San Francisco

We flew out of the UK on the 1st of January after a long drive from Suffolk to Heathrow (thanks to our chauffeurs Matt and Heather).

We were flying with United Airlines, who had appeared to have the biggest possible luggage allowance. We turned up with 2 enormous suitcases and a bag of diving gear each, after being assured by the staff on a phone line that we were entitled to do so. Unfortunately, their ground staff hadn't been told. We had a lengthy discussion with various members of United's staff, who told us we were wrong and refused to acknowledge that we had been told we were ok with this luggage. We were charged £140 for our diving bags. Bugger.

The flight was worse. We were lucky to be sat together at all, after being told at check-in no pairs of seats were available (much thanks to the check-in girl who must have done something very clever by the time we arrived in the departure lounge). Embarkation was chaos, as the stewards and stewardesses stood around while the passengers tried to guess where their seats might be, and fought for luggage space. Repeated tannoy announcements told us to get on with it, while the more intellectually and physically able passengers directed their co-passengers to their seats (row = number, seat = letter - how difficult is this?) and stowed their luggage. Once we were all set we taxied off, having missed our take-off slot by 30 minutes, to the sound of a steward loudly complaining to his colleagues that someone had had the cheek to move one of his bags on top of the other one to make more space.

I could go on at some length about the disaster that is customer relations and United Airlines, but will try and limit myself. I do have to express outrage that we had to pay for any drink containing alcohol, including the wine for our meals. I think I should also mention the amazing response of the stewards to the significant turbulence we encountered. In the first instance this consisted of loud serial proclamations of "Shit! ... Shit! ... Shit!" as we bumped along - clearly heard by occupants of the rear of the plane. Secondly, on our final descent in high wind, thick cloud and driving rain, we were encouraged to hear another of our fantastic staff explain to his colleague: "oh yeah, this is bad ... look at the weather ... we're being held back ... you know, the pilots can't see a thing ... this is when they earn their money ..." etc. This monologue certainly soothed those passengers already looking green from the fairground-like gyrations the plane was performing.

And that isn't everything. I broke a nail. I'm suing.

Still I can relax now. We have ate, drunk and slept well with our hosts in SF, Kieron and Kubi. The weather hasn't been too kind to us so far, being about as rainy as it could get, but we hope for improvement. We have the low-down on the best shopping, the best travel cards (which you are not able to buy in any of the stations or on the transport itself - I wonder if United Airlines are involved) and the various tourist attractions worth checking out. Indeed I can sit here and type this while Jo has a snooze and our hosts search the shops of our locality for our tea. What good eggs they are.

And that's it for now. Thanks for listening.

Seán x

"A meal without wine is like a day without sunshine." -- Jean Anthelme Brillat Savarin, never employed by United Airlines