Editors Note: We enjoyed the tour diaries J. Tom Hnatow wrote for us as part of These United States’ last tour, so we asked him if he wouldn’t mind doing it again as the band embark on their first ever intercontinental tour of the UK and Europe. He graciously agreed. This is the third installment of an ongoing series.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007
A leisurely breakfast, then off to Bath. Bath is stunningly beautiful. And with three universities, it has a thriving city center – plenty of parks and people out and about, despite the cold.

We play in the basement of a place called the Porter. Our contact there, Hollis, takes great care of us. It’s free to get in, so the audience is talkative. Combined with all of our collective exhaustion (and Hollis’ generosity), we put on a unique show. At one point, Jesse stands up on top of a table in the middle of the audience. We also get our first encore of the tour, which is exciting. We get to spend a few hours hanging out after the show, then crash for – literally – 2 hours.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007
As Hollis is coming back to his house from partying, he wakes us up and we’re on our way again. We leave on a 6:15 a.m. train, starting out in Bath and ending up in Paris, France. We all stagger our way through the day, napping on the train and every moment we can. The highlight is catching the ferry from Dover across the channel to Calais. The three of us get a cheap bottle of wine, some cheese and bread, and celebrate as we watch the waves break across the immense bow — pictures don’t do the ferries justice — in addition to the hundreds of people and cars, there are 50 to 60 full size 18 wheelers.

We land in Calais, discover that Mark’s French is a little shaky, and after a 30 minute sprint to the station (we miss our planned train anyway), we’re on…another train, en route to Paris.