How the west was won

7 A.D.

Kyle and Betsy are a young married couple of three years, hailing from a military town called Columbus in Georgia. They’ve travelled around most of the country and do the hostelling thing quite regularly (they stayed here a week ago, but were put down in “the hole” – now they’ve been promoted to be with us!) They are the second group of people who think the [English version of] Top Gear is fantastic...I guess old Clarkson comes across well over here! Unfortunately I forget to ask them which are their favourite Beatles albums. We do explain that it’s our first ever night in a hostel, and at this point I should explain that we were expecting the D.C. Lofty to be a quaint little house with two small rooms for guests. It’s not. In fact, there are travellers hanging out of every nook and cranny, of all shapes and sizes, and all nationalities. Some of them are very loud indeed (and that’s just when they’re holding a normal, sober conversation), but it’s quiet enough where we are on the second floor. Like I said, Kyle and Betsy consider our room promotion.

Tim and I went up to our room abut 10.30 for an early night. After talking about anything and everything with K and B, we suddenly realise it’s gone 12.30 and we need to get our heads down. By this point in the evening we have been convinced not to bother going to Atlanta as originally planned, and to consider swapping Memphis for Nashville. Our first night sleeping in a hostel could not have been better, but it sounds like we got lucky. When we arrived yesterday we met a young South Korean boy called Josh who was given a bed in the basement with 9 other people. Josh reacts to the smallest statement with wild enthusiasm, but he wasn’t too impressed with D.C. Lofty, especially because the water in his shower wasn’t going down the plughole and the staff were reluctant to provide him with a coat hanger. For some bizarre reason Josh is staying here for six nights, but Kyle and Betsy were here for just the one, which was a damn shame.

We were up and out next morning by 8.30 to go and do the nation’s capital. It was already roasting and I had decided that it was to be a day of shorts from the get-go, given that it was expected to hit 37 degrees at some point (Fahrenheit people need to multiply by 2 and add 32). Our first destination was the Washington Monument, which is a great big phallic thing...and that’s as much as we knew about it. By this point we had to make tactical decisions on whether it was worth risking leaving the shade for a closer view.

A walk around the lake brought us to the Jefferson memorial, which contains several grand statements that the great man made, and damned inspiring stuff it was too. If you will indulge me in one of them:

I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions. But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy, but either way James Gray still needs more shorts.

Not bad, eh? Somewhere close by was the Pentagon, but we couldn’t get a view of it through the trees, and given its high-security status, we weren’t likely to. Instead we carried on around the lake until we got to the Lincoln memorial and by this point the heat was pretty stifling. Every time we passed a drinking fountain we refilled our bottles. As for the memorial itself, well, it was good – one of those things you’re supposed to see when in D.C., though technically it’s just a big statue of a Victorian chap in a chair. Maybe if I was born here I’d feel different, but I haven’t regressed my past lives far back enough to recall what I did in the American civil war.

Next stop was the White House, or rather the White House from a distance through a fence. Obviously since 9/11 they have put huge restrictions in place for getting tours of the building and you need to contact your representative in Congress one month in advance...not sure what the MP for Southport would have made of such a request. By the way, the small bunny rabbit you can see in the picture is called “Pip”. Pip belongs to a friend of mine, and if she hasn’t worked out that I’ve stolen him to take around the world with me then she didn’t love him half as much as I thought she did! Pip is enjoying himself immensely and is posing for pictures outside all of the famous landmarks so far.

The afternoon would be spent in museums, free museums, which was handy because it kept us out of the midday sun. First we hit the Museum of American History, which was perfectly fine and told us yet more fascinating facts about Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln et al. The Museum of Natural History was next door and Tim was able to show off the knowledge he gained from his biology degree to the member of staff who approached us at the sound of our quaint English accents as we discussed the differences between Homo Erectus and Homo Flacidus. She said that I sounded like a young Paul MacCartney, so I took the opportunity to ask her what her favourite Beatles album was. She said she didn’t have one and I decided it was already time to stop asking this question to everyone I meet in the US.

Our third culture conquest was the National Museum of Art, which contained plenty of Renoir, Cezanne and Manet, and I spotted a few by Pissarro, Toulouse-Lautrec, Gainsbrough, Church, Constable and Turner. Also present was a cast of The Thinker, but you’re probably getting sick of me posing for those shots by now! It was at some point while viewing this assortment of paintings that I realised that we’d now been on the road for exactly one week...feels like five! Only 20-something more to go...

Our final destination was to Capitol Hill (we hoped by now the sun would be a bit cooler, but it still felt seven inches from the backs of our necks). Various body parts were now turning red, in strange V-like shapes, despite the factor 30. Here we saw the Library of Congress, the Supreme Court, and some other important-looking buildings. It was now time for dinner and a beer and we headed to yet another Irish bar. We are finding it cheaper to eat out than to shop at the supermarket. Yesterday I wanted to make some sandwiches, so went out to get some basic provisions. Unfortunately I went to a place called the Wholesome Food Store, which is a health-conscious place big on organic produce and not my typical kind of shop. It was also bloomin` expensive. I struggle enough with a new supermarket back home, so what chance do I have here? I vaguely remember picking up and putting down the same pack of cheese slices six times and leaving without buying them. Kyle and Betsy assured us that things will get cheaper when we leave the north east bubble.

The first day we spend in a new place is always weird, but by the second day it's like we’ve been there for ages, and so it was as we returned to the D.C. Lofty. Suddenly though, we were struck with a dilemma – our next destination was Niagara Falls, but the Greyhound website was stating it was a whopping 14 hours away! How were we going to manage that and still book into accommodation? But there was no time to worry about that when we got upstairs and saw our new room mate for the night – Anna, 20, from Sweden, extremely timid. I shall make no further comment for now.   

  

With a little help from my friends

6 A.D.

To continue the tale of yesterday's Manic Monday (or rather, just another day for us), after feeling no adverse effects from the Philly cheesesteaks, we moved on to the nearby indoor market in the hope of finding some Pennsylvania Dutch...only to discover that they're around preaching their good news every day besides Sunday and Monday. Why not Monday? And it wasn't just the Amish - a lot of Philadelphia didn't seem open on a Monday and we couldn't figure out why. But we didn't care that much either.  [In a Louis Theroux voice] My time in Philadelphia was almost up, but before I left I wanted to check out Elfreth's Alley.

This is a tiny street on the north east side that has the dubious claim of being the oldest street in America. As you can see by Tim's reaction, he wasn't too convinced, but it was rather quaint. Nearby was the house of one Betty Ross, the lady who made the first ever US flag. Unfortunately, with it being Monday, her house was closed, but it too looked quaint. Then, with belly's rumbling, we headed down to South Street - supposedly the place to be for drinking and partying, but I wasn't particularly impressed, though had to admit it had more appeal than West Street back home.

Next morning we were up at 7.30 to hit the road to D.C. We arrived at the bus terminal a little early, so I nipped to the "Old Navy" store, which I'd been told by Chaz would provide me with some more affordable shorts than K-Mart. With it no longer being a Monday, I was confident that the place would be open, but I hadn't reckoned against a 10 a. m. start, and that's when our bus went. Still only one pair of shorts for me! Back at the terminal, the great conspiracy continued as we asked which gate our bus went from and were told number 7. When we queried it 10 minutes later, we were told number 6. What do they have lined-up for us next - travelling in the hold with the luggage???

The best thing about getting the bus at Philadelphia was that we met Giselle. She was originally from Tasmania, had recently been living in London, and had been travelling for more years than I should probably mention. She'd worked lots of interesting jobs in various countries and had been to a lot of the places we had lined up to see. Also, she is probably the only person we've met for a good long while who did not immediately think that we were brothers. Giselle's favourite Beatles album is Rubber soul. She promptly made us her friends on Facebook, which she says she doesn't usually do, so the Grayboys must have made a good impression with their Southport charm! Oh, and she'd been to Southport several times - what are the odds???

The bus stopped first at Wilmington, Delaware (yawn!) and than at Baltimore, Maryland - wow! This was where they filmed the TV show The Wire which I was addicted to for all five of its series. However, from the bus it looked like the dullest city on the planet and I didn't feel moved to take one photograph of the cityscape. At this point I should mention that I used the lavatory on the bus for the first time (it's a three hour journey)...a deep black hole of a chemical toilet, it's where lost souls go to die.

There was a bit of a traffic jam on the approach to Washington. Alongside were the type of Maryland woods in which The Blair Witch Project was filmed. Would this visit be as scary? Hopefully not, but the D.C. bus terminal was in a pretty rotten area. Plus it was hot - humid with it and by the time we'd said goodbye to Giselle (who was heading out to West Virginia), we were feeling the heat on our backpacks. I should remind you, dear readers, that this would be the first time we'd be sharing a room with other people. As we hiked beneath the blazing sun, I prayed for two timid little French girls, not for romantic reasons, mind, just that they'd be preferable to a couple of big bruiser blokes from eastern Europe who's farts can cause cracks in the windows.

We arrived at the "D.C. Lofty" at 2.30 and were immediately told to take our shoes off...not a good start. Walking around in my socks, it felt like going to visit my aunt and uncle when they've just had a new carpet fitted. Roma, the Russian-sounding landlady, was pleasant enough, but keen to enforce the rules of the house (remove your quilt from your duvet cover when you leave and put in a pile on the floor???) At that point the two bunk beds next to ours were empty and we were heading out to watch England's famous victory against Ukraine in whatever bar we could find (we ended up chatting to a guy who was born in the Ukraine - what are the odds???)

[Don't stare too long at the legs or your eyes will burn!]

And when we returned, can you guess what our room mates were like? I'll leave you to chew on that tasty morsel `til tomorrow...