Hailstorm in Tallahassee

Hailstones in Tallahassee

Sunday, February 23, 2013

Tallahassee, FL

Gardens of Weems Plantation

Around 5 PM there was Hailstorm in our neighborhood. VTS went around took some pictures. We returned home to see hails size of a dime.

The hails from this evening's hailstorm around our neighborhood (Gardens of Weems Plantation) on Sunday, February 24, 2013.

Travel to Philadelphia, PA

Trip to Philadelphia, PA

Sat, Feb 2, 2013

I traveled to Philly from Tally via US Airways / United flight. I was traveling to Philadelphia to attend the fifty-seventh annual biophysical society meeting.

I left on the afternoon with okay weather both in Tallahassee and at Charlotte, North Carolina. But the weather in Philadelphia was cold, windy and below freezing.

In Tallahassee airport there is a free wi-fi service and it is called 'Digital Canopy'. I used it to check my e-mail and weather reports. This time I carried by Virgin Mobile USA smart phone too. That came in handy for checking news and weather updates.

I had a 1 1/2 hour lay-over in Charlotte, NC. At Charlotte airport also there was a free wi-fi service. The free wi-fi service was called 'CLTNET'. Once again I checked my e-mails and listened to Internet music on my smartphone.

By the time I arrived in Philly, it was dark, cold and snow flurries started falling. I collected my luggage and from the Terminal B, I went to the SEPTA regional railroad station. Fortunately, there was train within 10 minutes of my arrival. I took the train and got off at Suburban Railway station.

My hotel was a block from the 19th Street and JFK Street in downtown Philly. I called home and went to bed after a shower.

Travel Back home

Back to the US

Saturday, Dec 8 and Sunday Dec 9, 2012

Chennai - Dubai - New York - Jacksonville -Tallahassee

We left late in the afternoon around 5:30 PM from Chengalpattu in Thiyagu's SUV with another car carrying the luggage and my siblings families. We arrived at the Chennai International Airport Departure area around 7:00 PM and Bhanu had just arrived.

We said goodbye to our folks and checked into our Chennai Dubai flight EK547. The flight was delayed by 30 minutes and flew over the Arabian Sea. However, as it approached Dubai we were further delayed due to the unavailability of landing place ended by landing an hour late outside the gates and needed to use a bus to get to the Terminal 3.

We barely made it to our next flight to New York JFK and hoped our luggage would make. The flight EK203 a Boeing 777-300ER was also delayed fortunately since many people were still boarding past the scheduled departure time. We hoped this would be good flight since the duration was 14 1/2 hours long. It was okay due to good entertainment system called ICE.

We arrived an hour late in New York and went through the immigration and customs clearance and rechecked our bags to Jacksonville and waited for another delayed flight to JAX. Finally we left at 4 PM and arrived in JAX by 6 PM via jetBlue.

We picked our car and drove home stopping at a Taco Bell for dinner. By the time we arrived home it was almost 9:45 PM.

Visit Sripuram Lakshmi Narayani Temple

Visit Sripuram Lakshmi Narayani Temple

Sripuram (Malaikodi), Vellore, Tamilnadu

Thursday, December 6, 2012

 

With Thiyagu I went to Vellore to my relatives. We had planned to visit the "Golden Temple of Tamil Nadu" aka, Sripuram Lakshmi Narayni Temple but we were running late when we arrived at Vellore.

 

 

However, our realtive was ready and took us to the temple. We barely made it in time for the regular temple visiting time. The temple, the architecture, the surroundings were very impressive. We spent about 1 1/2 h at the temple.



Visit NESCO at Kalpakkam for karate tournament

Visit NESCO at Kalpakkam for karate tournament

Sunday, Dec 02, 2012

NESCO, Kalpakkam

Tamilnadu

Today we left around 6:30 PM with Arjun and Anita toward Kalpakkam NESCO auditorium to participate in the Kacheepuram district Karate tournament for Arjun. We arrived there by 7:45 AM and the tournament participants were required to be there by 8 AM. We had breakfast in the Mahindra XYLO SUV and headed to the site. There weren't that many people and it took about 1 1/2 hour before everything started to fall in place.

Arjun didn't participated in the katta part but did so on the individual fighting competition. The event was over by 12:30 PM and we headed home and arrived at Chengalpattu by 1:45 PM.

Travel to Chennai via Dubai

Travel to Chennai via Dubai

Wed, Nov 28 - Fri, Nov 30, 2012

JAX-JFK-DBX-MAA

jetBlue connection to Emirates

 

We traveled to Chennai from Jacksonville, FL (via jetBlue) through New York JFK international airport (via Emirates) and through Dubai international airport.

JFK-Dubai 12:30 hrs non-stop flight (EK 202)

We left around 6 PM at JAX and arrived at JFK around 9 PM. Then at JFK we left around 11 PM and arrived the next night 9 PM at DBX. This flight was Airbus 380 with almost 500 passenger capacity. It was big and nice entertainment program. Our 12 1/2 flight was okay.

Then from DBX we left around 3 AM and arrived at Chennai by 8 AM on Friday Nov 30, 2012.

Visit UCF and USF

Visit University of Central Florida & University of South Florida

Monday, August 13, 2012

Orlando and Tampa, Florida

We started early in the morning from our La Quinta Inn in Orlando (very good place to stay) and headed to University of Central Florida. However, since we couldn't pre-register for the tour we went around the campus using UCF's self-guided tour. Then at 10 AM we attended the information session which lasted about 35 minutes.

We then drove to a near by K-Mart to get some school merchandise and had lunch at a Subway nearby.

We then drove on I-4 West toward Tampa. Three-fourths on our way it started to rain heavily and that slowed our travel. We finally around 2:10 PM at the USF campus and missed part of the information session. Due to the rain the student tour was also delayed. Then around 3:05 PM we started the tour and we like the campus. We followed the tour until about 4 PM and left for home.

We stopped in Ocala to have dinner and arrived have around 9:30 PM.