Archive for the ‘ Toronto and East Coast USA 2008 ’ Category

Day 85 (19.ix.08)

Well my friends, here we are – tomorrow I get to catch a mid-afternoon flight from Pearson International airport that arrives back in England at some point in the late hours of Saturday according to EST, but in the early hours of Sunday by GMT. Assuming the in-flight entertainment, for whose quality I have little [ READ MORE ]

Day 84 (18.ix.08)

Well now that’s a pleasant surprise – my hostel room in Toronto is absolutely amazing! It’s technically a two-person suite (i.e. there are two beds) but I’ve only been charged the ‘single’ rate (a healthy $60 a night), which for two nights is pretty damn good – the whole place is exceptionally clean and quiet, [ READ MORE ]

Day 83 (17.ix.08)

Hmm, compared to yesterday, my day was the epitome of mundane and boring. I decided to rest my feet a bit, both of which are now complaining painfully about the 10km-average I’ve been walking every day since I got to the USA – to be precise, this meant that I stayed at my laptop till [ READ MORE ]

Day 82 (16.ix.08)

OK, so today was easily the most surreal of the holiday so far – since there’s not much of the holiday left, the rest of the week will have to be pretty damn surreal to come up to today’s standard… I used today for my planned trip to New Haven and Yale, partially for tourism, [ READ MORE ]

Day 81 (15.ix.08)

Ow, my feet hurt. Been walking (on a blister, to make things worse) since 11:00, when I finally tore myself away from the internet connection I’d located by chance this morning. First, I walked (yes, walked) the 54 blocks down to Penn Station to check out train times (because buses were apparently inefficaciously available) from [ READ MORE ]

Day 80 (14.ix.08)

I think it’s just impossible to find a good, or even decent, hostel in New York. The only advantage my current one, situated in the generic Upper West Side area, has over the Twelve Towns Pit of Satan I tried to stay in the first time I was here, is the area itself. The room [ READ MORE ]

Day 79 (13.ix.08)

Last day in Boston, and my cold has all but disappeared. Today was a combination of last walks round various areas I’d visited numerous times over the last fortnight, and lengthy chats with my room-mates. In the latter category belong the continuation of yesterday evening’s Mock the Week-based banter with the American rhetorician (name of [ READ MORE ]

Day 78 (12.ix.08)

Excellent news, comrades – the cold is retreating. Virus activity is down 37%, and the loyal strongholds of Sinus and Trachea have been relieved by the forces of Marshal Vitamin C and Commissar Aspirin… Right, I think I’ll turn off TUC mode now. But yes, I am feeling better, partially through the sheer volume of [ READ MORE ]

Day 77 (11.ix.08)

Seven years since terror struck the heart of Manhattan (11.ix.01). Lest we forget. Well well well (I love saying that). Today had the potential to be one of the worst of my whole holiday, but has in fact become one of the better ones instead. First of all, I awoke (too late for breakfast, again) [ READ MORE ]

Day 76 (10.ix.08)

The comedy last night wasn’t as good as it had been the week before, partially because several of the acts were the same, and all but one of those did identical routines to last time, and also because the ‘new’ acts weren’t all that funny. Even the host Jim Lauletta admitted it wasn’t exactly his [ READ MORE ]

Day 75 (9.ix.08)

It’s raining outside, so I’m back in the hostel a good deal earlier than I’d have liked. It was fine this morning, though, so I was able to complete my initial plan to take a look round the Back Bay Fens – the weather was, in fact, perfect, with a mild breeze keeping the soaring [ READ MORE ]

Day 74 (8.ix.08)

I did make it to breakfast this morning, which meant that by the time I’d finished my lunch – for which I went to a very good Mexican place called Qdoba, near the far end of Massachusetts Avenue – I was feeling absolutely stuffed. So stuffed, in fact, that I felt sure my centre of [ READ MORE ]

Day 73 (7.ix.08)

I actually ended up uploading a lot of photos to Facebook yesterday evening, namely the ones from this year’s Eton Fourth of June, the ball at St Johns College, Oxford, at the end of 9th week, and my trip to Princeton about two-and-a-bit weeks ago, and it was dealing with the backlog of comments on [ READ MORE ]

Day 72 (6.ix.08)

After yesterday’s scientific bombardment, I needed a little bit of greenery today to air my brain somewhat. So, after messaging Izzy B-J and chatting to Constanze D, I wandered down to where Massachusetts Avenue met the shoreline of the Charles River and wound my way down the ramp to the Esplanade. It had rained overnight, [ READ MORE ]

Day 71 (5.ix.08)

The days are just racing by now. After a series of chats with Francesca K and Constanze D in the wake of a rather quiet breakfast, I set off for the Museum of Science (oddly located on a man-made island in the middle of the river) at 11:00. This involved a very simple (if at [ READ MORE ]

Day 70 (4.ix.08)

I discovered Boston’s equivalent of Oxford Street in London today – it’s called Boylston Street, and has a rather impressive range of shops on it. I can see myself spending quite a bit of time on there window-shopping and browsing generally, and I began today by inspecting the local branch of Borders’. Surprisingly different from [ READ MORE ]

Day 69 (3.ix.08)

Shock announcement: I’m in a good mood!! And there are only three explanations why: the first is that I have (through my trusty brother-in-arms Dhan S) got a ticket to watch England at Wembley on 11.x. Yes, I know that’s the end of Freshers’ Week at Oxford, yes I know that I should be getting [ READ MORE ]

Day 68 (2.ix.08)

Nothing really surprises me here any more. Thanks to my deeply disenchanting experiences yesterday, I lowered my expectations appropriately to the lowest possible point, so that everything that goes well from now on will be a pleasant surprise. It’s just as well I did so, because today was frankly surreal and a little bit depressing. [ READ MORE ]

Day 67 (1.ix.08)

Boston. What a way to mark (just about) two months since I boarded the plane to Toronto all but clueless as to what awaited me on the other side. The city where the War of Independence kicked off with Paul Revere and the tea-party, guaranteeing it iconic status in the eyes of all later generations [ READ MORE ]

Day 66 (31.viii.08)

I’ve pretty much just arrived at my hostel in Boston (it’s 17:45) after sitting in an Amtrak train for most of the day – the place I’m in is much more like a proper youth hostel, with crummy walls, cheap carpets and curtains, and those things on the bunks that you use to stop babies [ READ MORE ]

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