London

We arrived back in the UK on Tuesday morning to a gloriously sunny day and our driver, Audley, was waiting for us at Terminal 5. It was a quick journey home through light London traffic, helped by the Chiswick Flyover repairs being suspended from now until the end of the Olympics. As a result, the long queues we have had to suffer for the past few months, on our way into London from Heathrow, were nowhere to be seen!

It is always difficult adjusting to a 'normal' life after a drive lasting a month, when virtually every day you are unpacking bags into a hotel room and moving on the next day. That being said, sleeping in your own bed again really helps!

So, what are our highlights of the drive? Here are a few - in date order.

Meeting up with our Texan friends - Kenny and Dee Anne and Fred and Ernie in Scottsdale, on the first night of the drive.

Seeing Yellowstone National Park in all its glory with its incredible geysers and scenery. The snow and then the sunshine certainly added to our sense of awe at such a beautiful place.

The drive out of Yellowstone along Wyoming's fabulous Chief Joseph Scenic Highway.

Also in Wyoming, the Devil's Tower, because it is such an impressive monument.

Next on the list are the amazing mountain sculptures in the Black Hills of South Dakota - the four presidents at Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse near Custer. They definitely did not disappoint us.

Moving on, it has to be the incredible Badlands of South Dakota. None of us could believe the amazing colours of the rock formations.

On into Nebraska to Omaha. Neither of us was expecting much of this mid-west city, but we both 'fell in love' with the place and, once again, we left there saying, 'we will be back'.

Then we come to Oklahoma and the wonderful Tallgrass Prairie Preserve. We need to come back in the late summer, when the grass is six feet high, to get a real feel for how it was when the first settlers came to the mid-west.

On into Arkansas and the great city of Little Rock. We discovered the Capital Hotel, which is now on our list of the top ten best hotels in the world. Then there was the Clinton Library and, opposite our hotel, the magnificent Old State House. Added to these the part Little Rock played in the ending of segregation in the 1960s and we came away wanting to return and see more!

My personal top highlight goes to the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. So much of the Centre reminded me of my teenage years, when I avidly watched every manned space launch, from the launches of the Mercury 7 astronauts into earth orbit in the early 1960s to the Apollo astronauts going to the moon on board the mighty Saturn V rockets ten years later. More recently, I have followed every Shuttle launch, including the 1986 Challenger disaster. For me to see so much space history in one place was incredible. The day simply flew by!

So, there it is. Another wonderful drive is over. Now I have to start thinking of when and where next? 2013 is looking rather full with, among other things, our expedition cruise in August, which goes from Iceland via Greenland to Churchill on the shores of Hudson Bay, Canada. So, we may give the 'drives' a miss next year and start them again in 2014. Perhaps my longstanding wish to traverse Russia will be fulfilled. Who knows? The world is our oyster!!