Last day of our holiday before heading back to the real world. Booo!
We left Anaheim early as were were heading up the coast to Santa Barbara.
We drove there via the Hollywood Sign as we missed it the first time we were in Hollywood.
Santa Barbara was a nice place. We bought adapters for the plane so we could use proper headphones on the flight home and had tasty tasty Vietnamese soup for lunch (it calmed the America Belly for a while).
BUT
After that was the real reason we drove all the way through the smog to Santa Barbara. THE AGGROLITES! They played on the beach and there were only a few people there. being one of my favourite bands and because they played so well I broke my "Owen doesn't dance" rule for this one off performance. It was freaking brilliant.
Straight after they finished their set by playing their version of Don't Let Me Down by The Beatles, we raced back to the car and gunned it down the freeway back to LAX for our (very full) flight home.
A tear was shed on takeoff in memory of all the good times I had on my trip, but in the back of my mind was the foundations of my next overseas trip being built...
Thanks to all the people we hung out with, met, had wicked adventures with etc and so forth, you guys really made the trip. I made a bunch of new friends and a million new memories to go with them.
Big ups especially to Justin and Sarah Larson, who not only were our reason for travelling to the USA, but looked after us and we had the best time with. You guys are brilliant and your wedding was the most fun/best laugh I'd had in a very long time!
Thanks :)
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Friday, September 18, 2009
Anaheim
Unfortunately we had to leave San Fran, and after dealing with Airlines again (groan) but this time getting our way, we arrived in LA. This time on arrival at LAX, we knew where to go and weren't needing to wait for public transport as we were hiring a car with GPS. Now, I know, LA traffic can be terrible, but thanks to two people in the car and carpool lanes we had NO problems. I love carpool lanes.
ANYWAY
After being adored by some Subway staff over lunch (and Esther proceeding to spill her drink everywhere on their floor) we arrived at our hotel, which turned out to be really good. As it was owned by Australians and as we were Australian (and still are), the guys at reception was mega nice to us and kept telling us how they reserved us a room that opened out into the pool. So much so that after being in our room for 10 mins they called us up to see if we could see the pool!
We rested all afternoon because that night was HOCKEY NIGHT! We went to the Honda Center to see the Mighty Ducks! They lost to the Vancouver Canucks but I ate giant pretzels and was happy.
What I have dubbed "America Belly" had well and truely set in by this point. It's a phenomena where after two and a bit weeks in the USA your body just starts rejecting food unless it's a bread based product. Pretty bad.
ANYWAY
After being adored by some Subway staff over lunch (and Esther proceeding to spill her drink everywhere on their floor) we arrived at our hotel, which turned out to be really good. As it was owned by Australians and as we were Australian (and still are), the guys at reception was mega nice to us and kept telling us how they reserved us a room that opened out into the pool. So much so that after being in our room for 10 mins they called us up to see if we could see the pool!
We rested all afternoon because that night was HOCKEY NIGHT! We went to the Honda Center to see the Mighty Ducks! They lost to the Vancouver Canucks but I ate giant pretzels and was happy.
What I have dubbed "America Belly" had well and truely set in by this point. It's a phenomena where after two and a bit weeks in the USA your body just starts rejecting food unless it's a bread based product. Pretty bad.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
San Francisco - part 2
Day 4 of San Francisco was nice and relaxing. We went to the SFMOMA and Esther got in for free! Some guy outside the place gave us a free ticket. He apparently was given free tix as part of some promotion and when he turned up he just gave the spare one away at the door. What a nice dude.
They had some Pollocks, Mondrians and most importantly Warhols (good dude) to look at, so that was pretty awesome. I don't really remember what else we did that day, but it was very relaxing.
Day 5 was full of things to do. It started off by catching the trolley bus to a store Esther heard of that sold different types of type! Letters taken from all kinds of signs and shops and things were for sale. We got a couple each and headed over to see the Painted Ladies AKA The Full House Houses. After taking many photos of each other messing around in the park, we went down the road for some awesome 'Weiners' from Rosamunde Sausage Grill and eat them in Toronado pub over a tasty beer. These two places were recommended by Liz (who told us about Zeitgeist) and were just as awesome.
We then went down to The Emarcadero to take photos of and ride on the trams they have (much fun), then headed up to Coit Tower after walking UP the 2nd steepest street in the Western hemisphere. The view was brilliant :)
We descended and ate some bad cheesecake, thus confirming that the USA does NOT know how to use anything dairy related (all milk and cheese products are terrible, sorry guys).
That night we were picked up by Sally, a friend of ours from Sydney who now lives in San Fran and were taken to AT&T Park to see the San Francisco Giants play against the Colorado Rockies. They lost, but I had a brilliant time and took my hotdog tally for the day up to 5.
It as also our last night in San Fran. Kinda sad to leave the place I like so much, but there were more things to do!
They had some Pollocks, Mondrians and most importantly Warhols (good dude) to look at, so that was pretty awesome. I don't really remember what else we did that day, but it was very relaxing.
Day 5 was full of things to do. It started off by catching the trolley bus to a store Esther heard of that sold different types of type! Letters taken from all kinds of signs and shops and things were for sale. We got a couple each and headed over to see the Painted Ladies AKA The Full House Houses. After taking many photos of each other messing around in the park, we went down the road for some awesome 'Weiners' from Rosamunde Sausage Grill and eat them in Toronado pub over a tasty beer. These two places were recommended by Liz (who told us about Zeitgeist) and were just as awesome.
We then went down to The Emarcadero to take photos of and ride on the trams they have (much fun), then headed up to Coit Tower after walking UP the 2nd steepest street in the Western hemisphere. The view was brilliant :)
We descended and ate some bad cheesecake, thus confirming that the USA does NOT know how to use anything dairy related (all milk and cheese products are terrible, sorry guys).
That night we were picked up by Sally, a friend of ours from Sydney who now lives in San Fran and were taken to AT&T Park to see the San Francisco Giants play against the Colorado Rockies. They lost, but I had a brilliant time and took my hotdog tally for the day up to 5.
It as also our last night in San Fran. Kinda sad to leave the place I like so much, but there were more things to do!
Monday, September 14, 2009
San Francisco - part 1
The next day wasn't so amazing. We got to the airport early but United airlines didn't tell us you needed to pay US$20 per bag when we booked the tickets so had to pay a bit of money to them. Their machines wouldn't work properly for check in (it's ALL self check in) and the people that were around were VERY unfriendly and unhelpful and just made the whole experience terrible.
On arrival into San Francisco we hadn't booked a place to stay and walked around dragging our bags about trying to find somewhere. After trying for a few hours we found an overpriced and horrible hostel.
We ended up just going to the local library to borrow some internet and went to see the movie Der Baader Meinhof Komplex, which was a great movie but a bad choice for the day because it was very violent and we were feeling very drained.
Day 2 in San Francisco was a bit better. We moved to a better hostel and went down to the Embarcadero for a walk and to find some good chocolate places we had heard about. In Ghiradelli Square they were having a chocolate festival, so we perused their wares.
That night we went to a bar called Zeitgeist. It was great! Brilliant beers and brilliant food. Liz from work recommended it as she has been there when she lived in San Francisco. I found a nice Bay Area porter to drink while Esther found a nice pear cider. The burgers and bratwurst was to die for as well. Good place.
Day 3 we caught the bus to the Haight Ashbury district to soak up some hippy vibes. In the end were were kinda underwhelmed by it all. Admittedly we don't know that much about the area, but it seems these days it's mostly just shops trying to cash in on something that once was great, but is now so integrated into popular culture that the message is very very lost. Good part about that area is that Amoeba records is there. It's pretty much the best music store I've ever been to. It's a converted bowling alley, so where all the lanes used to be is now filled with CD's. I had a field day and bought 14 cd's and 3 dvd's to add to the ones I bought in Chicago! My luggage is very full now!
After a quick rest we hopped on the BART and went to the Oakland Raiders vs San Diego Chargers NFL match. Upon arrival the atmosphere was brutal. Raiders fans were screaming and chanting before they even made it through the gates, a lot of whom had spent the afternoon Tailgating and drinking a lot of beer. Once inside it was even worse, with every opposition supporter being booed and sworn at from quite a distance and every fan chanting and yelling about anything and everything. I think the section we were seated in was one of the more rough sections as we had police come and stand at the bottom of it to make sure nobody did anything stupid. The Raiders went on to lose in the dying seconds of the match, which was a little disappointing, especially as they had a touchdown denied earlier in the game.
On arrival into San Francisco we hadn't booked a place to stay and walked around dragging our bags about trying to find somewhere. After trying for a few hours we found an overpriced and horrible hostel.
We ended up just going to the local library to borrow some internet and went to see the movie Der Baader Meinhof Komplex, which was a great movie but a bad choice for the day because it was very violent and we were feeling very drained.
Day 2 in San Francisco was a bit better. We moved to a better hostel and went down to the Embarcadero for a walk and to find some good chocolate places we had heard about. In Ghiradelli Square they were having a chocolate festival, so we perused their wares.
That night we went to a bar called Zeitgeist. It was great! Brilliant beers and brilliant food. Liz from work recommended it as she has been there when she lived in San Francisco. I found a nice Bay Area porter to drink while Esther found a nice pear cider. The burgers and bratwurst was to die for as well. Good place.
Day 3 we caught the bus to the Haight Ashbury district to soak up some hippy vibes. In the end were were kinda underwhelmed by it all. Admittedly we don't know that much about the area, but it seems these days it's mostly just shops trying to cash in on something that once was great, but is now so integrated into popular culture that the message is very very lost. Good part about that area is that Amoeba records is there. It's pretty much the best music store I've ever been to. It's a converted bowling alley, so where all the lanes used to be is now filled with CD's. I had a field day and bought 14 cd's and 3 dvd's to add to the ones I bought in Chicago! My luggage is very full now!
After a quick rest we hopped on the BART and went to the Oakland Raiders vs San Diego Chargers NFL match. Upon arrival the atmosphere was brutal. Raiders fans were screaming and chanting before they even made it through the gates, a lot of whom had spent the afternoon Tailgating and drinking a lot of beer. Once inside it was even worse, with every opposition supporter being booed and sworn at from quite a distance and every fan chanting and yelling about anything and everything. I think the section we were seated in was one of the more rough sections as we had police come and stand at the bottom of it to make sure nobody did anything stupid. The Raiders went on to lose in the dying seconds of the match, which was a little disappointing, especially as they had a touchdown denied earlier in the game.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Chicago - part 3
This day we took things pretty easy. We'd done a lot of stuff by this point and needed to rest. We went to a part of town known as Wicker Park/Bucktown where it's kinda like Newtown/St Peters. I found a great record store called Reckless Records where I bought 10 cd's and Esther picked up some new shoes a few shops up.
That night we went out for pizza pie! Pizza Uno's was the joint and we had this great 4 cheese with pesto and tomato pizza. It was huge and even though we shared one we couldn't finish it, and retired to an English pub to drink Belgian beers.
As we couldn't stay in our hostel for the Friday night, we decided to splash out and pay for a 5 star hotel room in the theatre district, downtown. They gave us a really nice room on the corner of two streets where down one was the famous Chicago Theatre and down the other was the Gehry designed Jay Pritzker Pavilion with the metro rolling along by in the foreground. Pretty awesome.
We dumped our stuff, grabbed some bikes and rode up and down the Lake Michigan shoreline. We ended up riding quite a way, including stopping off at the Navy Pier for shakes. Riding along was a great way to see a lot of the great architecture of Chicago in a short time as well as get a good look at Lake Michigan. The whole way I couldn't believe it was a freshwater lake after being so used to seeing saltwater oceans at home.
While riding we saw a sign for Lincoln Park Zoo, so we dropped the bikes off and checked it out. It's a free zoo in the middle of Lincoln Park and was surprisingly good, even though I felt the enclosure sizes weren't so big. They had quite a few large animals, especially large cats. They even had a polar bear which was pretty awesome. Unfortunately we were there at the end of the day and we ended up being kicked out at closing time.
Dinner consisted of some famous Chicago style hotdogs! I can't remember the name of the joint but even though it was pretty crazy inside with all the people running about, the food was really good and it was a good way to finish up in Chicago
That night we went out for pizza pie! Pizza Uno's was the joint and we had this great 4 cheese with pesto and tomato pizza. It was huge and even though we shared one we couldn't finish it, and retired to an English pub to drink Belgian beers.
As we couldn't stay in our hostel for the Friday night, we decided to splash out and pay for a 5 star hotel room in the theatre district, downtown. They gave us a really nice room on the corner of two streets where down one was the famous Chicago Theatre and down the other was the Gehry designed Jay Pritzker Pavilion with the metro rolling along by in the foreground. Pretty awesome.
We dumped our stuff, grabbed some bikes and rode up and down the Lake Michigan shoreline. We ended up riding quite a way, including stopping off at the Navy Pier for shakes. Riding along was a great way to see a lot of the great architecture of Chicago in a short time as well as get a good look at Lake Michigan. The whole way I couldn't believe it was a freshwater lake after being so used to seeing saltwater oceans at home.
While riding we saw a sign for Lincoln Park Zoo, so we dropped the bikes off and checked it out. It's a free zoo in the middle of Lincoln Park and was surprisingly good, even though I felt the enclosure sizes weren't so big. They had quite a few large animals, especially large cats. They even had a polar bear which was pretty awesome. Unfortunately we were there at the end of the day and we ended up being kicked out at closing time.
Dinner consisted of some famous Chicago style hotdogs! I can't remember the name of the joint but even though it was pretty crazy inside with all the people running about, the food was really good and it was a good way to finish up in Chicago
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Chicago - part 2
Today's adventure was bought to you by the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago. We slept in, got mixed up where to go, caught the wrong train but ended up in the place where we needed to be to get to the MSI. To get there you had to go on their Metra train network. The stations had lots of disconcerting voices coming out of speakers about where the steps were (stright out of Orwell I swear) and the train itself was this sweet double decker thing where the bottom rows were normal two seaters on either side, but the top deck was split into single seaters on either side and when you were on the bottom row your head went between the top decks. Weird, but look them up, I'm sure there are photos.
At the MSI, we saw a 'Smart Home' where they had a lot of common sense environmentally friendly things about it. Unfortunately the tour guide was amazingly painful and one woman asked a lot of dumb questions (Does a chimney have ash?) so we bailed as quick as we could, but it meant we had to kinda run through everything else as he took up a lot of our time. They had an actual U boat there which we had a look at, as well as the biggest HO scale model train layout I've ever seen in my life. It depicted the line from Chicago to Seattle and was extremely accurate. It was awesome :) Other great sights were buildings made from Lego and a robot assembly line.
After almost being locked in because we stayed too long (the lights were turned off on us) we grabbed some food and went to the Baseball! We went to US Cellular Field to see the Chicago White Sox vs Oakland Athletics. It was a really close game and after the White Sox gained an early lead, the A's came back for a tie at the end of the standard 9th inning. The Sox ended up winning after 13 innings were played and we cheered very loudly. It was so good to go and see a US sporting event and it only whetted our appetite for the NFL and NHL we are seeing next week.
At the MSI, we saw a 'Smart Home' where they had a lot of common sense environmentally friendly things about it. Unfortunately the tour guide was amazingly painful and one woman asked a lot of dumb questions (Does a chimney have ash?) so we bailed as quick as we could, but it meant we had to kinda run through everything else as he took up a lot of our time. They had an actual U boat there which we had a look at, as well as the biggest HO scale model train layout I've ever seen in my life. It depicted the line from Chicago to Seattle and was extremely accurate. It was awesome :) Other great sights were buildings made from Lego and a robot assembly line.
After almost being locked in because we stayed too long (the lights were turned off on us) we grabbed some food and went to the Baseball! We went to US Cellular Field to see the Chicago White Sox vs Oakland Athletics. It was a really close game and after the White Sox gained an early lead, the A's came back for a tie at the end of the standard 9th inning. The Sox ended up winning after 13 innings were played and we cheered very loudly. It was so good to go and see a US sporting event and it only whetted our appetite for the NFL and NHL we are seeing next week.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Chicago - part 1
Yesterday we hopped up at 4:45am, were dropped at Rapid city and flew to Chicago! We just wandered around a bit, got our bearings, figured out how the metro worked, had some food and just got used to the place. First impressions of the place were that it is very run down, but in a character building way. Dinner consisted of free hot dogs from a bar where we got some beer and watched a football game while working out what we were going to do for the rest of the week. We had a sleep but thanks to that were ready for fun Chicago adventures! :)
Today we hopped up, caught the train downtown and went to Millennium Park. They have all sorts of cool things there, such as fountains that project pictures of people, the Frank Ghery designed music shell and a big bean shaped sculpture called 'Cloud Gate' which is flat polished stainless steel that distorts anything reflected in it. Many fun photos were taken. Next stop was a bus tour of South Chicago. We were the only foreigners on the tour and also the only people under the age of 50. Despite our tour operator trying to convince everyone to buy places to live in Chicago most of the way, we got to see 'Obamaland' as I dubbed it. Obamaland consisted of his house, favourite pizza shop, barber, place where he had his first kiss and gym.
After getting off the bus we wandered up to the Magnificent Mile as we had heard that Oprah had blocked off the street as past of her 24th Season opening night. Upon arrival we were immediately met by the sight of Oprah sitting on the top of a bus we walked past interviewing someone about something, while men in uniforms barked at us to keep moving and other people tried to take photos as well. As the men had big guns I kept moving and walked around the corner to see a stage with the Black Eyed Peas coming on to perform a song and the crowd there were practising their dance moves ready for filming in a few hours time. Everywhere was Opraville so we wandered down the Magnificent Mile. It wasn't as magnificent as the name tended to suggest, it just seemed like a giant 'everything is too expensive so don't even bother' street.
After wandering down, on the way back up we realised that Oprah's show was about to be filmed on the street, so we joined the masses and watched. Got to see the Black Eyed Peas do a few songs and also James Taylor.
With sore feet we walked to the Sears/Willis Tower and went up to it's 103rd floor to check out the view. By this time it was night and the lights stretched out as far as the eye could see. Pretty amazing. They had these clear perspex boxes on one wall where you could actually walk OUTSIDE of the building and look down at the ground below your feet! Esther loved it, while I was kinda freaking out. 103 stories is a long way up!
Today we hopped up, caught the train downtown and went to Millennium Park. They have all sorts of cool things there, such as fountains that project pictures of people, the Frank Ghery designed music shell and a big bean shaped sculpture called 'Cloud Gate' which is flat polished stainless steel that distorts anything reflected in it. Many fun photos were taken. Next stop was a bus tour of South Chicago. We were the only foreigners on the tour and also the only people under the age of 50. Despite our tour operator trying to convince everyone to buy places to live in Chicago most of the way, we got to see 'Obamaland' as I dubbed it. Obamaland consisted of his house, favourite pizza shop, barber, place where he had his first kiss and gym.
After getting off the bus we wandered up to the Magnificent Mile as we had heard that Oprah had blocked off the street as past of her 24th Season opening night. Upon arrival we were immediately met by the sight of Oprah sitting on the top of a bus we walked past interviewing someone about something, while men in uniforms barked at us to keep moving and other people tried to take photos as well. As the men had big guns I kept moving and walked around the corner to see a stage with the Black Eyed Peas coming on to perform a song and the crowd there were practising their dance moves ready for filming in a few hours time. Everywhere was Opraville so we wandered down the Magnificent Mile. It wasn't as magnificent as the name tended to suggest, it just seemed like a giant 'everything is too expensive so don't even bother' street.
After wandering down, on the way back up we realised that Oprah's show was about to be filmed on the street, so we joined the masses and watched. Got to see the Black Eyed Peas do a few songs and also James Taylor.
With sore feet we walked to the Sears/Willis Tower and went up to it's 103rd floor to check out the view. By this time it was night and the lights stretched out as far as the eye could see. Pretty amazing. They had these clear perspex boxes on one wall where you could actually walk OUTSIDE of the building and look down at the ground below your feet! Esther loved it, while I was kinda freaking out. 103 stories is a long way up!
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