Trip report

Well, this trip starts out simply and gets downright ragged. Cities on trip. Houston, Provo, Utah, London, Corpus Christi, Frankfurt, Mainz, Dubai, Singapore, Tokyo, and Jackson, MS. What do they have in common? Three weeks of my life on the road.

Saturday AM finds me and my wife and 2 of my 6 children flying on CO to Salt Lake City. I upgraded to first and for some reason my daughter but not my wife was upgraded as well. Rented two cars and met another daughter and grandson #1. We stayed in the Provo Marriott. At 89.95 per night, upgraded rooms and free breakfast we can’t say enough good about this hotel. Great service. Friendly people. Slightly gullible though,

At night they were filming some movie outside the hotel necessitating us to enter the parking garage from a side street instead of the front of the hotel. As I returned from Chili’s with the sort of routine, but consistently adequate food it is known for I saw four of the hotel employees (two girls, two boys, fresh faced and whose summed ages were still in double digits). I said “Man there is a huge crowd watching that movie filming. You’d think they had never seen Tom Cruise before.” The reaction was immediate and simultaneous. Eyes wide open, they all said “Tom Cruise?!?!?” to which I (after a pause) replied “Gotcha!”

RECOMMENDATION: PROVO MARRIOTT ANY TIME

Visited 2nd daughter and Grandson #2. Excellent. Flew home and stayed long enough to pack two more bags. Off on CO to LHR. Smooth, bags on time. Heathrow express to Paddington with two colleagues, taxi to hotel. Corporate booking at the PARK PLAZA SHERLOCK HOLMES. If mediocrity is their only goal, they have kudos due. Hard to get into the details, but for 199₤ nightly we got mediocre service, fair rooms, no A/C and TVs that said “CNN and ESPN available only in Premium rooms.” Hmmm, paying 420$ a night and CNN is a luxury upgrade?

RECOMMENDATION: AVOID IT LIKE THE PLAGUE

Travel back and forth to our meetings in high end cars with drivers. Really not much faster than the train but better for three traveling together. Lunches were standard brought in food.

MEALS IN LONDON: Pret a manger for sandwiches at lunch. As usual, pretty good. Wagamama for dinner. My favorite super simple place in London for dinner. Next night at Bombay Palace near Paddington Garden. Very good and reasonably priced. Then again there are loads of good Indian joints in London so I’d hardly travel across town to get to this one.

Return trip: Taxi to Paddington, Heathrow express, CO business first, typical food, i.e. good enough….scheduled arrival 1:05 PM. Actually out of customs with bag at 12:45.! The 777 is a fine airplane for sure.

Spousal unit is there to pick me up and take me straight to the High School near my house. Here I am dropped off and drive a VERY large truck, loaded with band instruments to near Flour Bluff, TX (close to Corpus Christi). Accommodations: sharing a condo with another band parent. Food is mainly what we bought at the grocery store but we got decent seafood takeout at local dive “Snoopy’s”. Port Royal Condominiums relatively inexpensive. Bought 200$ worth of diesel at over 4$/gallon. Yiikes.

Drive back Sunday very early (left at 0600, arrived 1050) and went straight home to grab the next bags for a long segment. Same day a few hours later (1535 departure) on Lufthansa to Frankfurt. Crap lounge at IAH, thank goodness it is next to the BA lounge (password “London” for WiFi remembered from last week!). Flight was bumpy. Train to Mainz. Staying at the Hilton on the river. Great view, more or less typical Hilton but no Lounge. Big breakfast buffet included.

Dinner at AUGUSTINERKELLER (YES, WORTH A TRIP!) and lunch the next day at one of the many reasonable restaurants in town.

Next flight was Emirates from FRA to Dubai. Emirates Chauffer drive to hotel. Hotel is Royal Meridien Dubai (the one on the beach).

RECOMMENDATION: We paid 1200 AED for club rooms. What a great hotel. Free breakfast, elaborate teas, elaborate happy hours with heavy hors d’ouevres, great service, etc. Big thumbs up. Dinner the first night at the Seafood Market at the Hotel. Wow. Great food. RECOMMENDATION: Have someone else buy. I paid for dinner for two, 848 Dirhams. You do the math. Dinner the next night at the hotel again… Fusion restaurant with more reasonable prices and excellent food.


Next flight is Emirates to Singapore. Emirates Chauffer drive to hotel, staying at the M Hotel. Upgraded to Club level which means a nice suite, Jacuzzi, huge bathrooms, great spreads at the Club, free internet and 3 free pieces of laundry daily. The latter turns out to be pretty useful. Toured Chinatown and various temples Saturday. Naturally I eat laksa and chile crabs. Great food at semi-reasonable prices. I am loving it. Last night we get a 2.7 kg lobster cooked with red chile sauce. That and a lot of black pepper crabs. Wow.
M HOTEL: Definitely worth a repeat stay. SINGAPORE: One great place to visit and work.

Finally NW airlines from SIN to Tokyo and a quick layover at Narita. Long enough for a shower and a snack. Then CO for a LONG flight to the US. At least the wind has been more or less at our back for the whole trip. I finally really sleep on this airplane. Advil PM and exhaustion combine and do their magic.


A couple nights in my own bed, but then off on Continental Express to Jackson, MS for three days. Jackson Marriott. Always an upgrade for me there. I don’t need to write much about Jackson, Mississippi. Steak place called Nick’s was fair. My return flight on CO was cancelled due to weather and I had to get a SW ticket for 3 hours later and a taxi from Hobby airport to IAH. But at least I got home!


Finally HOME. Hope you enjoyed it. I am just glad it is over!