At last! We have managed to get online from our serviced apartment in Anaheim in Los Angeles. It didn't take very long actually. When I last travelled to the USA on business I tracked down a pay-as-you-go pan-USA Internet provider called NetZero (believe it or not - the subscription-free ISP model hasn't really taken off here in the America). NetZero requires you to download their own custom dialler/browser-launcher - which ensures that you can only connect using their "adware" dialler - and you have to put up with a pesky little java applet which you cannot get rid of or even minimise - and it occupies a good chunk of the precious screen-space on a laptop. Still - it's free because local calls from our hotel apartment are free - and for this I am not complaining! (Perhaps this is the reason why "free" Internet providers are not common in the US.)

Our flight from London Heathrow was delayed by about an hour due to the crew turning up late. It turns out that they had been delayed due to traffic on the M25. So we ended up sitting on the plane for quite some time before the air traffic controllers gave our captain permission to take off. We travelled Virgin - non-stop London to Los Angeles. Flight time was over 10 hours - so was pretty boring - especially for the kids. The good thing about Virgin is that they know how to keep kids happy - and those little TV screens on the back of every seat also double up as Nintendo games consoles. Kept me busy too ...

Most of the pics I have taken are off my family - it will be a few days before we will be in places where the scenery of the great outdoors is worth capturing alone.

Waiting to take off - economy class. Luckily for us - Virgin have probably the best value economy class in terms of space to stretch legs etc. on long flights like ours.

Mid-flight and the kids show no sign of tiring yet ...

Filling out those irritating Visa Waiver Forms. I had to do one for each of us - and it took me two attempts at each. One thing that puzzles me is why the US government would expect anybody to tick "Yes" to "are you now involved in espionage or sabotage or in terrorist activities; or genocide". And what does "moral turpitude" mean???

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