October Odyssey – off again

38,266ft above the USA, the edge of the Rockies approaching at 500mph, Los Angeles 2 hours away.  My October travels start again.

After a hectic few days in the office preparing and rehearsing presenters for the Talis Insight Conference, I’m back over the Atlantic heading for Internet Librarian in Monterey.  Unlike my last trip to British Columbia, where I tacked on a couple of days me-time  at the end, I am reversing the process and tacking the me-time on the front.

Hiring a car at LAX, the plan was to drive south for an hour to a place called San Clemente, check in to a hotel for the night and then spend the next three days driving the 400 or so miles past LA up the coast to Monterey.

As I say, that was the plan, until California started to have problems with out of control fires.  Yesterday I checked the fire map Google Maps mashup hosted by the LA Times.  Its amazing how prevalent and natural these mashups are, it only seems like yesterday when I won some Google and Ordinance Survey goodies for producing a mashup of UK libraries.

Anyway I digress; I checked the map to discover the hotel I had booked  was located right next to one of the angry looking flames on the map.  I powered up Skype and rang the hotel.  “Is my reservation still OK to check in tomorrow night” I inquired.  “At the moment, yes” came the response “The fire is about five miles away, we should be OK, the freeway is between us and it.”

“Are you coming for business or pleasure” the hotelier then asked - “pleasure” I responded.  He then suggested, as this part of my trip is for pleasure, it might be worth reconsidering as “its raining ash here at the moment and it isn’t very pleasurable at all”.  His offer to allow me to cancel without penalty, coupled with his explanation that they could use the room for evacuees from the fire, convinced me to make alternative arrangements, which I have.

The wisdom of this decision was confirmed, during a call back to them to confirm I was not coming, when I overheard someone who I presume to be a local explaining how the National Guard were parked on her driveway.

A close examination of the fire map made it clear that it would be unwise to go anywhere near the Pacific coast north or south of LA.  I am therefore going to take my rental car  due north for about an hour and a half from LAX to a place called Lebec to rest for the night.  My first full day should take me, and the lady in the sat-nav due west to hit the coast about halfway between LA and Monterey. From then on we will see where the whim and the sat-nav lady takes me.

Unfortunately it won’t be all pleasure, I’ve got a presentation to prepare by Tuesday so I must make sure all my hotels have broadband!