To elaborate, the reason for my severe delay in finishing the rest of the Montreal blog postings can be attributed to the frantic headrush of the past 2 weeks that have seen me tackling the huge logistics of an extended Florida trip.

If you can recall, I have been asked to pick up a van for a company and drive it back some 1500 miles to Vermont. I have decided to go ahead with this because I would be paid for my time, have the travel costs covered, get an opportunity to do some real-life US State-wide driving and also visit a large number of friends, family or relatives.

In order to visit relatives in a timely manner, I requested if I could get a paid Amtrak rail pass to chuff along the East Coast and make stop overs to visit people possible. Luckily the company agreed.

The huge logistics problem came about when I realised that I would have the mammoth task of coordinating a rally of visits with about 25-30 odd people that I have addresses and invitations for all the way down to Florida. I would need to schedule a day or two for each person and work out which Amtrak station is closest and if I need a Greyhound from there or not. Then I would need to check which days were suitable with everyone and make sure that it all lined up with the minimum of ‘backtracking’ up the railways.

Whew.

I think I’ve pretty much accomplished a good array of dates all one after the other which succeed their way down the East Coast.

My plans are:

WAY DOWN (Amtrak Train & Greyhound Bus)

Vermont – A ride down with my host Chuck as he had to go to NYC anyway

New York – Visit a friend of my mothers living on Mulberry Street, China Town in Manhattan.

South Carolina – My distant cousin who lives in UK but has a work placement for a year in the US

Savannah – My old hall mate from the first year at University who went to the States to do a different course

Florida – Visit a large number of relatives who have settled up and down the length of Florida

PICK UP VAN, DRIVE BACK UP

Stop off at any of the above who will be free to have me again

plus

Washington D.C – My cousin who I visited 3 years ago also

New York – My grandparents in Long Island.

Vermont – Drop off van and work out how to get a lift back home!

Thus it commences!

“Entering NYC”, a gull watches the cars pass under its domain

What happens now?

“See the gull?”

Right, so far so good except already having been dropped off in New York City after helping Chuck load up some sculptures he was picking up from an art gallery I made my way to Mulberry street in search of ‘Osa’ who I managed to get some form of confirmation from of visiting albeit with a halting TTY relay. Got to her apartment but there was no response except for a faint ‘ruff’ that I only just heard. Pondering what to do next, I started fiddling with my new Dell Axim and GPS receiver (examples of the new gadgets I purchased over the past 2 weeks for the roadtrip) to see if I could get the Mapopolis software to recognise the NYC map data. Only just succeeded to do that when up the stairs came Osa holding a nicely wrapped present.

Turned out that she couldn’t offer a place for the night as she had turned her flat inside out as part of a renovation. Not to worry, I had planned for that and decided to call my Grandparents to see if I could get over the Long Island on the train and then back to NYC in the morning to sort out train stuff to Savannah.

Instead, Ova treated me to dinner at a Malaysian restaurant (pretty similar to Chinese and Thai) and we had a nice chat for a couple hours. She is Swedish, I guessed that from her accent and pale blondeness. She was surprisingly young because she was one of the friends and contacts that my mother passed on to me from her own American adventures some 25 years ago. Already in the short meeting I could sense quite a quiet and reserved personality in her and also one that wouldn’t open up to just anyone. It took some coaxing to make her smile but eventually she became quite jovial in my company. I suppose the whole thing must have been quite an abrupt shock to her for me to show up so quickly, a blast from my mothers past.

Ova works in NYC as a freelance film camera operator and I drilled her with various questions related to the industry and how she was enjoying her job. In the end the consensus from her was that she had fun moments in the job but mostly the long days were tiresome and ultimately it was the pay check that mattered.

I decided that it would be best to get to Penn Station in order to sort out travel plans for tomorrow and obtain a rail pass. So Ova saw me off with a taxi and in the process asked if I would fancy driving a rented van for her so she could move some things to a new house she has bought. I’m now the ‘Van Man’ it seems people! I accepted her offer mainly because it would mean I could come back and spend some more time with her and checking out NYC.

“Osa & Pontus”. Both equally adorably

Oh, see, and she has an awesome Labrador doggy called Pontus. A very bubbly chap with a wonderful personality. The playful kind. It made me want a doggy! Actually I’ve always wanted one but my mother never let me get one. Maybe later when I’m more settled from all this travelling I guess..

So, in the taxi on the way to the train station, it became clear I wasn’t going to get there in a timely manner for it is Oct 31st, Halloween! A big, big event for these Americans. In NYC there is a special parade along 6th Avenue where everyone comes out in a spectacle of costume and colourful attair. They frolic and many get quite drunk.

“Taxi rear end”. I saw a lot of this.

I wasn’t actually witnessing any of the parade first hand, merely my taxi driver was informing me thus as we crawled our way through the honking traffic a meter at a time. The parade really made a mess of Manhattan traffic for sure. I wasn’t too concerned about the delay so long as we got to the station before 9:50pm as that was when the Amtrak booking office closes. I was at least however seeing some of the costumes as people made their way between streets, failed abysmally to capture any of the good ones on camera. NYC moves way too quick for my unadjusted senses.

Or rather, everything was moving quickly apart from our taxi in traffic. Set out at 8:20, Got there at 9:30pm. Usually a 10 minute drive!

Anyways, rambled through Penn Station and found the ticket office.

Now at this point I was all ready to get my $215 International Visitors pass, good for 15 days of going anywhere on the Eastern Amtrak rail network. HOWEVER, handing them my UK passport and putting on my best British accent, it wasn’t to be. Apparently the crucial bit they needed in order to allocate a pass (it doesn’t say this on the flip pin website) is the ‘I19’, a green visa form that you fill out when flying in to the country on an international passport. I didn’t do this, I entered on my US one so that I made stay here and work of course. Therefore with no ‘visa’ as such, I wasn’t able to get an International pass…. Bah!

However, At this point I realised that my plans were changing somewhat, initially it was thought that I would make a stop off with the Amtrak on every stop listed above. However in my later research, many of the stops are only reachable by a bus from a vaguely close Amtrak station (read 40 miles away on average).

So Taking this into account, I only really need to get an Amtrak to Savannah, and another one from Savannah to Tampa (end of the Florida line). One way, these two trips will total… $211.

Heh.

I suppose it was a good thing that this trip doesn’t really involve that much Amtrakking or else I would have been forced to fork out a lot more money to get around.

Oh yes, I just note that I have been given a cheque for $715, this covers the rail tickets, gas money for driving the van up and also a bit for my time invested. So so far, this trip has been ‘free’. Pretty good going considering I just spent $1200 on gadgets (more to come on that).. Oooh and I just remembered I’ve settled on a car for a mere $1500! (deserving of another post).

“Example Gadget”. A Dell Axim x51v

Ug. Chaos, I guess the current state of mind for any of you readers trying to comprehend this ‘run-away train of thoughts’ of a blog post will begin to get a little idea as to how my own brain has been for the past few weeks.

It’s not pretty but generally it’s getting stuff done with a bit of room left over for confidence to filter in.

Where was I? Ah yes, well, no longer eligible for a 15 day rail pass, I decided to just stump up for one of two Amtrak tickets and get me down to Savannah. HOWEVER, to get the cheaper Amtrak tickets, I had to leave at one of the more impractical hours.

It is now 12:29am, I started rambling on this blog post at 11:15pm, I have 5hours 15mins more to go..

So yes, my Amtrak ticket (at the cheapest price) would entail leaving at 6:15am this coming morning. Bleh, well that’s going to Long Island out of the window, I’m not one for trying to navigate my way back through NY to Penn Station after 3-4 hours sleep, so I decided to just set up shop here at the station and wait till 6:15am rolls around and then sleep on the train all day.

Fun stuff girls and boys!

It is lucky that my Savannah hosts are quite flexible, I gave them a quick ring after working out one of those old-fangled payphone call boxes that had me piling in quarters (25cents) to make a long distance call. Did a pretty good job of making me want a cell (mobile) phone. However it did the trick as I got through to my friends and warned them that I would be in fact 2 days early.

12:37am, *rolls and cricks neck* Oh, have mercy!

I don’t want to stop writing and rambling on this blog because it seems to be keeping me awake just about, however I fear I’ve lost 98% of you already. Hmmm maybe I’ll grab the pictures out of my new Fujifilm F30 and decorate the blog text a bit, just a like a proper blogger should?

Oooh wait, I’ll even take a picture of me now in the waiting area and some of the other patrons doing a worse job than me of staying awake.

“Me, looking mooked as I stop rambling on this post for a moment”.

Wonder if any of them are waiting for the 6:15am train like me? Surely not, no-one could have planned an excursion as badly as me? OK I’m being a bit harsh there but the mistakes are actually what make an adventure I suppose.

“Snoozy Patrons”. My view arising from the laptop.

One moment, I shall grab the camera..

Oki, photties taken, now nabbing them from the 2GB xD card, handy having a card reader in the laptop, no cables required!

Shall take a wee while though, made some movies too but they are relatively uncompressed and thus large files to transfer.

As I wait, I’m trying to connect to the wi-fi hotspot that is tantalisingly giving me a good connection, alas it’s not loading any webpages for me though. Tis a ‘Cingular’ hotspot which is a mobile phone carrier isn’t it? That’ll mean it’s probably for their customers only. Booo! Come on Google, save us from the excessive capitalism and install your free-for-all Wi-Fi tech everywhere else will ya now.

Still transferring.. hohums..

Ooh, 3 fairies in pink and white have arrived and sat to my left, do I dare sneak a photo of them? Do I do I? It’s gonna be too obvious arg.. and I hate ‘posed’ shots, much more nicer to do the ‘in-the-moment’ thing. Oh wait, I can’t anyway yet, the xD card is still in the lappy…

Laaaaaaa, mmmm 1:02am, tick tock tick.

Yay, finished. Mmm now to capture the fairies. Hoho..

Switch to movie mode… flip the camera around in my hands quickly… get a still from there…. yes! It worked. My sneakiness knows no bounds.

Aar, wait I don’t have the software to extract the single frame from the movie on here yet.. Hmm, oh I’ll just take a picture of the movie maximised. Indeed.

I give you 3 Fairy Angels actually, less so now that they dismantled their wings 🙁

“3 (wingless) fairy angels.”

Oh, their train was announced. Off they shoot.

Now to spend a little while throwing some other photos in..

…

OK that’ll do.

1:55am..

Better call it quits there I think.. 😉 Check back to see how I fare on the 14 hour train ride to Savannah!