Once again, I’m in Austin for SXSW Interactive; the forth time I’ve attended an event I find easy to disparage. Yet this is the first stop on a trip that will take in several hundred miles of Interstate highway between here and San Francisco; two points of familiarity on an itinerary that promises to be anything but predictable.
For the final leg of my North American tour I transcended the West Coast on Amtrak’s Coast Starlight. Getting to San Francisco wouldn’t be much fun, boarding a coach in Vancouver at a ridiculous hour in the morning and dealing with an offensive US border guard before arriving at a closed King Street station in Seattle sounding its fire alarm.
As I walked the streets of San Francisco, buoyed by their comfortable familiarity and unique soundtrack, I knew that this was still a city I could never call home.
Exploring New York and San Francisco with my friend Ellen, who braved the long flight over the Atlantic to come and visit me in America.
Some thoughts after spending a few days in the Netherlands second city.