Skip to content
Retired and Restless.scot

Retired and Restless.scot

Exploring Scotland, Europe and the World

  • Home
  • Big Trips
    • Browse All Big Trip Intros
    • 2020
      • Japan in Winter
    • 2021
      • England Grand Tour
      • California, Here We Come!
  • About This Site
  • 2004-2019 Archive
  • Search Guide

Category: Big Trip

California, Here We Come! (2021): Diary Epilogue

20 April 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry

At this point, the sightseeing was over and all that remained was to get home. One of the reasons for choosing Paris as the end point of our intercontinental tickets

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Days 16-18: And now, a long weekend in Paris!

20 April 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, Europe, France

Final Accommodation On Friday morning we relocated to central Paris for a three-night stay at the perfectly decent Holiday Inn Paris Montmartre. With just 54 rooms, it is one of

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Days 14&15: Miami Interlude and Return to Europe

10 April 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, Europe, Featured Flight, France, North & Central America, USA

A few hours in downtown Miami I woke up after what felt like a short night, due to the combined effect of the 3hr time change the previous evening and

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 13: Transcon in (Some) Style

4 April 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

St Andrew’s Day brought the first steps in our homeward journey, initially with a short hop back down the west coast to LA, then with a transcontinental flight to Miami,

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 12: Gallery day

22 March 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

After breakfast this morning, there was some business to attend to: before embarking on our eastbound return journey to Europe the following day, it was essential to do more laundry.

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 11: Sausalito, the Castro and North Beach revisited

16 March 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

Trip to Sausalito Today’s breakfast was at a nearby Blue Bottle Café, and this was followed by our usual shower routine before the day got underway in earnest. One notable

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 10: San Francisco on Foot

6 March 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

Today began at a leisurely pace: we had a very light Starbucks breakfast and returned to base for showers. The first real event was our 1130 reservation for dim sum

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 9: Arrival in San Francisco

2 March 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

Emeryville – San Francisco Today’s objective was delightfully simple: to relocate across the bay to San Francisco and get settled in for the longest and most luxurious hotel stay of

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 8: An Amtrak Thanksgiving

1 March 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

Los Angeles – Emeryville It was Thanksgiving Day – and our big Amtrak day! It began with a little bit of early-morning stress, but we eventually succeeded in finding a

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 7: From San Diego to Los Angeles

26 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

Morning walk in San Diego Once again, it was the same early-morning start for Bruce. After breakfast and showers, we took a morning walk in glorious sunshine, through downtown and

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 6: Walking in San Diego

23 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

Gaslamp Quarter to Balboa Park Bruce again had his early-starting half-day at work. As previously, he popped out at 9am to pick up some breakfast for both of us, this

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 5: Day Trip to Carlsbad

18 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, North & Central America, USA

Downtown San Diego Bruce was working Boston-time half-days until Thanksgiving, which meant 0530-0900 Pacific – clearly an alarm was essential! At the end of his stint we had a Starbucks

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Days 3&4: Our Outbound Flying-Fest

16 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, Featured Flight, North & Central America, USA

London-Helsinki on Finnair Once again, we followed the recently established pattern of no pre-departure breakfast, due to our proximity to the airport. Catching the Piccadilly Line to the airport, we

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 2: And now, erm … back to the UK!

16 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, England, Europe, UK

Schiphol-Heathrow Today started by following a similar approach to that used on Thursday: we left the hotel without eating, intending to have some form of breakfast in the lounge. In

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Day 1: Quick Visit to Amsterdam

16 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, Europe, Netherlands

Heathrow-Schiphol The trip was now underway in earnest, and you join me as Bruce & I enter the so-called ‘First’ lounge at Heathrow Terminal 5, which in reality is for

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Diary Prologue

16 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry

As the first travelling day of this trip was purely a positioning exercise to London Heathrow, with no sightseeing component at all, I thought of it as ‘Day Zero’ rather

Continue reading

California, Here We Come! (2021): Introduction

16 February 2022 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Intro, England, Europe, France, Netherlands, North & Central America, UK, USA

Yes, California here we come … but forgive us if we take the scenic route. (See above categories, and there are a further two countries that we merely transited!) 2021

Continue reading

England Grand Tour (2021): Day 20: Going Home

31 July 2021 RandR.scot Big Trip, Big Trip Diary Entry, England, Europe, Scotland, UK

With today being the final day of the trip for me, we decided to go out for a slightly more substantial breakfast than usual. The venue was Boston Tea Party

Continue reading

Posts navigation

1 2 3 Next Posts»
Text and photos copyright © 2020-22. All rights reserved.