Although I’ll be doing a fair bit of traveling in June, I’m committed to writing a daily blog this month.  I got up early this morning to head to Dulles Airport for my 8:15 am flight to Los Angeles.  And, since I’m writing this blog on the plane and since my mind is on travel, my topic for today for “Why I like Washington, DC” will be “location.”

For my travel purposes, Washington, DC is in a nearly perfect location.  It’s only a 45-minute flight (or 2 hour, 45-minute Amtrak Acela ride) to New York City, where many of my clients, business associates and friends are located.  And, within an approximately 2-hour flight window, we can fly to Miami and Boston (Philly is an easy 1 hour, 30-minute Amtrak ride).  It is a lengthy 5-hour ride to LA and San Francisco, but it’s a bit faster when flying back to the east coast from the west coast.

For international travel, DC is superbly located.  One can reach Europe in 6 to 7 hours, depending on where one is flying.  That means it’s only about 60 – 90 minutes longer to reach Europe than it is to fly to the west coast.  Two other international cities I fly to frequently are Montreal and Rio de Janerio.  It’s only a 75-minute flight to Montreal.  It does take 9.5 hours to fly to Rio de Janeiro but it’s a direct flight (and pretty easy when one flies overnight).

The other international area I fly to on a regular basis is Asia.  Of course, it’s much better being located on the west coast for flights to Asia.  But, there are now direct flights from Dulles to both Tokyo and Beijing.

In regard to areas of interest that one can drive to in under two hours or less from DC, there are many,  wonderful places to visit, including Baltimore, Annapolis and Richmond.  It does take another 30 minutes but one can also visit the beach towns of Ocean City, Bethany, Dewey and Rehoboth within 2.5 hours.

As always, this blog posting is just is one person’s opinion.  But, for my specific travel purposes – for both business and personal reasons – Washington, DC is ideally and centrally located.