Previous mini(er) American adventures

We've been to the States a few times, both separately and together....

In 2005, I flew solo via Fort Lauderdale, Florida en route to the Bahamas for a week of hippy healing from wild dolphins with Wildquest: one of the best things I've ever done (thanks Hols!). Here's the view from my room at the Sheraton Yankee Trader hotel in Fort Lauderdale.

Excuse the blueness; I had white balance issues. What I should've done was take a picture of the bed which was approximately EIGHT FOOT SQUARE.

Ad was sent to Disney World in Orlando for a week in December 2008 with work to photograph the possibly-last holiday of a brave little girl called Hannah Jones. A place where dreams come true... and all the food comes covered in cheese.

Then we hit New York for four nights in October 2009. Frickin' love that place, rain or shine.

 

Just two weeks to go and it's 'hello again, America'. Alllriiight.

Flag me up

Meet our map.

It's been with me through a couple of house moves, quietly waiting to be un-rolled and admired on the wall. When we last moved in September, the trip was becoming more of a reality (my three-month sabbatical form was inches away from my Editor's signature and Adam was getting ready to give his notice) and we now had wall space big enough to do the map justice.

After a couple of trips to Hobby Craft for some card/foam backing, duct tape and straws later, the map was erected and ready to be flagged. So many flags. Flags in New York, Boston, Niagra Falls (ooh, maybe a couple in Canada); flags in Ann Arbor, Michigan (Allie!), Chicago; one for Nashville, Tennessee (hello Dollywood); flags in Austin and Houston, Texas, and while I'm there why not a flag or two near Dallas; flags all over California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah and aaalll the way up to Portland, Oregon.

I love the flags. But turns out each flag represented a vast amount of our savings. Ouch. Bad flags. So as the calculator came out, so did the flags. Out comes Boston, out comes New York, out comes Niagra. Ann Arbor? Chicago? Staying. California: them flags ain't moving. Utah, Nevada, Arizona: no movement there. Tennessee had to give, as did Texas (the country music lover in me cried a little). Portland? Perhaps... but we'll take it out for now; we need another to cram into California. And we're now down from three months to six weeks.

So, with the mean old budget calculated, the flags remained in Chicago, Ann Arbor, California, Nevada, Arizona and Utah. Not too shabby. And a six-week holiday is not to be sniffed at. That's one and a half magazine cycles for me, and approximately 256 hours of agency photographing for the boy. That's a lot of holiday.

We love you, flags. Bring it on.