I've been keeping it secret for a while, whilst everything was being orgainsed - just in case it all fell through. But now I can reveal what I've been plotting for the last few months.

I'm going to be traveling to New York, and from there traveling by rail to San Francisco stopping off at loads of locations along the way.

I'll be in the States for the best part of a month, with a couple of days in London either side of that. So, its a big, big trip and I'm rather excited about it, as well as a little nervous.

As strange as it may sound, I've never really had the inclination to visit a particular place in the USA, but I've always wanted to go coast-to-coast. By that, I mean I've never fancied just spending a trip in just one location and with this trip, I will most certainly not be doing that. What has always interested me is just how diverse the landscape is in America. The country has it all from deserts to dense forests, mountain chains to vast plains. Traveling by train, I should get to see this huge country just unfold in front of me.

I'll be staying multiple nights in the big cities - New York, Washington, Chicago, Dever, Los Angeles and San Francisco, and visiting national parks and of course the Grand Canyon. But I'll also be traveling along scenic railroads at a sedate pace through spectacular scenery. The thoughts of photographing scenes as diverse as the Washington Monument and the rock formations of monument valley, just fill me with an emotion I can only assume is joy. I intend to document the entire journey and upload photos and videos as it progresses - after all I'll have plenty of time during some of the journeys. I've already got a nice little app for the iPhone that allows me to log my location on a map, which will create a trail of my journey that I can post on this site.

As you can imagine I've had my head buried in Google, and Google Earth for the last few weeks scouting out the places I'll be visiting and finding out things to do at the various stops. I'm starting to build up a list of 'must do' items, and 'must shoot' photos. There is no point in sharing this list right now, as it is changing every day.

The only little fly in the ointment is that the NBA and NHL aren't running when I'll be visiting. The MLB is though, and I'll have to look at the schedule to see if any fixtures correspond with the places I'm visiting. I'm going to be seeing an NFL match this year, although in the ultimate irony, it will be at Wembley in London. Yep, I'm going to travel the breadth of the USA and then watch American Football in England.

The next few months are going to go very slowly.