THE MISSION
THE ROUTE
THE CAMERA
THE DRIVING
THE ETERNAL YOUTH
THE BEST SLOGANS
THE OVERNIGHTS
THE FOOD & DRINK
THE BEER
THE POTATO CRISPS
THE WORST
MARION, OHIO
THE CAR
THE BATTLEFIELD
THE ALLERGIES
THE SHACKS
THE BATES MOTEL
THE CATS, DOGS & BIRDS
THE BREAKFASTS
THE CINNAMON BUN
THE FALLINGWATERS
THE COFFEE
THE MISSED
THE EM DASH
THE WEATHER
THE SIGHTS
THE FOLLIES
THE STORIES
THE FAMILY
THE HOMECOMING
THE PEOPLE

THE MISSION
Von and I needed to visit the States because there were two old ladies we thought we wanted to visit before it was too late. How wrong we were.

THE ROUTE
Manhattan, NY; Berlin, OH; Marion OH; Grantsville, MD; Washington DC; Ridgefield, CT; Riverside, CT; Port Washington, NY; Manhattan, NY. 1,650 miles.

THE CAMERA
You know what we do for a living. We license image rights. We work for fotoLibra, which is a picture library, or stock agency in America. I think we were somewhere above the Azores when I remembered I’d left the camera behind. The aeroplane nearly had to turn back. Martha very kindly came to the rescue and lent me hers, along with US adaptors and US plugs for the Mac. Thank you, Martha; it made our holiday.

THE DRIVING
Americans no longer drive at a boring 55. Many cars on the Interstate routinely passed us at 80, and the standard of driving seems to be higher than it used to be. In 1,650 miles, we didn’t see a single fender bender. They turned their lights on in bad visibility, they slowed down in bad weather and in general they behaved in a most civilised manner.

THE ETERNAL YOUTH
The two ladies we came to America to see were both 90 years old. To me that sounds old. Not to them. God is old. I reckon they’ve both got a good few decades left in them yet. And they are beautiful.

Minamarie Crane was the mother of my first best friend, whom I met in Berlin in 1955, when we were both 9 years old. Tommy went on to become a nuclear physicist and died of motor neurone disease. I never saw him after 1958, but my mother and Minamarie always stayed in touch. She is gorgeous, but then she always was. 75 at most.

Evelyn Berezin told us how as the only female physics student at Hunter College in the 1940s the boys all used to follow her home. And we weren’t surprised. Later Evelyn started and ran the Redactron Corporation, makers of the world’s first computer chip which they designed and shipped in September 1971 — Intel only sold their first chip in November 1971. This is how I got in touch with Evelyn: Why Is This Woman Not Famous and Goodbye Old Friend.

THE BEST SLOGANS
“It’s Not Rocket Surgery.”
[picture of a canoe] “Paddle faster. I hear banjos.”
An ad for a motel: “Have A Night’s Stay”.
The Four Horsemen Of The Eucalyptus (OK, that was Dede).

THE OVERNIGHTS
We stayed with friends, and in three shacks. How lucky we are. Mike & Martha put us up in Manhattan, David & Jane in Washington, Shân and Paul in Ridgefield, Lucy and John in Port Washington. What a privilege to be staying with the man who wrote the Lonely Planet guide to New York City. Shame we were in Washington DC. Thank you all so much!

THE FOOD & DRINK
I discovered Pisco Sours with Vince at Calle Ochos in Manhattan. Yum yum.

A wine list in Cork, a Washington DC wine bar, actually had two wines from Jura on its list. I was beyond impressed. Then I saw they were both Chardonnays. I don’t want to get too hints of raspberry and elderflower about this, but the whole point of the Jura region is the Savagnin grape which makes the vanishingly rare Vin jaune, with its own sherry-like flor. It’s cheaper and more commercial to plant the ubiquitous Chardonnay grape instead, which is driving out one of the most fascinating and unusual wines on the planet. Shame. We should boycott Chardonnay from the Jura. I did.

Snow Crab Claws in Grantsville, far western Maryland. If I’d attempted to finish them I’d still be there.

The smartest restaurant was the 1789 in Washington with Steve, Melanie, David & Jane. Photography was not permitted in the restaurant, which was where Barack Obama took Angela Merkel. Very posh for a first date.

I rather like bourbon. David had plenty. ‘Had’ being the operative word.

Jack cooked a gigantic pile of lobsters for us which just goes to show that a First from Oxford and a Master’s from Yale doesn’t make you a bad cook. The following day with Shân and Paul we went to Hopkins Vineyard in Connecticut — and we drank Connecticut wines! Rosé and Chardonnay, and they were perfectly potable.

Paul and Shân also used to have a bottle of some rare spirit, bless its pointed little head:

By Grand Central Station I Sat Down And Ate: The New York Strip in Michael Jordan’s Steakhouse in Grand Central Station was one of the best steaks I’ve had. And Cader erased his photographs!

We had an outstanding barbecue with Barbara & Craig in Port Washington …

and a great Mexican at Ah! Chihuahua on 53rd Street with Donna, Ellen and David.

THE BEER
It’s been 13 years since I last visited the States, and the outstanding difference is that America Now Has Great Beer! They have a huge variety of craft beers, and the very few I managed to sample were quite astonishingly good. It’s a pity the place is so far away.

THE POTATO CRISPS
Epiphantastic moment: The best potato crisps (potato chips to our American cousins) I have ever had in my life were in Havre de Grace, Maryland last Friday. (Incidentally that’s ‘havva duh Grace”, not “Arvrer de Grasse” as I assumed.) Until I arrived at Ridgefield, Connecticut that same evening, that is. America has reinvented the potato crisp. This is the Real Deal, They are spectacular; huge, thick and delicious. They’re handmade, and they only last a day. Sold on the day they are made, they are scrumptious. But no one in Britain would be brave enough to sell a product with a shelf life of 24 hours. Bread in Wales remains ‘fresh’ two weeks after purchase. These chips were handmade in the Havre de Grace restaurant and very similar chips are sold in the remarkable Stew Leonard’s shop in Danbury, Connecticut, the “Disneyland of Dairy Stores”. Everyone should visit a Stew Leonard’s shop; other than Fortnum & Mason and Fauchon I cannot think of any other food shop that could genuinely be classed as a tourist attraction.

THE WORST
The drive up the I-95 and New Jersey Turnpike on Friday from Washington DC to Ridgefield, CT. It took 90 minutes to get over the Geo Washington Bridge, then we hit the solid 684 north. We arrived at the traffic jam with an indicated 18:30 arrival time. After 5 minutes sitting in the stationary traffic our ETA was revised to 20:32. So Von swung across the median (central reservation to us) and re-routed south. The journey took three hours longer than we planned. And if that was the worst we had to endure during the holiday, we were indeed blessed.

MARION, OHIO
We arrived in Marion, Ohio, at lunchtime on Monday. Now I’m well aware that our idea of lunchtime and the American idea of lunchtime do not converge, and seldom include our obligatory two bottles of wine. But we were disappointed to find the one restaurant in Marion, Ohio, was closed — for lunch. In fact the whole of Marion, Ohio appeared closed, even the World Famous Popcorn Museum. A large hotel in the centre of town offered “TV & RADIO IN EVERY ROOM”. We found our B&B, just by Warren G Harding’s house, perhaps the worst President America has ever endured.

The B&B was deserted. It looked run down, like the rest of Marion. We knocked. I swear a white cat jumped up into every window. There was no answer. We went away.

Marion was one of the most run-down, depressing cities we’ve visited. Even a Marion native described it as “the armpit of America”. No names, no pack drill, Bill.

It’s called Marion, OH. It should be OH, Marion!

THE CAR
That famous Dutch artist Hertz van Rental lent us his blue Toyota Camry SE with optional Garmin satnav, which turned itself off every 10 minutes and was very annoying. The car was fine; quiet and comfortable, undemanding and thirsty (28.5 mpg which is worse than the Phaeton, but Americans have different gallons or something). Where the accelerator is in the Phaeton the Toyota has a volume control. You press it down and the engine gets much louder, although nothing perceptible happens. Someone spat chewing gum at the car and the stuff welded itself to the front wing in the heat. It was impossible to remove. Ach-y-fi.  I hope Hertz has a patent removal system. The car had a built-in reversing camera which was worse than useless and clearly bolted on just for showroom kudos.

My three nieces all have huge Audi Q7s. Are they working in concert?

THE BATTLEFIELD
Our host Denny at Shack II suggested we might like to visit the Antietam Civil War battlefield. I couldn’t understand him at first, having only seen the word in print and assuming it was Anti-Eatem. He pronounced it Anteedum. We went. It was harrowing. 27,000 soldiers killed or wounded. How futile. The introductory film was excellent, and we were left to drive ourselves around the huge battlefield. I have never seen so many separate monuments in my life; every state must have erected at least one.

THE ALLERGIES
The skin around my piggy little eyes was puffed, pink, flakey and raw from hay fever weeping. Eye wash, anti-histamine and conjunctivitis drops made less difference than time. After leaving Washington they were bearable, and I could actually see for a while. Now, a day after we got back to Blighty, the privet is in full flower and  I am weeping copiously again.

THE SHACKS
Three nights in a row we stayed on the road, having booked them through AirBNB. Did you know it was originally called Airbed & Breakfast? — because the Idea was that your overnight hosts would blow up an airbed for you. Mike & Martha and David & Jane joined in the spirit. The first night on the road was in Berlin, Ohio, the heart of Amish country, and we were thrilled to see a covered horse-drawn buggy trotting sedately along, with a reflective warning triangle stuck on the backboard. Then we saw another! And another. And another … Then, Oh look, there’s a buggy. The Amish do not appear to be under any threat of extinction any time soon.

We were, though. Restaurants in this part of the world shut at six, and they don’t sell wine. We do not consider KFC to be a restaurant. So we bought a Jack Daniel’s Brand Pulled Pork Ready Meal and a loaf of rye bread and guzzled it with a couple of G&Ts. The tonic helped to cut the absurdly over-sugared pulled pork. Does one really add sugar — that much sugar — to pulled pork? Anyway we survived. It was the worst meal of our trip. By a long chalk.

The second shack? Check out The Bates Motel entry.

And the third was in the wildest, remotest part of the Maryland panhandle, 2,600 feet up in the New Germany State Park. Hummingbirds floating round the stoop, one of the finest guitar collections I’ve seen, and our agreeable host Denny joined us for dinner, only partly because he could help us find a restaurant that served wine.

THE BATES MOTEL
After we described our first encounter with our B&B in Marion to them the Cranes urged us to stay with Minamarie. We’d booked, so we were obligated, so we returned. And we were delighted. Our host did bear a passing resemblance to Anthony Perkins but the house was grand, elegantly faded and had secret hidey-holes where escaping slaves had been hidden on the Underground Railroad. We stayed in the vast Presidents Room — eight US Presidents came from Ohio — and it was one of the most comfortable beds I have ever slept in.

THE CATS, DOGS & BIRDS
The Ellises had two cats, Ocean and Breeze. I never saw Breeze, but Ocean accepted me with some reserve. Cats are not allowed out of doors in Washington DC. Pixie, the Norman’s cat in Connecticut, was also not allowed out but that was because their other cat had gone out a month or so ago and never came back. There are bears in those woods.

Two weeks ago Tara’s Bengal cat had had her tail half bitten off by a coyote in suburban Riverside.

The Days had a lovely dog, a bundle of fur who loved chasing balls so much it was hard to tell if she was coming or going.

In Maryland we saw ruby-throated hummingbirds — ‘nasty, cruel birds,’ observed our host laconically. At Antietam we saw our first bright red cardinal of the trip and in Ridgefield we had a plethora of birds on the feeder — several varieties of woodpecker, a nuthatch, Mr & Mrs Cardinal and the spectacular American Goldfinch. Paul had earlier seen a pterodactyl, which excited him as you might well understand, but after further research he concluded it was probably a Pileated Woodpecker.

THE BREAKFASTS
Wow! I guess it might be possible to eat a healthy breakfast in America, but frankly, who would want to? I have a craving for cinnamon, and so it seems does the rest of America. But I also have a craving for crispy bacon, French toast, maple syrup, eggs easy over … need I go on? I think I put on a stone.

THE CINNAMON BUN
I think you need to read The Cinnamon Bun to understand the American concept of portion control.

THE FALLINGWATERS
You know the collective noun for a bunch of architects? It’s an Arrogance of Architects. Few have been more arrogant than the Welsh American Frank Lloyd Wright. When the Dean of the Florida Southern Baptist College rang to complain there was rain falling on his desk in his new office building, Lloyd Wright snarled “Move your desk.”

But what he achieved in the remote (to us Brits) Pennsylvania woodland is nothing short of sublime. Fallingwater is a breathtaking house, not very large, built on the banks of a cataract tumbling through deeply wooded land. It is strictly regimented — you can only visit through a compulsory $25 a head guided tour — but the tour is intelligent and informative. The docent can also field questions, so it’s not all done by rote. When the tour was over we walked down to the classic viewpoint of the house, and eventually Von had to tear me away. It is hypnotising. If you are ever in the Pittsburgh area, go, go, go!

And of course at Craig & Barbara’s BBQ we saw their own falling waters and his remarkable metal garden sculptures.

THE COFFEE
Charles Kuralt once remarked that American coffee was to real coffee what kissing your sister was to sex. By and large that’s true. Ordinary American coffee is weak, insipid and lukewarm — in case the vendor gets sued. Starbucks takes refuge in large cities; you don’t find branches in rural West Virginia. In places where they offer coffees other than Cona, they sometimes demonstrate an alarming streak of individuality. We found a stand offering lattes and cappuccinos near the Lincoln Memorial in DC. We opted for the latte, which had warm milk, no discernible coffee flavour and some revolting sweet gooey syrup. It was vile. WHY? why? Why not just coffee and hot milk? It works for the rest of the world.

At the swish Gilded Truffle (actually the ‘1789’) restaurant in Washington I horrified the waiter by asking him what they put in their cappuccinos, explaining that I’d suffered the corrosive experience of what Americans did to their coffee.

THE MISSED
Thom Tessier. Where are you, Thom? Steve Arkin. Next time, Steve!

THE EM DASH
This isn’t the place for an essay on fonts, but as I am The Knowledge Of All Fonts (thank you, Lorraine) I feel compelled to support my friends in their ongoing battles with editors who deprecate the use of the em dash. I use the em dash as a matter of course — though I suspect in America they use it without spaces—like this—and not — as in Britain — like this.

And in case you think I missed out an apostrophe in The Bates Motel paragraph about the Presidents Room, I didn’t. No President has stayed in the room, it simply had pictures of the eight Ohioan Presidents.

THE WEATHER
Hot, sunny, humid, cloudy, hot, rain, lightning, thunder, hot, humid, torrential rain, sticky, uncomfortable. Some people love it. I don’t enjoy profuse sweating.

THE SIGHTS
Nothing spectacular on this trip, apart from the sensational view Mike and Martha took us to see at the top of the new World Trade Center (the elevator ride is remarkable), the impressive High Line in Manhattan and of course the classic image of Fallingwater.

In Washington, the Big Pointy Thing, the Big Columny Thing and the Big Domey Thing (which was covered in scaffolding, of course). From the interstate, very little. Lots of trees and little else. On the highways, very pretty countryside. Parts of southern Ohio resembled Catalonia or Hampshire.

THE FOLLIES

There is an exact, full-size replica of the Mausoleum of Mausolus at Halicarnassus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, in Washington DC, otherwise known as the Temple of the Scottish Rite. I don’t believe Hiram Abiff designed this one.

A mysterious column topped with a spread eagle on an islet in Todd’s Point, CT.

And maybe Fallingwater, given its cost?

THE STORIES
As a child, David Masello and his two siblings had to ride around standing up with linked arms in the back of the family car because someone had nicked the rear seat.

Fireflies, only below the Mason Dixon line.

An American Bald Eagle deliberately flew into Manhattan and shat on Von just as we were walking into Michael Jordan’s Steakhouse (thank you Jennifer) in the fabulous Grand Central Station. It’s good luck, so they say.

We guzzled a Manhattan and a G&T with the Ellises at The Press Club in Washington DC, by the piano where Truman played for Lauren Bacall. When it comes to modern history, America has the rest of the world beat.

David Ellis told us that the streets nearest the centre of Washington were one syllable long, and you could tell how far you were from the centre by the number of syllables in the street name. Sounds fair to me, and also to anyone living in Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyndrobollllantysiliogogogoch. That’s quite far.

THE FAMILY
Shân is my niece. She lives in Ridgefield, CT. Lucy is my niece (and Shân’s sister). She lives in Port Washington, NY. Tara is my niece. She lives in Riverside, CT. Was it something I said?

THE HOMECOMING
Door to door from East 48th Street to Mount View Road took 11h 58m. I thought that was pretty good.

THE PEOPLE
Our holiday in the USA was a radical departure from our eremitical lives in London and Harlech. We had breakfast, lunch and / or dinner with friends and relations every day. So we’d like to thank Vince Chicarelli, Cheryl Chicarelli, Minamarie Crane, Susan Crane Pasters, Bill Pasters, Denny Merrill, David Ellis, Jane Lloyd Ellis, Nathaniel Ellis, Benjamin Ellis, Steve Carey, Melanie Kenderdine, Shân Norman, Paul Norman, Jack Norman, Ella Norman, Maddy Norman, Tamara Yiannakou, Senna Yiannakou, Fin Yiannakou, Lucy Day, John Day, William Day, Megan Day, Thomas Day, Craig Werle, Barbara Selvin, Andy Werle, Laura Werle, Donna Wilkinson, David Masello, Ellen Walsh, Evelyn Berezin, Michael Cader, Jennifer Mitchell, Lorraine Shanley and last but first, Martha Moran and Mike Shatzkin, without whom very little of this would have been possible.

We love you guys.

Yes, it’s Royal Academy Summer Exhibition time again, the Start of the Season, and the latest news in my personal battle with unimaginative or fearful artists who persist in drearily calling their works “Untitled.”

There were 26 of them this year, out of a total of 1,131 exhibits. Things are improving; that’s a 21% fall on last year. It must be my influence. And another sign of my increasing persuasiveness in the art world — no fewer than 14 of the artworks had Welsh subject matters, almost as many as there were of Venice. That has to be down to me. There’s lovely, yes?

One of the more disgusting of the Welsh subjects was a photograph of the flooded interior of Gaewern Slate Mine, a C-type photographic print by Robin Friend. I can’t show it to you here, because it’s a huge image and to see it smaller reduces it to incomprehension. The cavern has become a tip for wrecked cars, a Fuck The Environment statement. So sad. The photograph depicts the awesome scene in fantastic detail.

Breughel’s Tower of Babel is an image recognised in all civilised countries. I was surprised to notice it in the Summer Exhibition, until I cleverly spotted it was a photographic montage, Babel London (after Breughel) by Emily Allchurch, beautifully done to mock the follies of the City.

I loved a translucent acrylic chess set, Franklin’s Morals of Chess (Jade) which pitted London’s new architecture — the Shard, the Gherkin, the Walkie-Talkie — as black versus the white of the old — the Tower, St. Paul’s, Westminster Abbey.

My friends Mike & Martha would no doubt appreciate an intaglio plan of Croton Water Filtration Plant, New York, USA by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, beautifully constructed of wood with etched metal and alas not for sale.

I was amused to see our local Stroud Green launderette, on the corner of Ferme Park and Stapleton Hall Road, now appears as a work of art, Launderette, a mixed media collage by Dominic Mallin and Laura McEwen. It was hideous when it was reskinned in the 1980s and has become even hideouser now. But the artwork is only £190!

But of course the showstoppers were two sheds by the acclaimed Richard Bounford (who he?). My mate Trevor does alarmingly similar work and when he tracks this Richard feller down there’ll be hell to pay.

As always, it’s a wonderful, unmissable show. Go and see it.

The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition runs from June 8th to August 16th at The Royal Academy, Piccadilly, London W1J 0BD.