Visited California, come back with no jetlag

Life has been busy as usually just before Christmas. Anyhow, I spent a few days in California at the end of last week, and finally have enough time to write a few words of the trip.

I flied with BA and I’m hooked to their service now. The planes were much nicer compared to Lufthansa and especially United — whose planes seem to be running down more and more every year.

I arrived to SFO and went through immigration and customs with surprisingly easy. Maybe the early arrival time helped, as there were virtually no queues. My bags arrived also timely and I could continue to Airtrain and to Hertz.

My rental car was a Hertz Prestige Collection model, so I could go to the Hertz Gold Club office that has nobody to serve me. Talk about premium service! Finally, a lady appeared and after taking my details informed me that my Infiniti G35 is not available. Then they offered first Audi A4 convertible, an SUV, a Hummer and then Nissan Z350. The last one would have been nice, but then they miraculously found an Infiniti from some bowels of their garage.

The car was a disappointment; huge powerful engine that responded too briskly every time you step on the accelerator. It was a bumpy ride without bumps on the road. On the highways, the big motor helped to overpass and join the traffic flows.

I bunked the three first nights in W Silicon Valley, a luxury / boutique hotel in middle of nowhere. The room was spacious and nice, but the restrooms showed that the building has not been designed as a W Hotel — the usual cardboard style walls you see in most US hotels.

Amenities and such were the normal W level, and as an additional bonus, the room had a microwave oven and dishes for two. Would be nice hotel for our family, too.

Most of the days were spent in business meetings around Silicon Valley and SF Bay Area, and then I just crashed on the bed. I woke up early morning, between 2 and 5 AM, so I had time to run some remote errands in Finland.

On Friday, I visited Petteri in Google and was shown around the campus. Had also a lunch in one of Google’s cafeterias. Nice place. Not sure about working there, however.

I visited a few stores and bought the usual stuff: Banana Republic t-shirts, legos for Aapo and books.

On Saturday, I checked out from the hotel (was the easiest check outs ever, just checked the bill in my room and walked out), returned the car to SFO and took BART to Mission district in San Francisco. I spent the Saturday evening and Sunday morning with Jyri, Ulla and Eliel, in their nice flat in Mission and around the town.

I run a 45 minute shopping spree in downtown San Francisco. Had time to visit about a dozen of stores — fortunately I’ve learned the streets quite well — and bought a bit too much. Can’t say much more, as one of the items was a Christmas gift for my wife.

BA took me back to London and then to Helsinki. I was here at 1.00 AM on Tuesday morning. Four days of hectic work ahead of me and a fear of jetlag hitting any moment.

It didn’t happen. For some odd reason, I completely avoided jetlag this time. I was tired, yes, but not drowsy and had no problems sleeping full nights with normal schedule. Strange, but satisfying.