One thing that never changes on a White House trip, no matter where in the world we are travelling, are the extremely long days on the go. You are running off planes and into the back of deafening military helicopters which sometimes spew hot oil all over your clothes, and then jump into the motorcade. Repeat three more times in one day and you start to get the picture. Actually I love all of it. It’s definitely an adrenalin rush and sometimes it’s adrenalin alone that will get you through a tough day. We normally assemble at 6-7am and sometimes finish at midnight if there is a state dinner or such. On one of the days, we awake in Tanzania, fly to Rwanda for a full day’s schedule, then get back on the plane and fly six hours to Ghana. On the last day, we leave Ghana, cover Bush’s historic trip to Liberia, then overnight on Air Force One back to Washington. The long days working in unfamiliar environments, hoping you don’t have to break out the satellite phone to transmit your pictures (we never did), and constant time zone changes eventually take their toll on everyone and thankfully most trips don’t last more than a week. But the longer it goes, the more “silly” things start happening to people, sometimes with painful consequences.
