Day 1 - May 31 - London - Chicago

 jump to: Day 2A Pre-trip


After traveling up to Heathrow Wednesday afternoon and staying at Travelodge 'Terminal 5' we were awake early and left the hotel for the short drive to Terminal 3, where we were met by the valet parking man from Purple Parking.

We had to deal with a dodgy self-service check-in machine at American Airlines (unfortunately they don't offer on-line check-in for Heathrow flights), then through a preliminary check by A.A. before dropping off the checked in bags.

After that it was through security and then we decided on Strada for breakfast.
Following breakfast we had about 90 minutes to kill before boarding was due to start.

While waiting we met up with the first couple who were on the same tour as us - Andrew & Wendy from the Isle of Wight. The 90 minutes soon passed and we boarded on time, but unfortunately we were a bit late taking off, Eight hours later we landed with a bump Chicago O'Hare International airport and started the usual performance of US immigration, customs, baggage reclaim, all without a hitch.

By now we were outside the terminal with the 9 other people on out tour who were on the same flight, and a quick phone call to the hotel had the courtesy bus on its way to pick us up. The airport shuttle soon has us at the Doubletree Hotel at Rosemont. Here we found the California Sunriders representative, our guide for the tour, Gary. We did our check-in, had a quick chat with Gary and then up to the room to get ourselves sorted.

While Mrs. K. was doing what she does best (taking care of re-packing the bags) I went back down to see Gary and get the paperwork sorted out for the bike hire. Thankfully I had everything I needed with me (basically Full bike driving licence and a credit card) and so after singing several forms we were done.

There was a pre-tour meeting arranged with everybody with Gary for 7PM, so in the meantime  back to the room for a room service order for tea.
The meeting lasted about an hour and covered various topics like...

• We'll have a riders briefing at the start and at the end of each day
• How we'll ride as a group, do's and don'ts
• For the next day we'll meet for our welcome breakfast at 7 am, Load up the truck with our luggage at 8 am, and we'll leave at 8.30 bound for the bike pickup at Chicago Harley-Davidson.

By now it was about 9 pm, and we were struggling to keep awake (remember that back in the UK it would have been 3 am!) and so by 9.30 we were in bed, lights out shortly after.

As predicted, at about 1 am we were awake, and really unable to get back to sleep - hopefully it'll be better tomorrow.

 jump to: Day 2A Pre-trip