The Arrival

I’m here in Ashland Oregon and what a beautiful place it is.  Everything from the scenery to the people and daily life is nigh on perfect. 

So the journey here was thankfully uneventful, I first flew from Heathrow to San Francisco direct.  The flight path took us via Scotland, Iceland, Greenland, around the North of Hudson Bay, through five Canadian states entering the US via Washington State and then along the West coast to San Francisco. At a cruising altitude of 38,000 feet with an average ground speed of 570 mph, 6000 miles and 11 hours later we touched down.  Perhaps the most difficult aspect of the journey was the 23 hours of constant daylight due to different time zones.  I guess I may have looked quite dazed on arrival.  Whilst circling in the air waiting for a landing slot I could clearly see the Golden Gate Bridge, which made me smile, of course I’d seen it before…… but only in the movies!

From here followed a somewhat shorter flight of an hour 20 minutes to Medford Oregon.  Leaving the Boeing jet behind this leg was on a propeller plane, which only had 20 seats and vibrated all the way to Medford (I think I successfully managed to hide the fear in my eyes), it was a little bumpy coming down through valley to land but the female pilot did a grand job and at 9pm local time I HAD ARRIVED!  Darlene my landlady collected me from the airport and we made the short drive to Ashland.  Darlene is already a firm friend and there is definitely A LOT of fun ahead this summer J