Final travel blog from USA soil

Wed 15 June

Said a farewell to Mike Jacobsen and his family, thanking them for their kind hospitality, hosting me the last two days. Went into Penn State University. The Uni has a student population of c.40,000 students at the ‘State College’ campus plus other campus sites. State College is truly a university town, around which everything revolves…The campus is immaculate and well laid out. The American Football field is massive and has a capacity of 110,000 people….as big as most premiership football teams in the UK, however only 6 games per year are played in the stadium and practise is elsewhere….Crikey!

Went to the forestry department with Mike Jacobsen and gave a presentation n EU and UK agroforestry including outlining what we are doing at Whitehall farm. Some useful discussion re ecological impacts and in particular use of different trees and biomas to benefit pollinators earlier in the season.

Filled the car with more inexpensive fuel (US$30 to fill the car c.£21!!)…and set out for route 80 east taking me through the heart of Pennsylvania and New Jersey to Newark Airport. Stopped for lunch and was unfortunate to be first on the scene of a motorbike/car accident…..poor chap got badly mangles and I helped by applying some pressure to a bloody wound. Thankfully the police came quickly and I departed – washed up / cleaned up. Thankfully I had already eaten my steak lunch….I may have thought differently had it been before lunch. Funny though, the Boy Scout training from 30 yrs ago kicked in….…….4.75 hrs later and after hunting for the hire car drop off for half an hour I arrive – seems the ‘hire car drop off’ signs don’t apply to Alamo hire car and I should have trusted my faultless Tom Tom on my iPhone….certainly the best purchase I made for the trip. It has taken me door to door everywhere without any problems – Im converted to iPhone and Tom Tom…..Technophobe goes all Tecky!!!

So now just the 8.5hr flight to London with Virgin Atlantic – Richard Branson better treat me well…..