Another American blog from a visiting Australian

To my patient readers, welcome. It's been two years since I blogged about my trip to Philadelphia and New York City, and now I am going to do it again.

We start in Perth, Western Australia. Cathay Pacific earned our trust this time around, and after a kindly drop-off at the airport by my beloved daughter, Lynda and commence the journey to Washington via Hong Kong.

The trip Perth to Hong Kong takes 8 hours, and we arrive a bit tired. We had planned to take a trip into the city during the day as our connecting flight doesn't leave until late afternoon, sadly there was a mix-up with the tour guide so the planned trip doesn't happen. We catch the express train to the city just in time to meet a heavy downpour, so a quick walking tour is off, ducks.

We're a bit peckish, so we adjourn to the Michelin-rated Hung's Delicacies for a taste of their amazing marinated goose. Very satisfactory with a strange tofu side dish. We had no chance with the set menu (see pic) but by pointing at the menu we got a few dishes and some wine.

Goose  slices with Tofu

A few hours and brain cells were killed in the airport bar - coffee, wine and wifi and then back on the plane for 14 hours of tedium to Newark, New Jersey.

We had decided not to book a train from Newark to Washington on the assumption that the trains are every 20 minutes around 9:00 o'clock. This is absolutely true at 9:00 am, but alas less so at 9:00 pm. For whatever reason there were no seats on any train leaving Newark until well into the next day, so we caught a train to Penn Station NYC and then a 3am train to Washington DC.

The Marriott Wardman Park hotel is out of the main city, near a zoo and the embassy district, It's a massive "convention centre plus towers" and a typical venue for the NACUA conference.

 Staggering into Reception at breakfast time, we check-in, hit the breakfast buffet and adjourn for a snooze. As the sun sets, we walk nearby to the main street where there are a series of perfectly good restaurants. At Medaterra Restaurant we enjoy a good and large meal and are enchanted by a little firefly buzzing around the table and every so often lighting its end with a green bio-energy glow.

Ginger Chicken and Fries