Goodnight, Travel Well

123 days. That is how many I have to wait until I will finally get to go back to New York. After the week I've had at work I wish it wasn't so long. It's been absolutely horrendous, to the point where I even had to go to the MD because it had all got too much.  Sometimes I just wish that I could do something to make it all better and so I enjoyed going to work again, but the atmosphere is so uncomfortable in my office now (it has even been described as like a morgue) that there's nothing I can think of to change it.  I don't know how things will be when I go in on Monday morning - I'm nervous to see.

Anyway, back to my holiday. 123 days. It may be excessive to count down so far in advance, but I can't help it, I'm that excited.  I am starting off with 5 nights/6 days in New York with a couple of friends, doing the "tourist" thing as neither of them has been before. It will be nice to take people and show them New York, but I'm hoping being able to do that means that it won't feel repetitive as the majority of it I will have done before.  We shall be staying at the Affinia Manhattan during our time there, which should be a good base to do everything we want.

When my friends leave I will be heading down to Nashville, although I won't actually be spending that much time there - I have one full day (no travelling) and I'm spending it going to Lynchburg, TN to visit the Jack Daniels Distillery - I have wanted to go for the longest time, and I couldn't pass up the opportunity when it came about.  That only leaves me the evening of the 25th and the morning/early afternoon of the 26th before I have to get the Greyhound to Memphis, where I will be spending four nights at the Hampton Inn & Suites Memphis - Beale Street, leaving in the evening of the 30th to go to New Orleans.  When in New Orleans I will be staying at the Chateau Bourbon Wyndham Hotel, which is on the corner of Bourbon Street and I can't wait to explore.  New Orleans has been one of the places I've always wanted to visit in the US, and now I'm ecstatic that I finally get to do it, plus, it means I get to spend Halloween there, so that should be a lot of messy fun!  From New Orleans I'm going to Atlanta for three nights, staying at the Hilton Garden Inn Atlanta Downtown before heading back to New York on the 5th for a further three nights at the Ravel Hotel in Long Island City (which for those of you who don't know is actually in Queens, not on Long Island), right over the Queensboro Bridge from Manhattan, before I head home, although whilst I'm in New York for the last three days I'm thinking of flying up to Vermont for the day to visit the Ben & Jerry's Factory.  It all just depends on what I end up doing on the days I'm there.

I have had a bit of a nightmare with flights on this trip.  I thought I'd done really well, getting all my transportation and accommodation booked well in advance, only to have two of my flights change on me.  The first was my flight from LGA to BNA which was originally scheduled for 7pm, only to be changed to a 10pm flight.  When I looked after the change the 7pm flight was still showing as available, so I phoned up American Airlines who promptly moved me back to the 7pm flight.  This gets me in to Nashville at 8:35pm, which is a whole lot better than 11:20pm, which is the time I would have arrived had my flights remained the same.  The other flight was my big flight from MAN to JFK, which I originally booked with Delta - a direct flight, which was then cancelled and they put me on a flight that would take me through Paris, involve a change of planes, and add an extra 3 hours+ on each leg of my journey.  In the end, I had to cancel that flight and book on the American Airlines flight (direct and gets in to JFK a couple of hours earlier than the Delta one did and also earns me frequent flyer miles) which has cost me slightly over £100 more, but is the flight I wanted to go on originally anyway, and at least it's direct!

So that's my travel plans I have to look forward to. It's what keeps me going and gets me through the week when I'm having a hard time of it at work.  I would be nothing without music and travel to keep me sane. I'm always planning and thinking about where I am going next, and my aim for the year is to have at least 10,000 songs on my iTunes (only 492 to go - I think it's doable). Just got to keep positive and aiming for that next thing =c)