Marin County by Bike

The plan for the day was to walk from the hotel, via Chinatown and North Beach, to the Coit Tower, to get a view over the city.  Unfortunately the nighttime fog had not cleared by 10:00 so we decided to skip the tower and proceed to the next part of the plan, which was to hire bikes and cycle to the Golden Gate Bridge and beyond.  Cycling turns out to be an excellent way of seeing a lot of SanFrancisco in a relatively limited amount of time.  It did not take too long to get to the bridge, with its numerous photo opportunities.  I had to contend with a puncture before we could continue on our way.

It is an easy ride across the bridge into Marin County and then down into the quaint bay-side village of Sausalito, where we had lunch in a very pleasant seafood restaurant.   After lunch, we continued around the bay, mostly on cycle tracks, taking in the scenery and enjoying the perfect weather. 

Arrived at Tiburon with plenty of time to catch the 5:00 PM ferry back to San Francisco. A great day out.  Highly recommended.

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San Francisco

The flight to San Francisco with Virgin went OK, although I was feeling pretty rough all day after picking up the bug that Jessica had been suffering from over Christmas.  Arrived to beautiful sunny weather.  I was quite pleased that I successfully managed to navigate the hire car to our hotel without the use of a map

We spent what remained of the afternoon doing the standard tourist cable car ride from Market St to Fisherman's Wharf, and then wandering around the various piers and shops there.  It was noticeable that many of the up-market shops that had been around on previous trips were no longer there, and several others had closing down notices.  So the recession is really biting here it would seem.  Had an early night as still not feeling too great.

Topsham Christmas

Nick did a great job of hosting the family Christmas get-together in his cottage in Topsham.   The large new kitchen/dining room was perfect for accommodating the 12 of us, and he succeeded in serving up not only a perfect Christmas lunch, but also kept us all well fed for the days either side of Christmas Day.  

Dublin

I spent an enjoyable 24 hours in Dublin, courtesy of i-conX who were hosting their Christmas Party in the city.  No work to do so I spent an afternoon looking round the city centre and revisiting many of the places I had last seen over 10 years ago.  Compared to London, Dublin seems to be almost unaffected by the recession, with lots of activity in the shopping streets.  I was also impressed by how clean the place is compared to London.

The Christmas party was held in the Ocean bar, which is in the new Grand Canal Square development.  Very impressive ornamental lighting.  It proved surprisingly difficult to find any bars open late, in spite of Dublin's' reputation as a place to get a drink.  As a result, no hangover the next day, and an uneventful flight back to London.

Muang Boran

Muang Boran - meaning Ancient City - is in reality a sort of historical theme park an hour's drive outside Bangkok.  It contains reproductions of many actual buildings, or styles of building, that are to be found elsewhere in Thailand.  Even though the set-up is somewhat fake, it still makes for an interesting day out. Renting a cycle enables you to get around the park, which covers quite a sizable area, relatively easily.

Tomorrow, flying home at last.

Ayuthaya

To fill in the days before flying home I decided to visit some of the more interesting sights within easy driving distance of Bangkok.  Ayuthaya used to be the capital of Thailand when the country was part of the Khmer empire, until it was sacked by invaders form Burma.  This explains the similarity between the temples here and those in Angkor Wat in Cambodia.  In fact if its temples you're after, then there are actually more to be found in Ayuthaya than in the immediate vicinity of Siem Reap.

Bangkok is like a ghost city now.  Tourists stranded here after the airport closure are gradually being flown home (I seem to be at the back of the queue), and with no new arrivals over the past two weeks and many people put off by the ongoing political instability, the tourist industry is looking pretty sick.  The end result is that a walk up Sukhumvit which used to take 15 minutes because of  the tourist throngs can now be done in less than 5. Bad news for street traders and bars.

Back to Bangkok

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With my return flight from Phnom Penh to Bangkok cancelled, as well as my flight home from Bangkok, I had to find some other way of getting out of Cambodia.  Because of the many cancellations, all the flights to Singapore and Malaysia were full for the next 2-3 days.  I was not very keen to stay in Cambodia, so the only alternative was to travel back overland by bus.  This was not a particularly appealing prospect as the journey time is >12 hours.  

In the end, it proved not to be too bad.  Of course the bus company, like the boat company, showed pictures of luxury coaches on their promo literature, but the reality turned out to be a rather battered standard affair (at least with air con). Plugging in the noise cancelling headphones and listening to relaxing music, interspersed with sleeping and gazing at the scenery out of the window, made the time pass reasonably quickly. And at least the road from Phnom Penh to Piopet was surfaced, even if not up to western standards.

Crossing the boarder back in to Thailand made me realise just how much more far advanced this country is than its neighbours, in terms infrastructure, cleanliness, etc.  I guess civil wars tend to set a country back somewhat, and American carpet bombing probably does not help much either.

I arrived back in Bangkok on 5th December, the Thai king's birthday.  The big news in town was that he was too ill to appear in public, so another crisis is looming.

Phnom Penh

With most of the family having been here before me, it is going to be difficult to come up with anything particularly new to say about Phnom Penh.  Over the past couple of days I have done all the usual stuff, including the Royal Palace, National Museum, S-21 museum, and the Killing Fields Memorial. This has been interspersed with lengthy periods spent on the Internet trying to sort out my ever changing travel arrangements, which has soaked up much of my time here.   The only consolation is that this can be done whilst in a bar, so rather than just drinking, I can drink and surf.

Having completed the usual tourist’s tour, I have to say that Cambodia, and Phnom Penh in particular, is one of the few places I have been to that I would not particularly want to revisit.  The city is a total shambles.  The traffic here makes Delhi driving look positively organized in comparison. I believe that Cambodia inherited driving on the right from its French colonial masters.  However, no one seems to have told the locals about this system, so they drive on both sides of the road.  At the many traffic-light-free crossroads the flow of vehicles would make the average motorcycle stunt show look tame.   Nevertheless, it all seems to work somehow. Actually (and Jessica may know more about this), I recall reading somewhere that the latest urban traffic flow theorists are actually proposing doing away with traffic lights as this paradoxically results in greater traffic throughput and lower accident rates.  So the Cambodians can claim to have got there first!

One of the few positive things I can think to say about this country is that the people are some of the most friendly that I have come across anywhere.  OK, there are a lot of beggars, and many of the casual workers are trying to extract the maximum number of dollars out of you, but I guess you can not blame them for that. But in general, they seem to genuinely be happy to see you, and their standard of spoken English I found to be surprisingly good.

My travel situation is changing by the hour.  In spite of Bangkok Airport supposedly having reopened for service on 4^th, my flight from Phnom Penh to Bangkok has been cancelled.  But no problem, because the BA flight from Bangkok to London has also been cancelled!  A nice lady from BA tells me that the earliest flight they can put me on departs on 10^th December.  I tried to get a flight from Phnom Penh to Singapore, from where I could pick up an earlier BA flight home, but these are all fully booked for several days.   Having escaped from Thailand, I now find myself about to get on a bus for a 13 hour journey back to Bangkok.  I can’t face any more nights there, so I will be looking at flying on to Singapore somehow.

Killing Fields

Royal Palace

Wat Phnom

Sap River to Phnom Penh

My original plan had been to travel from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh by bus, but my driver pointed out that there was also a direct boat service on the Sap river.  I opted for this as it sounded more interesting and, at 5 hours, was no slower than the bus option.  When we arrived at the boat terminal, I did wonder whether this was a good decision. The boat looked like a Central Line carriage, both inside and out, and was really cramped.  The engine noise was deafening once it got started, but it did at least travel at quite a lick.    

The first part of the journey was across the Sap lake, which is so large that you can not see either shore from the boat.  It becomes more interesting once the boat enters the Sap river itself, with views of fishing villages perched over the water, and fishermen tending their nets.   The whole trip became much more pleasant when I ventured out on to the boat roof where many of the other travellers were perched.  Great views and a nice cool breeze improved things considerably.

After arriving at Phnom Penh and checking into my hotel, I did some wandering around before the usual bar/restaurant/bar end to the evening.

More Sap River photos

Ankor What?

Managed to get up in time for my 5:00 pick-up at the hotel, to take me to Ankor Wat in time to view the sunrise – and hopefully miss the crowds.  The spectacle was certainly worth getting up early for.  I was able to do pretty much all of the central group of temples before flaking out at 1:00 pm.  Certainly one of the great sites of the world that should be on anyone’s must-see list.

Afternoon spent relaxing by the hotel pool before another evening exploring Siem Rap and sampling more great Khmer food – the amok coconut curry is now one of my favourite dishes.  Booked ticket for boat trip to Phnom Penh.  Watched news on TV – Thailand seems to be heading for civil war, so glad to be out of there.

 More Angkor Wat photos

Goodbye Thailand, hello Cambodia

The first part of my overland trip to Siem Reap – the Thailand bit – was not too bad, taking only 4 hours to get to the boarder from Pattaya. The Cambodia immigration process was as tedious as everyone had warned, but eventually we were in. I had decided to upgrade from minibus to taxi for the Cambodia part of the journey on the basis that this would be quicker and perhaps more comfortable. The first hour or so of the drive was reasonably OK and I was starting to wonder what all the fuss had been about. Then we hit the dirt track that passed for a road for the remaining 3 hours of the journey to Siem Reap, and I was wishing that I had been able to fly in as originally planned. At one point we hit a bump so violently that my head hit the roof of the car quite hard.
The hotel I had booked at the last minute was, as I had feared, some way out of town so I had to get a taxi in to the main eating and drinking places. Had a great Khmer meal and a few beers, then walked around a bit before heading back to the hotel for an early night, ready for a 5:00 am start the next day.

Cambodia here we come

It’s just as well that I have had no activities planned for the last two days.  It has taken me most of that time to rearrange my Cambodia trip.  No doubt I will eventually recover all the money spent on the hotel reservations and air tickets that have had to be cancelled, but it does not make up for the fact that I have lost four days of holiday thanks to the Bangkok airport situation.

Anyway, the Cambodia trip is now sorted and I will be escaping there tomorrow.  If the situation in Thailand has still not improved by my planned departure date of 5^th December, at least I can fly out of Phnom Penh to somewhere.  Now off to one of the many bars to be found here in Pattaya to engage in intellectual conversation with the locals and expats. 

Pattaya by Night

From Robin's Travel Blog

From Robin's Travel Blog

Looks as if my hopes of doing some diving are not going to come to anything.  In being forced to switch from Phuket to Pattaya, I had forgotten these locations are subject to different weather systems.  Phuket is good in the winter months during the North East monsoon season, whilst the reverse applies to Pattaya.  End result – there is a tropical storm affecting the Gulf of Thailand which rules out diving for the next few days.

Pattaya is apparently famed for its night life. Having sampled it last night I can see why - I won’t go into details here.  One place of interest I came across was the Blues Factory, off Pattaya’s famed Walking Street (both pictured).  The resident band was headed up by a guy who is apparently Thailand’s number one rock guitarist. I had actually seen him perform once before in Bangkok and can confirm that he is pretty good at what he does.  He is a ‘70s throwback, looking like a Thai version of Richie Blackmore (or more accurately, his grandfather). Anyway, the band gave an entertaining performance.

It’s looking as if Bangkok airport is going to be closed until at least 3 December, so my plan to fly to Cambodia is not going to work. I have been researching overland travel and it seems that I can get a mini bus from Pattaya to Siem Reap easily enough.  Once in Cambodia, I can fly back from Phnom Pen to Bangkok, if open by 6th, or to Singapore if not. Slightly ironic this. There was a time when people tried to escape the killing fields of Cambodia by fleeing into Thailand. Now I find myself doing the reverse!

Escape from Bangkok

The situation in Bangkok appears to be deteriorating and it is clear that there is now no chance of me being able to fly to Phuket as originally planned.  The general view here is that there is likely to be an escalation of the fighting between the Red Shirts and the Yellow Shirts (the ones currently occupying the airport), and foreigners are looking for ways to get out of the country.  I am still waiting for my Cambodia e-visa to come through so I have decided to escape to Pattaya for the next two or three days until the situation improves.

Having arrived in Pattaya and checked into my hotel (I was the only new customer they have had for the past two days), I am not so sure that this was a good move.  Bangkok was getting rather boring, but this place is the pits – at least as bad as the guide books make out.  The dregs of western humanity seem to have washed up here.  I hope the diving is good.

Stop press:  just heard the news that the Thai government has declared a state of emergency and the Bangkok airports are going to be closed for at least two days.

Still, at least it is better than being in Mumbai.

Trapped in Bangkok!

I had planned to be in Phuket by now, for a short diving holiday with my ex work colleague Jim, before heading on to Cambodia.  However, I found out that Bangkok airport has been closed because of a protest rally by thousands of anti-government demonstrators.  Luckily I discovered this before heading out to the airport otherwise I would be trapped there now with the other 3000 or so tourists that you can see if you look at the TV news.  I have extended my hotel stay in Bangkok by an extra night to see what happens tomorrow.  There are rumours that the government may send in the troops soon to sort things out - we will see.  Meanwhile, I am looking at alternative places to visit in Thailand that I can get to by bus, in case the problem drags on.  Thinking about Kanchanaburi, which I recall Adam recommending.  Other possibilities are Hua Hin or Pattaya, if I want to stick to the diving itinerary.

Sorry I can not post any exciting pictures of the latest news from the airport, but frankly I would rather be lying here by the pool than sweating it out there.  Watch this space for further developments!

Khon Kaen

I caught the bus from Bangkok's Mo Chit bus station for the 6 hour trip to Khon Kaen.  The ride was not at all bad considering that this was a standard bus (you can also go via VIP bus, which is even more luxurious).  The views on the way were nothing special but still interesting to see some of the countryside outside Bangkok.  After arriving at Khon Kaen, I met up with my friend David, who took me to his house in a new development a few km outside the city.  He lives there with his Thai wife and their 2 year old son.  Not a bad lifestyle but I don't think I could stick it myself.

Spent some time exploring the local countryside on bike.  Mostly rice farms and a few water buffaloes as far as I could see.  We went on a tour of some of the local temples, including the one pictured, which is still under construction.

Bangkok

Flew in for the start of my Thailand-Cambodia holiday.   Met up with Jim, a colleague from Subex, for a drink and some Thai food.  My original plan was to join Jim for some diving in Phuket, but this was modified as I bumped in to David, a friend from earlier work trips to Thailand, who was currently working in Bangkok.  He invited me to visit him and his Thai wife at their home near Khon Kaen, in the Isaan region of Thailand.

Singapore Grand Prix - Race Day

Arrived at the race track in time for the first of the support races. The guy selling me a beer said that it was going to rain within the next 2 hours, which in his opinion would be cool for the McClaren team. Looking at the grey clouds, I thought that he was probably right. In the end, it remained dry the whole time.
Wandered around some of the other trackside viewing points that I had not visited the day before. Many great locations available. The only downside compared to a grandstand seat is that you do not get the large video screen and commentary, which is vital for knowing what is going on in the rest of the race. One way round this would be to rent one of the Kangaroo TV consoles which are basically portable multi channel TVs that allow you to tune in to the race action, including in-car shots and the ability to follow the driver of your choice. Cool, but I decided to pass on it this time around, and reverted to my grandstand seat for the race itself.
The race itself was incident packed, with two outings for the safety car after drivers hit the crash barriers. This meant that the end result was rather a lottery, but it made for exciting viewing.
Post-race entertainment was provided by the Wailers. I am not sure how the band were entitled to use this name, other than the fact that some of them came from Jamaica and they played the Wailers' greatest hists. There did not appear to be any of the original band members present in the lineup. Anyway, an entertaining way to round off the evening while waiting the crowds to disperse.
Although the Singapore track is impressive, particularly because of the nighttime setting, it suffers from the same drawback as Monaco in that overtaking is very difficult. It was certainly something well worth experiencing, and I was glad that I had taken the opportunity to be present at this historic moment in the evolution of F1 racing.

More Grand Prix pictures

Singapore Grand Prix - Qualifying Day

From Grand Prix

From Grand Prix

From Grand Prix

Yesterday, I had come to the conclusion that my grandstand seat was not necessarily the best place from which to view the race, so today I decided to explore the viewing opportunities around the rest of the race track. Most of the circuit park is accessible to all ticket holders, the exception being the paddock and stands next to the start area. It turned out that there are many good viewing spots right next to interesting bits of the track where it is possible to get up close to the action.

Singapore has a new tourist attraction - the Singapore Flyer - which is basically their equivalent of the London Eye. I decided to take a flight. The concept and design is basically identical to the Eye (although they claim it is the biggest of its kind in the world), and it provided a great view of the race track and the starting grid. I was able to watch some of the support race from his vantage point, and get some good shots of the city.

Musical entertainment for the evening was courtesy of the Australian Beatles Show - not a bad imitation of the real thing.

Walking around the circuit in the 30 degree temperatures and Singapore humidity was literally a draining process, and I was dripping with sweat the whole time, except when in enclosed spaces with aircon, such as the Flyer. I could hardly keep topped up with water and Tiger beer.

The qualifying session itself was tense enough, with Hamilton only just getting into the vital Q3 session. It should be a great race tomorrow.

Singapore Grand Prix - Practice Day

Today was my first opportunity to see the full extent of the transformation of Singapore’s streets into a F1 race track. I must say that they have done a great job, particularly with the track lighting which is bright and yet not too harsh. It is particularly impressive seeing all the historic buildings in close proximity to the track.
My grandstand seat is not particularly good, being one of the last to be sold, and is near to a not-particularly interesting bend in the track, and rather a way from the giant TV screens which you need to see to follow what is happening elsewhere on the circuit. However, I used this practice day as a chance to wander around other parts of the track, and there are many alternative viewing points that give you an interesting perspective on the race.
I was also using this first day to get a feel for how to do motor sport photography. Not as straightforward as you might think. For a start, the general public has to view the race though the protective barrier, so every shot has a mesh grille superimposed on it. (Only the professional photographers have access to unrestricted vantage points.) Then you have to work out how to actually capture the car in your shot, using a fast panning technique. This takes some practice to perfect, and for every successful shot, I had to discard five failures. Happily, digital photography makes this a less painful process. Finally, you have to get the camera settings right. It is no use using auto exposure, auto focus, etc as these just do not work in this environment. Everything has to be set manually, which again takes some practise.
In between each racing session, there are plenty of other things to do, including sampling some of the regional foods on sale at the nearby hawker stands, and listening to musical performances on one of the several stages dotted around the race track area. Also many stalls selling F1 merchandise, but I did not feel inclined to fork out £40 for a tee shirt just to show that I supported Lewis Hamilton.
And then of course, there are the cars themselves. They look much brighter in real life than on TV, and nothing can prepare you for the engine noise. (I will be wearing earphones today). But that is all part of the atmosphere of being at a live event.

More Grand Prix photos

Singapore River Festival

By chance it turns out that there is this river festival running the whole week up to the Grand Prix. Friday night was the grand opening, with a load of musical entertainment in the Clark Quay area. The Singaporean Chinese seemed determined to outdo their Beijing cousins by putting on their own spectacular light show. (movie to follow). So plenty to do at night in the lead-up to the Grand Prix weekend.
I discovered a major drawback to my hotel selection: it has no swimming pool. Previously when I have been in Singapore it has been for work and I have had little time for lying by the pool. This trip is leisure only and the lack of somewhere to chill out in the afternoons is much missed.

Singapore

I left England with my body clock still on Pacific time, and by the time I arrived in Singapore, it was anyone's guess what time zone it though it was in.

Checked into my hotel, which is a basic affair in the red light district of Singapore. Not ideal, but all the hotels in the central area were either fully booked or had quadrupled their prices for Grand Prix week. I was not prepared to pay these rip-off prices, hence the 'interesting' location. My room is very small but just about has everything required for survival. I do not intend to spend much time there anyway.

Next task was to collect my Grand Prix tickets. Having travelled into the centre of town, I discovered that the Singapore Post office where I was supposed to collect the tickets was closed. Not a good start, but hopefully they will be open at some point over the next few days. On my taxi ride into town, we went though some of the streets that will be used for the F1 circuit next weekend. Workmen were in the process of installing concrete and wire mesh safety barriers and the overhead floodlighting really did make the road as bright as day.

Went to Clark Quay for a meal and beer at the Breworks microbrewery - one of my favourite eating places. After eating, walked round to corner to watch the GoFlyKite team putting on their usual spectacular performance flying their radio controlled kites. I will post a movie of this as soon as I work out how to convert the file from my cellphone.

On the way back across the river, I saw signs advertising the Singapore River Festival with starts tomorrow and runs for the whole week up to the Grand Prix weekend. Plenty of musical and other entertainment to keep me occupied in the evenings it would seem.

Finished off the evening in the Crazy Elephant bar watching one of the local blues bands doing some not bad Hendrix covers.

Seattle

I was originally planning to return to Seatac Airport by coach but the conference travel agents realised that my flight to London was in the evening and that this would mean me having to st around in the airport all day.  Instead, they booked me on to the commuter flight that connects Port Angels with Seattle.  So I got an extra half day to look round the town, and a short scenic flight to Seattle, with great views over the Olympic Peninsular, Puget Sound and the Seattle skyline.

More Port Angeles photos

CCC2, Final Day

I had the privilege of speaking the final slot of the whole conference. This had the advantage that many of the previous speakers had already covered much of the background to my topic during their presentations, so I was able to devote more time to the key points in my own presentation.  The presentation itself went well I think, and the feedback was certainly very positive, although I'm not sure how many participants actually understood all the implications of what I was saying.  Anyway, the questions were all intelligent enough.

One of the other presenters on the same session as me was a professor from Connecticut University whose work I had been following for many years, and who I had previously regarded as some sort of rival.  During the conference I had got to know him quite well ant it turned out he was an ex-Brit who had moved to the US about 40 years ago. He actually remembered corresponding with me when I was at Imperial and we had some good discussion about cosmology as a whole, and the quality (or otherwise) of the various presentations at the conference.   Although the details of his model are slightly different to mine, he was very supportive and offered to help me publish in the future if I encountered any difficulty in finding a suitable outlet.  He even offered me some constructive advice for improving the maths in my model. In the end we parted on the best of terms and will probably collaborate on something in the future.

Not surprisingly, there was no consensus on anything at the end of the conference. Everyone who came with their own theory stuck to it doggedly and would not concede any common ground to anyone else's theory.  The objective of the conference had been to find a way of switching public debate away from the discredited Big Bang model of cosmology, but which is doomed to fail unless we can come up with a coherent alternative. In this respect, the conference was a failure, and it is not clear how the Alternative Cosmology Group will take things forward from here.

From a personal point of view, it was invaluable. I met several professional scientists who provided useful advice and are keen to keep in contact after the conference to exchange data and theoretical models.  It has helped me to catch up with the latest developments in cosmology that have taken place in the six years since I left Imperial. It has provided several leads that I need to follow up to see how my model stacks up against various unexplained observational data.  I am not sure if or when there will be another CCC, but I have accepted initiations to two other theoretical physics conferences next year, which should be more than enough to keep me up-to-date. Now I need to get writing my next paper.

More CCC2 photos

CCC2, Day 3

Today we got to the part of the conference where a number of delegates were invited to put forward their own cosmological models.  Most of these were fairly flaky; many were incomprehensible.  Only one seemed to come from someone who knew what he was talking about, but even then it turned out he had made a major error in his data analysis which probably invalidated his whole theory.  Some of the debate got rather heated with the Russian participants in particular feeling that their theories were being denigrated.

The majority of the delegates appeared to have written books outlining their personal cosmological theories, some published as real books and some in electronic form.  Clearly they must have had trouble in shifting their stock, since many of them had brought along copies of their opus to give away to other delegates.  I now have a suitcase full of books about way-out cosmological theories - enough to send me to sleep for many nights to come.

In the evening we had the conference 'banquet', which was not particularly notable, and we even had to pay for our drinks!  The first part of the evening's 'entertainment' consisted of the local tour operator giving a talk about the history of Port Angeles, including an epic tale of how they raised the town out of the tidal mud by sluicing half a hillside down into the town (see picture of mural illustrating this episode).  The second part of the show turned out to be our tour guide from Sunday giving us an hour long Mark Twain monologue.  Many delegated decided that the pub was a better option. Unfortunately I had to stay clear of that as I was presenting the next day.

 

CCC2, Day 1

The first day of the Crisis in Cosmology Conference proved to be very interesting. The sessions covered several topics with which I was not very familiar. This has given me a load of observational data that I need to assimilate into my cosmological model.  A number of speakers covered the background to some of the topics that I needed to include in my session, which is good as I have been able to remove these from my presentation, giving me more time to devote to the key concepts.  

The other delegates fall into two main categories: professional physicists working at universities, who have an unconventional outlook on cosmology, and independent researchers such as myself, many of whom are either retired or working in engineering related jobs.  I have to say that I have a lot more time for the professional physicists than for the part-timers, whose ideas are often fairly flaky.  

Talking of flaky, I have been plagued by one guy (there as a non-participant observer) who turned out to be a UFO nutter, and ardent conspiracy theorist who would have been very at home in the X-files.  

My list of useful contacts has expanded yet further, and I have already received an invitation to talk at another theoretical physics conference to be held in Australia later next year.

Olympic Park, WA

The Sunday before the conference was designated for side trips. I chose to go on a trip to the Olympic National Park, which is about 30 minutes drive from Port Angeles. Our guide, Willie Nelson (not the Willie Nelson but looked like him), was a real character who knew all about the natural history of the Olympic Peninsular. This made the outing informative and entertaining. The trip was split into two parts; a morning visit to Lake Crescent and the nearby primeval forest, and an afternoon trip to Hurricane Ridge. The views of the Olympic Mountains from the ridge were quite spectacular. The coach rides were a useful opportunity to get to meet some of the other delegates, and I made several useful contacts.

More Olympic Park photos

Port Angeles

Flew from San Francisco up to Seatac Airport, then a 3 hour coach ride via Tacoma to Port Angeles, which is on the North coast of the Olympic Peninsular.  Staying in the Red Lyon Hotel, where I have a room with a view over the sea to Victoria on Vancouver Island. It's only a mile or two to Canada from here!


View Larger Map

San Jose

Travelled on Caltrain from San Fancisco to San Jose, where Jonathan met me in his smart new BMW.  Quick drive around downtown San Jose then off for lunch at a microbrewery restaurant in Los Gatos.  Afternoon spent by the pool at his Alameda apartment.  In the evening we went to a local wine bar for some wine tasting and tapas.