Holiday 2016 Day 1
3July 12, 2016 by Mel
Well, we’re here. I thought it a good idea to do an update each day where we can.
We started out at 6am when the taxi picked us up. Surprisingly the traffic was OK so we made good time and got to Heathrow T5 at 7.45. We got the bags checked it and went for breakfast.
The flight left at 11.20. It was quite a surprise to Jamie who hadn’t been in a plane before. Talk about baptism by fire, first ever flight being 8 hours long. Food on the flight was good as was the selection of films we could watch.
Lee had a window seat and so had chance to see some of the iconic scenery. He took a photo of the Potomac River from the plane as we were coming in to land.
We landed at 1.50pm Washington time and was met by our taxi drive, Quentin. Quentin took us to our waiting taxi, well when I say taxi, I mean a great big SUV.
Seriously, how awesome is that. The drive to the hotel was quite entertaining. Quentin was really easy to get on with and a great conversationalist.
After checking in we took a walk to the local eating establishments and had a really fab meal at Smokey Bones Grill.
Back at the hotel now as we are now at 9pm local time (2am UK time) and we are absolutely hanging. Tomorrows plan is to start on the battlefield tours.
See you tomorrow
It was a long day, but an exciting day at that. I was really impressed with the plane (Airbus380, women say size isn’t important 😂). Being Jamie’s first ever flight he had experienced a take off and landing (that’s the best bit for me, although I don’t like my ears popping).
Coming through border control was something different. They take finger prints of both hands and take a mug shot. The queue for this was quite long as you can imagine how many people were on the plane.
As Mel has already said the taxi driver was great and the car was something else. Once we got in the car the first question he asked us was “how do we feel about the Brexit vote?”
I asked him why he asked the question and he said that the US were following the campaign closely. We talked about why we made our decision and he could see our point of view. We talked about many things and what I found is our countries are very similar.
There are 3 hotels around the exhibition centre and all are across the road to the event centre. What I did notice coming into land and the drive down to Virginia was America is a big place that has a high population count. But, there seems to be a lot of space for people and you don’t feel crowded.
Looking at the temperatures for the week it’s in the late 88f to 96f and with a high humidity, man I think I’m going to melt.
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Awsome photos gang. Looks like you have had a great start to the holiday. How did Jamie like flying? Interesting they are so interested in Brexit. Maybe it shows what an influence or amusement we are to them or do they see us as genuine allies. Look forward to the next update.
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Oups not anon lol it is Ian (Spicegang) lol
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