My Other Sabbatical Travels

My sabbatical at Brown University in the second half of 1983 gave me the opportunity to travel quite widely. I started my trip in the north-east of Italy at a little town called Udine, where I presented a paper at a prestigious international conference called Plasticity Today. After the conference I spent the weekend in Venice and then a few days in Rome where I got to see the Pope bless the crowd in St Peter's Square. Then it was on to London to visit old friends and finally a few days with my brother Paul in Swansea.

From London I flew to Boston and then by bus to Providence, Rhode Island, home of Brown University. For the next six months I was to stay in the house of a Brown professor called Don, while Don was to stay in my house in Cape Town while he was visiting UCT. Don's rambling house was on a huge plot in Barrington, an upmarket suburb of Providence. I also had the use of Dan's elegant Buick car which I used to commute to work and explore the countryside, including the surrounding states of Connnecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine. I also made quite a few trips by train to New York.

As it happened, I was there during the running of The America's Cup, a few miles down the road in Newport. I went down to see the yachts and watch a race or two, as well as imbibe the festive spirit of the occasion. It was a momentous occassion because for the first time ever the Americans lost and the cup went to the Aussies.

Shortly after I arrived in the states I went to Hawaii on a windsurfing holiday. I flew out via San Fransisco where I spend a few days sightseeing, and flew back via Los Angeles where I stayed with friends. I saw Hollywood and stuff but mostly wandered the LA beaches. I spent a whole day cycling from one end of LA to the other along the beach track.

When my time at Brown drew to an end in January 1984 I went back to San Fransisco to visit my friend Peter at Stanford University, and hook up with my ex, Liz. Peter had been at Brown when I was there and we were the same age with similar engineering interests. He is still an emeritus professor at Stanford, nearly forty years later.

Liz and I went up to Lake Tahoe and then on to Reno, Nevada, where we checked out the marriage chapels! Liz and I flew home together from San Fransisco, via New York.