Hello again. Two years have flown by, due to a job change I have a month of gardening leave so its time to resume the Woodlands to Woking blog. After the last train journey I’ve decided to change the primary form of transport to the great American automobile for a road trip around Texas and the deep south of the USA.
I type this at the wonderful Changi airport in Singapore waiting for my flight to Dallas Fort Worth, Texas. An exact 25 hour journey via Dubai with Emirates arriving 9:45 on Monday morning. Happily, I have been informed both flights are pretty much empty so I hope to be able to sprawl across 4 seats and arrive in the US of A refreshed.
The route I will be following is below and totals out at 3582 miles over two weeks. Not nearly as far Woodlands to Woking but this time I will be responsible for the vehicle and not just warming up noodles so a slightly daunting solo drive. Driving from London to Tehran or from Singapore to Shanghai are actually shorter car journeys. To state the obvious, America is a massive place.
Processed with Moldiv
During the trip will be avoiding interstates on the advice of Bill Bryson and getting to see a little of small town America I hope. I’ll also be avoiding chain restaurants and trying as many local delicacies as possible. Which unfortunately mainly seems to be a large chunk of meat slowly cooked in a bbq served with a beer or whiskey. This will be hell.
Also with the inclusion of Austin, New Orleans , Nashville and Memphis I am very excited about some of the music that I’ll be able to listen too. Especially excited to be able to catch a live performance from Rebirth Brass Band, a band I’ve listened to a lot since watching Treme, a show about New Orleans post Katrina.
Hoping to also catch some sport, I have a ticket to one of the biggest stadiums in the world to see the LSU Tigers. I should be able to see some more, perhaps basketball , ice hockey or rodeo too.
I’ll be aiming to keep this blog updated every couple of days, plenty of pictures and hopefully amusing little stories.
If there is anyone reading this and they have a real need to hear about train trips, let me know and I’ll write-up a recent train journey into North Korea soon!
Cheers Tom
Woodlands to Woking 
Hi Tom
Have a great trip! I will definitely be reading about it. Looking forward to it!!
Cheers,
Arnaud
Have a great trip, Tom. looking forwards to your descriptive blogs.
Hey Tom-
great to hear from you and fantastic that your a) blogging another trip again and b) that you’re heading to a place close to our heart’s- TEXAS! ((Did you remember that sam grew up there??))
A couple of tips from me and our visit:
Dallas: the 6th floor book depository (where JFK got shot from (or did he?!)) museum is pretty good. Good bit of history. If you manage to locate the “grassy knoll” outside though you” be doing better than me!. We saw an NBA game (dallas Mavericks) and that was good. Some locals took us and when we spotted (from our seats that were miles away) some empty seats a few rows back from court side that were unused we went and sat there. no one seemed to mind! We took the train from downtown Dallas to Fortworth but i guess you’ll be driving… Fortworth is ok… if you can try and get along to a line-dancing bar- we missed it but looks like fun. There’s a cracking burger place halfway down the main drag that had live country music too. It’s little and odd looking but i recommend the burgers!
San Antonio- we drove from Dallas to SA and back in one day so that was a bit long. The Alamo is worth a visit to simpy say you’ve been there but it is the most underwhelming thing you’ll ever see (think of a not-that-old church building from England that’s falling down a bit) – it will take you about 3 minutes to walk around. If you’re anything like me you’ll spend the short time there exclaiming that this doesn’t count as real history in front of as many Americans as you can. I then went to the book shop and read through a book of the story of the Alamo and realised that even the supposed heroes of the story were simply disobeying orders and one of them is too ill to fight so is stabbed in his bed. Anyway- according to Sam it inspired everyone else to get off their butts and fight and it probably is pretty important historically but when you come from somewhere that has 1000 year old big castles it doesn’t quite compare. The really nice bit of San Antonio is the “river walk”. We took a boat trip round and that was quite nice and peaecful. lots of nice little cafe’s around there too.
Anyway brilliant that you’re doing this and i’ll look forward to every one!
Take care buddy and safe travels!
Tim
Hi Tim, Thanks for all the tips. Just been to the Alamo, it was a little underwhelming.
More coming soon.
Cheers Tom
Tom read your blog only now.
Hope u are watching football today.
Please put your korea train trip too.
Enjoy the travel and keep writing.