We're Here !

And the photo opportunities look great! We had to wait at the gate on Sunday night to see if the ash cloud would move enought to allow us to land in Manchester. After a two-hour delay we were told we were good to go! Landed here about mid-day on Monday.

Drove down to Hereford. I'm staying at a hotel out in the country. It is great being able to see the countryside. I don't know which is worse: driving on the left-hand side of the road, or doing it in a car with a manual transmission!

I am very comfortable with a manual transmission. My pickup has a manual. But since the steering wheel is on the "wrong" side of the car the shifter is under my left hand, not my right. I've missed a shift a time or two while waving my right hand around in the air looking for the knob. In town I've been driving with my left on the shifter as a reminder. That seems to help.

Work has been good. There were several topics that have been open from before I went on vacation. We've gotten good information by being here on site, and are making great progress on them. Next week we are changing the work schedule to be better able to support the teams back in Pennsylvania and Minnesota. That means I don't come into the office until late morning. It may give me the opportunity for some early morning sunrise photo shoots before I head into the office.

Last night I took a drive out through the country to check out some hiking sites for this weekend. I found a little village with an old church that should provide some great sundown shooting if today's partially sunny weather holds. The weather forecast for the weekend is great. Partially cloudy and temps upto 24C (80'ish !)

We're working hard and enjoying experiencing the new culture. More reports to come!