“”Because my inside is outside
My right side’s on the left side
‘Cos I’m writing to reach you
But I might never reach you
I long to teach you about you
But that’s not you”
~ Writing to reach you”, Travis

I’m really hoping to get some stuff written while I’m away or at least a supply of photographs to be able to look back over. There’s already experiences and lessons brewing from the whole trip, so I’m sure to walk away with quite some memories.

At the moment the Google Map is a bit sparse, but considering the four-day weekend in the middle is mainly taken up with the FanimeCon convention, that is probably a good thing.

“Mr. Play It Safe was afraid to fly
He packed his suitcase and kissed his kids goodbye
He waited his whole damn life to take that flight
And as the plane crashed down he thought
“Well isn’t this nice…”"
~Ironic, Alanis Morissette

“I’m not going to change my passport. It’s British, you don’t mess with
that. Blue passport. Gold writing. Stiff. With a crest on it. You don’t show it to
officials, you slap them aside with it. *Bouff* Out of my way, Johnny Foreigner.
You don’t need to look it it, it’s British that’s all you need to know. Mm, British,
best in the world. Yes. Reason for visiting: Imperialism, ok?”
~ Jack Dee

Travelling always brings with it paperwork and people stating loudly “Show us your papers!” in thick accents while clicking machine guns in your general direction. Paperwork is the global standard for putting people off travelling or filling up empty cells in local prisons.

The most vital paperwork is, of course, the passport. The little booklet that acts like an autograph book for countries rather than Z-list celebrities you meet walking out of a toilet in some restaurant you picked because the very fancy one was booked up. By looking at your passport and previous countries visited, local law enforcement agencies can easily help identify who they are going to accuse you of spying for.

I had to actually re-apply for my passport last year, as it was due to expire, and was sorely disappointed because everytime I travelled to continental Europe I’d had no stamps and just been waved through, and all my other trips before had been on group-based passports. But now I was starting on a clean slate.

It was like having a new identity. I got a crisp, hard and fresh passport through, and a new photo in the back. The photo itself impressed me no end, because the last photo I had taken was while I was in college about a decade ago. The photo was of me with an addition of over ten stone, or 140lbs, and no neck. The new photo, by contrast, was more defined, even if slightly sinister.

Because I am going to be travelling in to the US, and indeed this is now applicable if you are only stopping off at a US airport waiting for a connecting flight, I had to complete the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) application, the new version of the green card.

The main difference as I see it is that the ESTA must be completed before departing – you may not be allowed to board without it being completed – as opposed to green cards being handed out while in transit, alongside complimentary peanuts and miniature pillow to smother the snoring git beside you.

Fortunately, since the system started in January this year, most travel firms are quite prepared and ready to let you know that it is a requirement for travel and are able to give you details of how to get your ESTA completed. A quick jump to the application website is all that is really required.

The ESTA application is simple and straightforward, built in a website that really harkens back to the early days of HTML and is only really not truly retro because there is an absence of animated gif files. There really is no expense spared on the site, because there seems to have been no expense at all.

A series of personal questions and details of your travel and accomodation are asked for, even if you are travelling on from an airport to continue on a multi-stop journey. All the usual questions are asked – name and nationality, birth date, passport number – as well as city you are boarding, airline and flight number, address while in country.

Then it gets on to the trickier, more difficult questions. These questions are the highly sophisticated method that the US law enforcement agencies use to make sure nobody naughty enters the country. They are subtle and it’s very easy to slip up, and quite often they’ll group things together so you may well end up being guilty of something because of how they combine. Even harder, it transpires, because you are only allowed to answer with Yes or No. There is no fine line or grey area, no area to justify or rationalise.

No kidding though, it actually says at the top:

Do any of the following apply to you? (Answer Yes or No)
Please select if you need additional help on any of these questions.

I’m not sure exactly how you could have a problem with them, well actually maybe I can. But I’m sure if you had a problem trying to give the correct answer, it’s most likely going to mean that you’ve been on the naughty side.

A) Do you have a communicable disease; physical or mental disorder; or are you a drug abuser or addict?

The first and already we’re dealing with a merger. The mental disorder does make me wonder, are they looking to ban all disorders? Will a person with a nervous tic be denied entry next to the guy who turns up carrying a butcher knife and wearing a pelt of faces? How likely is it that a psychopath will click yes?

Also, I’m not addicted to drugs, and I’m not a drug abuser. However, having said that, when I was little I used to have to ground up my aspirin, sometimes beating on it with a spoon. I swear though, I only did it out of love and because sometimes it needed to know what limits our relationship had.

B) Have you ever been arrested or convicted for an offense or crime involving moral turpitude or a violation related to a controlled substance; or have been arrested or convicted for two or more offenses for which the aggregate sentence to confinement was five years or more; or have been a controlled substance trafficker; or are you seeking entry to engage in criminal or immoral activities?

Isn’t it nice to see turpitude used in the modern day, though I think in some cases it might need a little hover-over window to explain it.

It’s the last of the question that interests me, are you seeking entry to engage in…immoral activities? This causes me a problem, I’m not travelling with the intention of immoral activities, but you know, what happens if a guy just gets lucky? There’s a good club scene, a few drinking places, maybe some beautiful ladies who like deformed men with english accents sometimes morality gets forgotten momentarily. So, I guess the answer is No, unless I get very, very lucky.

C) Have you ever been or are you now involved in espionage or sabotage; or in terrorist activities; or genocide; or between 1933 and 1945 were you involved , in any way, in persecutions associated with Nazi Germany or its allies?

Well, I’ve watched all the Bond and Bourne movies, played Metal Gear Solid and used to side with Cobra when playing GI Joe (they had the better figures), but as far as espionage, sabotage and terrorism go that’s about my level of activity.

As far as I know none of my past incarnations were in the Nazi party, however, I could be mistaken and deep seated genetic memories may someday be untapped through hypnotic therapy. In fact it might have some explanation for my fondness for mad science, taking over Liechtenstein, political power and having unstylish facial hair.

D) Are you seeking to work in the U.S.; or have you ever been excluded and deported; or been previously removed from the United States or procured or attempted to procure a visa or entry into the U.S. by fraud or misrepresentation?

I have no real desire to work in my own country, why anyone would think I’d want to work elsewhere is beyond me. Except Liechtenstein. As I conquer it.

E) Have you ever detained, retained or withheld custody of a child from a U.S. citizen granted custody of the child?

From a US citizen? Nope, never.

F) Have you ever been denied a U.S. visa or entry into the U.S. or had a U.S. visa canceled?

No, but I once had an American Express application denied.

G) Have you ever asserted immunity from prosecution?

I tried to use it to get out of a detention while on a school trip to Germany, but it turns out that just because you are travelling doesn’t mean you have diplomatic immunity. Oh, and apparently teachers are immune to it anyway. As it happens, they mean asserting it correctly while possessing immunity. So, the answer is no.

The response to my application was instantaneous, granting me the rights to enter and wander about the US, though warning me that I could still be turned away at the airport by local customs and immigration officers. Still, it’s a result.

Back already? Geez, I hadn’t really finished yet. I guess we’ll see how far we get and then I’ll wing it.

As established in the vlog, I have been given a very generous amount of luggage allowance, which is the advantage of getting on a scheduled flight and booking things on your own. I mentioned in the video about the response I recieved from my airline, and I feel it prudent to point out that for the most part of my journey I’ll be travelling with Air France until I reach the destination country where I’ll switch to one of the more domestic airlines. I’m travelling the standard economy class, so it isn’t actually anything special that gives me the space.

Thank you for contacting Air France.

You will be able to take up to TWO bags in the hold, weighing a maximum of 23kg per bag. The three dimensions of each bag (height + length + width) must not exceed 158 cm (62 inches). If an item weighs more than 23kg (and less than 32kg) a €50 one-off fee is applied. If you wish to check additional baggage a fee of €150 per additional item carried will be charged.

You may also take one piece of hand baggage plus a small accessory such as a handbag. The three dimensions of your main hand baggage item must not exceed 115cm (height + length + width) and the weight of your hand baggage must not exceed 5kg.

We look forward to welcoming you on board.

Yours sincerely,

Air France Web Support Team

Now, the filling of the luggage and issues around the carry-on luggage will have to be addressed later, because it is there that things get complicated.

I’ve had to consider all the wonderful things like warm weather clothes, cosplay (yes, you read that right), special wear, entertainment, communication, toiletries and gifts. We’ll no doubt get on to that all shortly.

The simplest, most mundane aspects of holiday planning becomes a deep delve in to logistics when I’m involved.

Considering I knew that I was picking a locally busy time for the hotels for my upcoming vacation in May, it was obvious that the hotel booking had to come first, and considering most hotels allow you to reserve the rooms online and change bookings easily without incurring any charges – and most don’t require deposits in advance, just verified credit card – then it made sense to book in advance and then rearrange bookings when flights were confirmed.

The first hurdle to overcome is the issue of hotel location. I’m staying in a fairly sizeable city – in fact, by British standards it’s probably ‘huge’, and by standards of a Brit who lives in southwest England it’s ‘freaking gigantic’ – so I had the choice of city centre (or ‘downtown’) or on the outskirts.

The outskirts meant that I would have actually been closer to most of the homes of people in the area, but would need to travel a fair bit to see sights and to do the wandering aimlessly in a foreign land, and given that I don’t drive and would therefore be relying on public transport or the kindness of locals, this would have added difficulty. Of course, if people now decide to do everything on the outskirts, I’m fairly screwed.

The price difference wasn’t too much per night, somewhere between $5-20, but it was recommended to me to stay downtown to be near everything and it also meant the hotel would be a handy hub for doing things if needed.

Because I was aiming for a two-week stay, this made hotel booking slightly more complicated. When you are going for a shorter period, you can often get lucky and just miss an influx of people coming and going around your stay, the longer you plan to stay for then the more likely snags will come up. I anticipated that several hotels would be booked over the weekend joining my trip, there is a convention in town and that is in part a reason for my visit – not the whole reason, but it was a good way to justify the trip that little bit more.

My expectation came to fruition, as several of the hotels reported back that they’d be unable to supply a room for one or two of the nights. I was fortunate though, in that I did manage to get a downtown hotel. The Hilton. The Hilton does carry a slightly hefty price tag to it, though one I had been expecting to pay anyway, and with breakfast and wifi connection in my room then for the whole period it works out at – and before you ask, yes it is totally worth it – about $2300 (£1645).

Now, that isn’t too bad considering it’s a king-sized bedroom, with wifi and breakfast, neighbouring the convention center, close to the airport for travelling, close to every other standard meeting point, and for eleven nights. The last time I stayed in Exeter it was about £110 a night and they didn’t have any internet connection – or a gym, swimming pool, working television in the room, fridge – although it did have a good breakfast. I’m kind of hoping they have a game room, though I think I should be concentrating more on things like laundry service.

I do have to add that the Hilton telephone staff are, at least half the time, wonderfully sweet and endearing people. The four times I called, internationally to the US, twice I spoke to very friendly staff, one of whom was so amazingly sweet that it pretty much sold the hotel to me on conversation alone (even though it was surprising to her that we don’t have Thanksgiving in England). The staff at the actual Hilton I’ll be staying at have been very friendly in emails and phone calls too.

Oh, and apparently by staying eleven nights I’ll earn enough points for a free night next time I stay in a Hilton.

“I want my love, my joy, my laugh, my smile, my needs
Not in the star signs or the palm that she reads
I want my sun-drenched, wind-swept Ingrid Bergman kiss
Not in the next life, I want it in this
I want it in this”
~ Good As Gold (Stupid As Mud), The Beautiful South

For the upcoming ‘grand adventure of 2009′ as I haven’t actually dubbed it, and probably shall never refer to it as again. I had to work out my own arrangements for flights and hotels, rather than taking the prescriptive package route. This was a rather eye-opening experience to the world of vacationing that both appealed and troubled me simultaneously.

The thing about me is that I try to be organised, punctual and conservative with my time. If I have to meet someone I tend to be ten to fifteen minutes early, even if I try to be on time or even a little relaxed and delayed, most of the time I’m in the vicinity of the meeting place a half to full hour before. Whenever I make travel arrangements, I’ll be the guy who factors in changeover delays, toilet breaks at stopovers and leeway for arrival. This might seem like it borders on anal retentiveness, but in truth it’s less about a need to do it and more a fear of things that could go wrong and need dealing with – what if something breaks down, what if I miss a changeover – and also a part is that should anyone be waiting for me, I don’t want them to feel like they are wasting time.

So when working out flights on my own, I poured for hours over the timetables to mix and match flights there and back again. I wanted as few stopovers as I could, but with enough time at each stopover to get from terminal and gate to new terminal and gate. That’s the other thing with me in charge of travel, I will check boards and displays to make sure I’m at the right gate or platform, sometimes multiple times and even after checking with staff.

Price comparison websites and booking websites do tend to be a little deceptive though, because once you’ve guaranteed your ticket at the set price, they are free to screw around with your itinerary and all you can do is accept the change and hope that it’ll be ok when it comes to flying.

Its a careful balancing act when working out when to book flights and hotels if you want good value, if you get them too soon you could end up paying more, if you get them too late then you might not get them at all. The flight was actually the thing I booked the last, it would seem stupid to book a flight and have nowhere to stay and unable to cancel, whereas hotels are fairly flexible.

For the flight, my main goal was to save money and effort, and in doing so expected to have to take up increased time for the trip itself. I knew that if I flew from one of the main airports, such as Heathrow or Gatwick, that I’d have to put in extra travel to get to the airport and probably get a hotel and stay the night before and/or the night after travelling back. This would then take up a lot more money in rail fare and hotel fare, and cost me a day travelling. Instead I chose to use my local airport and fly in hops.

There’s only a few short hops, to be fair. I make a stop off in continental Europe to get to my long haul flight and then a stop off after the long haul to get a short haul to final destination. I currently don’t have too many delays at any of the stops, though my provider has updated my itinerary several times since booking for the return flight and for whether I’m entitled to be fed or not. I’m a little antsy about flying, not helped by the fact I’m flying with Air France and I dread looking for sympathy after some of the things I’ve said of those wonderful citizens of a fine country.

The flight itself cost £446 ($630) which is mostly tax, booked through the Opodo website. It uses eTickets to save time and to not need paper tickets, instead of paper tickets I’m advised to print out the confirmation of booking, the itinerary, emergency contacts and a few extra documents. To save paper.

So, my flight out leaves my local airport – Bristol – at 6:45 in the morning and after fourteen hours in flight with three and a half hours of stop overs, I arrive at a local time of 16:20-ish. My return flight, originally scheduled for about 9:30 in the morning, to allow me to get up and maybe say some goodbyes, has kindly been forced forward to 6:30 in the morning, though I still get home at the same time as my original booking of 10:30am local time – because they increased one of my stop overs by three hours.