avenue and waited for the bus.
We were joined by another 10 people and we all stood there for a good 40 minutes before any of our buses showed up, an attempt to hail a cab proved unsuccessful.

The rest of the crowd eventually got on other buses and we waited... and at last our bus arrived... followed by another. We were not happy bunnies though we did manage a laugh at the fact public transport was as bad here as back at home. On the plus side, the ticket machine was broken and so the driver let everyone on the route without a card board for free.

We made it to our hotel which was pretty funky and contender for the best I've ever stayed in.
Norngirl put together a little collage of photos I took of our room on her post. The motorised entrance way curtains we're a sight to see, I just wish I'd taken a photo of them.

Settled in, we headed for food close by and found a Mexican restaurant. We did get food but the lady who served us didn't seem to want to give us sides with our meal or ask if we wanted a desert, in fairness the meal we got was pretty filling, maybe it was for the best. I do suspect it was our accents that led to some confusion though, ah well.

A short walk for supplies completed the day. With a whole trip ahead and the confusion of the day in my head, I joined Norngirl in bed and dropped off to sleep with my mind dreaming in surreal yet vivid randomness, my mind attempting to piece it all together.

Thoughts from my 1st transatlantic flight

1075 miles or 2 hours and 5 minutes from landing in JFK international airport, I was flying over North America for the very first time. Here are my thoughts from that point in our transatlantic flight to New York, my very first time across the pond.

"The map on the screen in front of me on our Virgin Atlantic flight had the nearest city down as Goose Bay but it was still a long way off as I couldn't see it out of the window. Maybe I was on the wrong side of the plane?

The flight so far has been a good one. I've watched two movies, The Other Guys and Dinner for Schmucks (both good movies though Dinner for Schmucks was my favourite of the two), had a meal, a couple of snacks and have had plenty of wine - kudos to Virgin for basically recreating our living room but making it fly. The free sky bar is just the icing on the cake! Even after a few glasses of red wine I managed to beat the chess game on medium setting so either the AI on the game isn't up to scratch or the wine needs to be a higher percentage :P

So far however, apart from the excitement of heading to a continent I've never visited before, the main highlight of the flight (Norngirl's manic smiling aside) has been a fly-by of the Virgin Atlantic Orlando flight. It flew by underneath us at a safe distance, both flights seemingly flying on the path of plaited hair criss crossing in the skies. It flew by close enough to see the plane properly, to be able to read the Virgin sign and to see the trail of its engines like air rising from a heater. Amazing to see as you see it on adverts but never in the sky and it was like being able to see a mirror of the vehicle you were in but from the outside, zipping through the sky like a bird, well, if birds could survive at minus whatever ridiculous temperature the outside air temperature is. In the middle of the Labrador sea at 38,000ft it was quite a sight to see another plane so close.

There has been one disappointment so far but this was entirely self made. I really want to see/visit Greenland and the path of the flight at its closest point that has already passed didn't take us close enough for me to glimpse it. Thankfully the view of Canada I do have out of my window is quite enough to satisfy my Geography nerdiness. The islands off the coast were leaving trails of white disturbance in the wake of their shorelines in relation to the prevailing currents as they flew by us. At this point in time I'm seeing more lakes, hills and forests than I've probably ever seen at once.

Though I'm heading to New York, I would love to also visit the part of Canada below me - nay, all of Canada! Maybe one day :)

Even from the skies it looks to be a beautiful, if not a scarily remote, part of the world. If I'm not seeing ice, sand or rivers, it's the browns, greys, greens and blues of the forests, hills and lakes. By the coast it looks like bacterial cultures in a petri dish peppering the landscape ending with a barrier of pristine looking coastline.

When we fly it amazes me how small Northern Ireland and the UK really is in comparison and overall how small the world really is too! Although I do go on a lot about what in reality is a tiny part of the planet's surface, these times really are a good reminder at how amazing the world is and how much there is out there. Something which puts it into even greater perspective the size of our little planet in the universe.

I've decided to take in some music for the rest of the journey and though we're on one of the older planes without the on demand media, there is a channel playing music I caught onto whilst browsing through them all. As I see the first signs of inhabited North America with strips of cleared land either side of lines dissecting the wilderness, I'm listening to the sounds of Seth Lakeman and what sounds to be folk rock. Quite apt for the tranquil looking scene from so high in sky.



The linear settlements have been closely followed by highways and small towns, I got a little lost in looking out into the distance there and apparently now close below us is Bangor, Maine (not to be confused by the Northern Irish or Welsh or any other Bangors). I have to say that from the air it really does look like something from a Stephen King book, he wasn't just making it up!

We've filled in our immigration form and are ready to see what NYC has instore for us. In all honesty, apart from movies, TV, books and blogs, I've not really any idea what to expect when we land. We plan to get a cab from the airport to our hotel and I can't wait to be somewhere new and to have every glance out of every window to be a new sight. I'm so very much looking forward to this trip for our anniversary that I just can't wait to see it all for myself."