US of A Road Trip

We got up early and decided to head off to the Canyon in Damian (as we have named the car). It was easy enough to find from Flagstaff. Flagstaff-reminds me haven't talked about it! Pretty little town lot like Cambria, locals here are lovely and it has a town hall that is again straight off of Man Street in Disneyland very 'cute' place. In winter it is a skiiing resort (yeah and you go through dessert to reach it, madness I know) but it sits under the shadow of the San Francisco peaks which are snowcapped even now.

The drive out to the Canyon is dull, it is very flat, a lot of woodland and mountains but after a while it just goes flat and this is boring. It's an hour and a halfs drive and we kept seeing signs for leaping deer and cows, not that we saw either there was even a sign for white Buffalo... but they were clearly long gone. Parts oif it were very Kansas-flat with the odd little wooden house in the middle of nowhere and we even saw real ranches...not the mom and pop sitting on the wooden porch whilst the guys get the cows in ranches, but proper ones....they mainly live in ramshackle old huts and caravans - a far cry from the 'ranches' we saw where the tourists stay. We passed such places as 'Coyote Springs' and they love their names out here, on yesterdays drive we passe a place called 'Holy Moses Wash' and even a 'Devil Dog Rd' I couldn;t resist asking Dawn how long the '5 mile Rd' was.

There are also sign for stags - yellow signs on with deer with massive antlers and they are stood on what is meant ot be a patch of grass but we have decided we are watching out for stags encased in concrete blocks - they clearly annoyed the mafia in someway.

When we got to the Canyon we stopped at McDonalds for breakfast (yeah I know) and there menu for breakfast is massive they had something called a McGriddle. We asked what it was Dawn said she had had enough of pancakes and didn;t want anything with pancakes in to the assistaant and so we asked what the difference was between a mdmuffin and a mcGriddle - he said different types of bread. We thought okay maybe it's like sourdough so ordered one just because we don't have them in the UK....

The different bread is that a McMuffin is in a muffin and a McGriddle was in .....a pancake. Dawn not amused.

We pushed on to the Canyon showed our pass at the entrancve and I found a jammy spot that seemed to be right near the rim from what I could make out through the trees. I waited an age whilst Dawn did the sun cream thing bouncing around impatiently as I wanted to go see it and then she was ready.

Sadly though today was overcast and the sun never came out so we never got to see the Canyon bathed in sunlight.

Anyway Dawn was ready so we hit the poath and there it was we had parked right next to it. I went really cold - you cannot imagine the sheer size of it, wrong time of the month and you may have caught me crying.

The backdrop of the Canyon looks like a painting it is barely realy and everything got photographed., We walked along a while and got chgatting to a couple from Colchester who were doing the same holiday as us only in reverse (and they were very rich) and we compared our notes on the country for a while it was hilarious.

We pressed on to Bright Angel Lodge and decided to hike partly down the Bright Angel Trail this was beautiful and not that difficult (but then I'm a fitness freak). A couple of prospecters passed us on their mules (don;t think they'd had any luck that day though) and to be below the rim was another amazing feeling. When we decided to go back I hadn't gone far and I felt so out of breath, I wasn't tired or over exerted I just felt like it had all gone it was a weird feeling I guess this is an altitude thing because no way was it tiring I train on worse. As we got back to the surface and I adjusted it got easier. I envied all the people hiking past me to the bottom to camp for the night - maybe one day.

On the way back to the car we took lots more pics and marvelled at the Condrs, saw Squirrels, chipmunks and even a lizard! It was stunning. Can;t do it justice here.

We wanted to see sun down in the Canyon but it was just too cloudy so instead we drove roound to another part of it and from here we could see rain over one part of the canyon - it was crazy this big grey cloud over one part and the rest untouched - I hope the photos I took can capture a small essence of what we saw. As we drove back to the part of the rim we had just come from you couldn't see the rain cloud anymore it was hidden - a truly fascinating place.

We stopped for dinner at the Yippe-I-Oh-eh (yeah quaint) steak house for a meal and then headed back to the hostel. We passed through more storms heading back it was crazzy you could see storms over the mountains, storms in the distnace and then mega patches of bright clear sky with the sun filtering through - it is indeed a beautiful country.

We decided to get an early night and if it;s sunny in the morning we will head to the Canyon again before Vegas to see it in the sunlight - if not Oatman it is then Vegas (aggghh gotta drive the strip and noooo sat nav!)

So no blog till sunday after this as I'll be in.....A HOTEL!!!

First thing I'm doing is having a bath haha.

Catch you sunday 21st June hopefully

xx

After making our pancakes, soon as the shuttle we had booked for 9am turned up - we were on it to the airport to get our hire car to get out of LA. Not before however I routed the sat nav and it said 'avoid HOV lanes' unsure what this meant I asked 2 american girls
"Excuse me but what are HOV lanes?"
"huh?"
"what does HOV lane mean do you know?"
"um no sorry"
"ok"
"Oh HOV lanes oh yeah that means carpool lanes..."
AAGGHHH I have had this so many times I ask an american a question they say they don't know several times then they repeat it back to me exactly as I just asked them then go oh yeah and tell me the answer it's exasperating I'm sure I'm speaking english (even if they do all keep asking if I'm australian).

At dollar we got to pick our car and as they were all the same we chose a blue one! rare colour here!!

We headed off on a very random route as chosen by our sat nav but it got us out of LA so I really didn;t care where she stook us. Ocassionalyl we got to use the car pool lane (mis-use of these gets you fined $341....341??? round it up people!)

Boring boring Freeway for a while 7 lanes of chaos although I smiled as I drove through San Dimas (WYLD STALLIONS!!!! haha) and then it levelled out, then got sparser...then got mountainous, then more sparse then......we hit desert!!! fascinating!!! I'd been driving a couple of hours when we saw a sign to Barstow so thought we'd dtop there for lunch. As we approached Barstow I noticed my sat nav screen had gone blank...

"Um Dawn why has the screen gone blank?"

We checked it and worked out it wasn;t charging off the lighter plugin and had died!!! So we stopped at Barstow for an In n Out Burger and somme fuel and I asked a nice man at the gas station if I could check it in his car so I knew it was our car not my wire... it was our car. I decided to get some maps from the fuel station. Every fuel station I go to I have issues with paying with my card and this one was no exception 'see attendant' normally you go in hand your card over and they keep it till you have filled up then you go get your card back, sign for your fuel and you are on your way. This lady took her sweet time taking it off me (she was thrilled I was her customer you could tell) and so I wnt back to the car and tried to fill up....nothing. I went in and she was training another lady up so I much to her annoyance was clearly interrupting her
"um excuse me is pump 9 switched on?"
She sniffs leans back slighly and looks
"yup"
so I go back out try again and still nothing so I went back in.
"Hi really sorry nothings coming out I'm not sure where I'm going wrong"
she rolls her eyes and shuffles her jabba size frame from behind the counter and out the door to the nearest pump. There she picks up the novel lifts up a lever it is resting on and goes
"you do that"
then she tuts and goes back inside. So I fill up with my new found knowledge of the lever I missed....duh.
When I go back in to pay and pick up a map the new lady is on the till, I assume - first day she'll be pleasent! As I need to get to Flagstaff I need an Arizona map but I also want to get to Vegas via Oatman in a couple of days and unsure if Oatman is Nevada or Arizona I aks her advice.
"Excuse me is Oatman in Nevada or Arizona"
"You're in California"
"Yes I know that I'm going to Flagstaff but is Oatman Arizona or Nevada?"
"You're (gesturing) here and you are talking about going over here (she gestures some more) you're in Caliornia.."

This went on for several minutes and so before I lost my temper I said
"you know what I'll take both maps thanks" and left it at that.

We carried on through mountains and flat land there were times when I could see miles into the distance and just thought oh god I may go insane this is dull...but then you'd round a corner and be amongst the most amazing rocky outcrops or passing towns that were no longer there, just signs pointing to a Motel (with a pool) that pointed to a big old patch of empty dead grass, or Big Als car yard where maybe a garage had once stood but now there was nothing but barron land.

We passed trailers, very little wildife (except the odd raven waiting for wandering travellers or tired drivers I joked) and at one point we both saw something dark in the sky like little dots as we wondered what it was it went "splot spolot splot" and exploded across the windscreen-turned out we had just driven through a cloud of the biggest kamikaze flies ever!! we laughed about this for half an hour after it was so gross it was funny as hell. Mind you the amount of bugs we encountered I believe my windscreen is beyond cleaning! As we pushed on although it was a long drive pulling over wasn;t going to be the easiest thing in the world there was very little safe opportunity to stop and I was doing fine so I carried on driving and the time passed in no time at all. Dawn offered if I ever got tired to say so as it was an easy enough road but I was happy as (and how often do you get to drive on Route 66 in your life right?) so she navigated (it was easy we got on the I-40 to needles and stayed on it for several hours to Flagstaff!!)

There were weird moments when you would clear the mountains and there was what we thought was water...it wasn;t it was grass and a town just sitting at the bottom of a valley in the middle of the desert!

As we neared Flagstaff the desert turned to Woodland and after making several attemtps to come into our hpstel (which was located on a one way street and we kept missing it!!) we finally made it, no sat nav just two girls and a map (and we all know girls are not afraid to ask for directions!)

Nice little hostel - has a frieght train line running behind it and the trains pass every half an hour (all through the night it transpires) and sound there booming horns as they pass but this is what my ear plugs are for!

Sharing a room with 2 girls from Germany who leave tommorow and gave us their Grand Canyon pass, this is worth $25 and they refused to take money on the grouns they were going to bin it - bonus!! anyway looong day (although the drive was a dodle) so we went to bed early as hitting the canyon tommorow - excitement!!

Well I somehow woke up at 8am despite going to bed at 2am and having more than my fair share of cola coloured vodkas (Bobo the clown doesn;t measure his spirits he just pours 'em).

I showered and made some more of my very excellent pancakes (I'm getting good at this). Dawn however was in-valid for the day, a comnbination of our rubbish diet and alcohol consumption left her in bed for the day so I decided to stick to my plan and headed for Venice Beach! Next to noone was on the streets it was overcast and quite cool and there is me with shorts on *TOURIST ALERT* I began to feel self conscious until I got to the bus stop and ended up stood next to a man who had been mauled by a plastic surgeon in his quest for femininity and a guy dressed in thigh high PVC boots and a hoodie that made him look like a skeletoin when done up. I suddenly felt more normal.

Of course LA has it's fair share of strange people (I'm being polite here) but today the reason for a higher number of trannies etc than normal is it was also the Gay Pride Festival and as I neared Santa Monica Blvd on the bus I noticed everyone flocking to it so I thought why not and got off the bus and joined them. Honestly it was insane the paraede was the biggest I'd ever seen and what suprised me the most was the mayor and the sheriff of LA were heading it. There were also such groups as PFLAG (parents and friends of Lesbians and Gays) and they were carrying banners saying 'God loves her gay children' and 'God blessed us with a gay kid'. Make of that what you will. There was also the local high school band playing such greats as "I kissed a girl" by Katie Perry (love it) and a firetruck adorned with the best looking men in pants I have ever seen. SO unfair that 1 firemen don't really look like this and 2. They are gay. Shame.

When the parade had passed I re boarded the bus for Venice Beach it took a good hour to get there and the Metro(bus) is not the easiest mode of public transport to use ever). I ended up chatting to some lad who was a law student - it worries me people here will just approach you and get chatting and sad as it sounds it is hard to tell if there intentions are good or otherwise. It turns out his was just chatty "here's my stop great meeting you" he said as he got off. Sweet guy. The next was an example of not so good. I finally got a seat after an age of standing and this Spanish Lad suddenyl appears next to me, introduces me and asks if I know what stop he needs for Venice Beach-so I told him. As we got chatting it turned out he had lived here 6 years and this was his first trip to the beach? I don't think so... As we got to our stop he gestured to someone else and I noticed this and he noticed I noticed I was also concerned he had looked at my bag a lot and mentioned times here were hard in amongst his I'm a sweet Spanish lad guise. I'm not an idiot. He mentioned he was with a friend and then asked if I wanted to join them "I said no as I was dropping in on some friends at the beach..." at this point we got swept off the bus in this crowd and I ended up sandwiched between these two massive black guys who said "hey little lady where you from?" I clearly stuck out like a sore thumb probably because I'm so pasty. These were the good guys though they were part of a core of drummers headed to the beach to play_I told them I was concerned about the Spanish lads and stuck with them till we reached the beach (the Spanish lad and his friend weaved off through the crowd fully aware of the direction they were heading in...) then as there were so many people I bid them goodbye and went to have a nosey. Unsure of which way to go I asked a couple of homeless guys for directions (the best thing about the homeless dudes? they are guaranteed local to the area and so they know the place!!!)

First stop was Muscle Beach. Venice Beach looks just like it does in Baywatch but with an area behind the beach that is like Wellesbourne Market stretched out for miles - it's crazy and very busy. I visited the gym at muscle beach and watched a agme of basketball for a bit and finally I found some sun. Clear blue skies baking hot, pure white sand and blue sea. When I tired of the sellers and the steroid heads I wandered across the beach and had a bit of a smile to myslef - the famous Baywatch beach huts are here and I kicked off my shoes and walked along the sand and when the sand got to hot I walked on the edge of the sea. Beautiful. Further on down the beach I looked and realised my Spanish friend was back and this time there were less people around. He came legging it down the beach to join me chatting away and offering to carry my bag - god knows how but I eventually pointed out he'd abandoned his friend,. I'd like to be alone, I'm meeting my friends at Santa Monica Pier, yes I'm about to phone them now, hobbies? yeah I box... he finally left and I survived that. I was lucky.

In the distnace was Santa Monica and the pier and keen to be near loads of people I headed back to the market.

The entire length fron Santa Monica to Venice Beach is a concrete path on which people blade, cycle, run...it;s so much fun it;s perfect. As I walked past there was a little boy kicking a football around and I overheard a guy go: "Hey look at little David Benham over there...." I guess Posh and Bens" made a real imppression over here when he played for Glaaxy then haha.

I stopped for some munchies at a beach cafe and then pushed on to Santa Monica. There was seaside pier here with a funfair, very different to Venice Beach here there were families and people of all ages having a good time so to leave the sleazier end was the best choice. On the pier there was alsoa trapeze school and down in the sand a field of white crosses I don;t what they were in aid of some sort of memorial i guess but I didn;t stop to look as I wanted to find the bus stoip that would take me back to hollywood.

It was getting late and I wanted to check Dawn was okay so I took the long bus journey back. Dawn was feeling a lot better a combination of food and alcohol have really affected her so she has had a rough day but was now up and about and buying CD's for our epic desert adventure tommorow.

I decided to take a Hollywood tour that took in the various areas some movie locations and the homes of: Jennifer Aniston, Sharon Stone, David Beckham (Benham), Eddie Murphy, Britney Spears, the riginal Osbournes house (now ONE of Christine Aguileras) the owner of the 'Guess' empire (he has 15 ferraris on his drive!!) Ringo Starr, Jackie Chan, Simon Cowell, Hannah Montana (Miley Cyrus people) and lots more - spotted Steve Martin, Jay Leno, Nellie and Michael Jackson so there are celebs here I was beginning to think it was a myth, mind you I know living here is handy for work but if a celebrity doesn;t want ANY attention then this is not the place to go you cannot move to Hollywood and complain about privacy isssues. It's like moving to Blackpool and hating funfairs or stag parties. Honestly the amount of money here is obscene who needs 15 ferraris?

After the tour it was getting late and I was knackered and also eager to leave LA, I've had enough it's like a giant industrial estate, I trust next to noone (there were 2 murders near where we are staying in the last 6 months and after the LA Lakers won the match there was a riot and yet they won? A fight kicked off top of the street and the police were called on the sunday night whilst we were down the road (we jsut saw the cars) and all we heard all sunday was siren after siren, it;s mad it;s crazy I don't like it. Dawn feels the same. I don't feel safe, I'm not happy. Looking forward to getting out of here we went to bed early - then tommorow will come quicker and we can move on. Don;t get me wrong there is fun to be had here, it's unique, it's an experience, but I also have a bad taste in my mouth.

I thought it never rained here??? well it does apparantly. The grey has finally turned to drizzle and today we are going on a long walk into the LA hills to view the Hollywood sign. First things first though breakfast make your own pancakes uh-oh

It was fine here the mix was already made for you and they had proper pancake pans rather than a waffle maker?? mine were a success and ymuumy when smothered in maple syrup (hey I worked out last night and have sore musckles to prove it, plus I'm hiking today so all is good...honest!)

After breakfast we went for a soggy walk round the block where we encountered a homeless guy (which Dawn hadn;'t spotted) who suddenly sprang into life as we were passing him as he'd seen a bird and squealed "hey little birdy!!" at the top of his voice and scaring the crap out of Dawn. Then on the next block as we wlaked past a garage that was blasting out the song "I just called to Say I Love You" another homeless guy walking along the street started re-writing it:

"He just called to say...he was homeless"
"He just called to say he was Homosexual"

I wanted to add "and Homosapien and in Hollywood" for a couple of extra verses but decided not to engage him. We headed back to the hostel now very soggy and got ready to go on the walk to the sign. We got chatting to a 'local' and he says that normally there is maybe on a rare ocassion grey cloud on a morning but it;s gone by midday however this weather was crazy, he'd never seen it before and in his opinion it was utter s***. So we're just lucky I guess haha.

Our tour guy showed up and off we went I got chatting to him and turns out he is from Santiago Chile and he has a rock band and is currently finishing off his 12 track album and then hopes to get it 'out there'. He formerly had a band with his brother called 'psycho freaks' (nope didn't think you had) but his brother went back to Chile and now he has a new one. He's played the Whiskey A Go Go twice and the new band are called super massive.... he doesn't know super massive what though as he has yet to think of anything but there is already another established band called just plain 'super massive' so obviously they can't have it. The girl that showed us to our room yesterday was from Southend and she is here hoping to get work as a stuntwoman, she is trained by Bruce LEe's teacher (aren't they all) but her visa runs out in August and she has had no luck so she has to go home. Like London where every person that serves you is an 'artiste' Hollywood is the same.

To get to the Hollywood sign we caught a dash bus up into the hills and passed lots of very large (and some very crazy) houses. You can't get to the sign but we got underneath it and were able to get some good shots - the sign itself cost $28,000 dollars per letter Hugh Heffner sponsored the Y and I believe Alice Cooper has the first 'o'. Normally there would be stunning views across LA from up here but it was too misty today. As we walked back down I talked more with the guide about our trip and his plans and then he asked what we were up to tonight as he had free tickets to the Viper Lounge if we were interested! Heck the Viper Lounge, free = partying in LA with a wannabe rock star on Sunset Blvd? How often are you going to get to do that??? and isn't that what this holiday is all about? so I gave a hell yeah and we agreed to meet up in the lounge bar at 21:30. Before we caught the dash bus back we were sat outside this little cafe and two young men were stood outside they looked straight off the 'Hills' very chiselled jaw lines and I swear they must have spent an hour on their hair and a spirit level was probably also used in the process, when they were out of sight Dawn and I couldn't stop laughing - surreal.

Back at the hostel we had some lunch and then caught the bus to Rodeo Drive - this was a somewhat lengthy process, and it is gay pride this weekend so we passed all the rainbow balloons and displays (and serious doses of camp-ness) down Santa Monica Blvd before reaching BEVERLY HILLS!! There was a cool sign in the park that said Beverly Hills so I waited my turn and then jumped up to have my photo taken on it. As i got up there I noticed by my feet a sign saying please respect this and don;t climb on it...oops. Well maybe it would be better placed where you can read it before you climb up there..?

We headed down rodeo drive and the plastic on display (the people not credit cards) is crazy. I have an obsession with boob jobs (probably because I don;t have any of my own) and you could literally walk past each person and go 'lips' 'nose' 'lips, nose, botox, implants....' it was like I spy for surgical procedures. We nosied at Cartier etc and as we walked past this expensive sunglasses shop Dawn stopped as she had fallen in love with some very large bejewelled sunglasses (no price tag) the very smartly dressed assistant came out. He was this huuuge black dude and asked where we were from were we having a good time etc... then he asked if we wanted to try them on? Dawn said we couldn;t afford to and he said "hell even with a discount me neither, come on have a try" we liked his honesty. We both had shades on and he looked at mine and went "Hey I love yours they're great what are they Christian Dior or Chanel...?"

Stunned silence before I managed to say

"um...New Look" and then I fell about laughing. Dawn was wearing a pair of proper Christian Diors (it's written all over them) and there's me in my high street 5quid pair getting admired it was hilarious. He had never heard of New Look pretty obviously and this was funny as hell.

We tried them on and it turned out they were $1500.... we chatted for a while thanked him adn then left.

We decided after Rodeo Drive we wanted to go to the Beverly Centre (mall) and so asked in a shop if it was nearby. The assistant looked horrified and told us it was a good half an hour to an hour (that's a big difference..) walk and it was miiiiiles. We have leanred they are lazy buggers here and decided to walk. It was only a half hour after all and we got to go past very swish houses and saw amazing cars (some were chauffer driven with blacked out windows - you never know!) past exclusive boutiques, hairdressers, residences and...a plastic surgeons.

The Beverly Center was large and nothing special (apart from a ladies footlocker which had the most amazing trainer selection) but it provided me with peanut butter cookies - heaven.

We caught the bus back to Hollywood and got chatting to a guy on his way home from work, when I asked him what he did....'a singer songwriter'. He also quickly cleared up something for us that has had us baffled. A lot of Americans are saying they cannot understand what we are saying and asking if we are Australian. The guy said to us "so you guys are English?" He is the first person that has actually said this to us and not asked uif we were Aussies! We said finally and explained and he said "ah well I wasn't totally sure until I heard you (pointing to Dawn) speak and then I knew you were Enlgish, but you (me) your accent is difficult to tell". So I guess being a Midlander that lives down south has screwed up the way I speak haha.

Liking it, I'm a weird sounding, designer sunglass wearing, tinkerbell lookalike out here.

Anyway we went back to the hostel - I got on t'internet for a bit (and emailed Lottie a girl from Totnes who now lives out here) and we are trying to aramge to meet tommorow then i went to omy room and got ready and went to the bar here and decided to stay here instead. It was a bit freaky as our barman was "Bobo the clown" (no seriously make up the nose the lot) which freaked Dawn out. Bobo the clown is actually a stuntman who also does gore effects for horror movies of all things. The other bartender is a pop singer from London who sounds Irish and then there is also the resident male model. It got past midnight I decided I was in the mood for dancing after all and couldn;t be bothered to go 3 miles across town for the Viper Room so went to 'Kress' with the male model. It's crazy in there, everyone dances like they are on MTV (well they try to) there was even a guy 'busting some moves' in his wheelchair (I kid you not). This really wasn't my kind of place, I was the ethnic minority for sure and by god were there some dreadful posers and I wasn't feeling like being one of them, I was also really missing Paul and needing some normalness which usually comes in the form of him so as it was morning in the UK I figured now would be a good time to catch him at home so I made my excuses and headed back to the hostel. It was crazy the streets were heaving people were cruising past windows down stereos blaring it was lively, mad and fun and despite being told there have been two murders at the bottom of our road in the last year I don't feel any less safe here than I would in the not bad areas of Torquay you just have to exercise a little caution.

I got back to the hostel and called Paul as - so um apologies if I made noooo sense whatsoever honey but it was good to hear you voice!! xxx

Please excuse the blogs state of late but since leaving SF I have been on a bit of a pay as you go internet thing so am typing against the clock - and not wasting dollars checking my punctuation!

Anyway after a night where I did sleep despite there being one window in our hostel (at the other end of the room) so it was mega hot, my ear plugs meant that when the Amtrak train pulled into the station behind the hostel at 4am, I didn't hear a thing. We were eager to get on
(and away from this hostel although to be fair I didn;t get bitten by anything here) so we were up super early and I'm pleased to note the lack of doors on the shower and toilet cubicles issue has been resolved.

Breakfast was 08:30 and it was now 07:30 so we headed for State Street for breakfast (the good thing about the hostel was the location - 1 minute to the beach and 5 minutes to State Street! We crossed the railway tracks (these are uncovered and there is no level crossings so if a train is passing through you either hear the horn and take heed and wait; or you die. Simple.

The residents had been out early and watered all the flowers and everywhere smelt of pollen. The flowers in California are simply stunning, like everything else here they are big, bold and bright and they make the air smell so sweet. When I had been walking back from the beach last night, the smell in the air was tropical and you could hear crickets and frogs (and squirrels) and it is like a little paradise it's lovely! Sadly though whilst the morning started off clear enough it soon became overcast again. We have barely seen any sun all holiday so you guys in the UK shouldn;t feel too hard done by.

Originbally planned to head to Starbucks and instead came across 'Joe's' so we went in - this place was established in 1823 which is shocking really as just about everything else on State Street was proud to announce it was established in 93-89 (1900's not 18...). I've had enough of carbs so I went for the All American which was poached eggs and bacon - no more carbs,m no bread, no spuds I've had enough. So the b****y thing only arrives with fried potatoes and 2 slices of toast on the side! After beakfast the reception was finally open back at the hostel so we joined the long line of people desperate to check out.

We filled up at the local gas station (this is an experience you have to put your card in the machine first or the ladyt in the shop takes it off you then you are allowed to fill up). Put $15 in and we were good to go - so we headed for Malibu. Got there quicker than planned as usual passing all kinds of beautiful scenery however may I just say I will never EVER complain aabout Britains roads again, honestly the roads here are dire! You know how tyres eventually wear down the concrete to grooves? well all the roads are like this here not to mentiuon nearly all road surfaces have like a spiders web of black tar litterally dribbled all over the orad which we keep joking is where they have been filling the cracks in after earthquakes rather than actually repairing the surface properly - we could be right!) either way the roads are awful, bumpy and in bad shape.

As we were heading towards Malibu I glanced quickly across Dawn to look at the pacific and saw something very briefly that wasn't a surfer.... "DOLPHINS!!!!" was all Dawn heard as I I skidded to a stop in the nearest convceniently located pulling in spot, we weren't alone someone else also had done the same thing and his wife was out the car door and scrambling to the beach before the guy had even styopped the car. There was 7 of them all passing by the shore. Their fins and backs broke the surface of the clear blue water as they swam, lazily along the shore heading along the coast. It was amazing I couldn't have imagined it to be any more exciting!

When they were out of view we got back in the car and drove past the seriously expensive and ocean front properties that lined the beaches at Malibu. If only the sun would come out though!!! The lanes were in 3's and got reeeeally narrow now wer have quite a large car but I was getting seriously dwarfed, I don;t get why everyone needs to have such massive vehicles out here??

We reached LA really quickly so I decided a tour was needed before we dropped the car off and so sat nav was programmed and we cruised round Rodeo Drive and Sunset/Wilshire Blvd before setting a course for LAX where we were dropping the car off. Again this was 7 lanes of madness, yes seriously 7 lanes, but there was so much traffic you could barely reach the 65mph speed limit so it was pretty easy to negotiate and we got there without incident, said goodbye to 'Sabrina' as we had named the car and then went to the airport to catch a shuttle to our next Hostel. The shuttle took about an hour and took us through all sorts of neighbourhoods I have heard a lot about LA so was startinbg to wonder where the hell I had booked us into. We were the last to get off the coach and so the driver pointed stuff out to us like....the extremely tiny Hollywood sign (haha honestly it's tiny) and then he dropped su to our hostel. No worries here it;s huge, it has a bar and chill out room with flat screen plasma telly and complete wii set up (including ther entire Guitar Hero set up) for you to just play on should you get bored. Dorm nice and it has abath and shower and all looks good so far. Dumped our stuff in, signed up for the walk to the Hollywood sign tommorow and headed off to explore the neighbourhood.

We are right on the walk of Fame!!!

Hollywood is mad and fun, walking down the street we explored the costume shop, the Disney Store (of course) and saw the Chinese and Kodak theatre and then popped into Fresh n Easy (the US version of Tesco) for some dinner and bits for tommorow. As we were walking back we dodged all the tour gudies and the CD pushers (they give you thier CD and then chase you down the street for money for it) and of course also dodged Jack Sparrow, Homer Simpson, Batman, the Joker, Sweeney Todd and saw Tinkerbell waiting for a starbucks - only in Hollywood I guess!

I decided enough was enough and I needed to get to a gym for an hour of normallness. Gold's had offered me a free day pass - however I couldn't find them and stumbled across 24 hour fitness instead. Although on the way I cam across Henry Winklers old school and lots of interesting houses, -plus met a couple of friendly but aloof Hollywood cats - I miss my boys!! Next time I'm going to keep looking for Golds honestly this place was shocking. They had tons of unusual cardio machines so I warmed up on some strange running/climbing thing for a while then asked someone if the weights were on the next level - they looked at me like I had 2 heads and said yeah they are upstairs. (this places was huge and I was given a pass no questions asked without even being shown where the changing rooms were! size isn't everything as they say. I soon found out why I was given the strange look it was one mass room of steroid heads and not a girl in sight, they were all downstairs sweating it out on the treadmills. I don't do treadmills : )

I worked out some machines I needed before heading for the free weights and of course out here the weights are different I have gone from kilos to pounds and there was little compromise in weight size iot was either heavy or super heavy. So I settled for using weights that felt like they were the equivcalent of lifting a small person and had to settle for working to a lot less reps - my chest and shoul;ders will hurt in the morning...

I felt better after this and headed back to the hostel where we went back on to the boulevard and promptly landed in a chinese restaurant dammit. We walked further down the line dodging batman, the joker and a random demon that yelled "hey tinkerbell where are your wings?!" at me. I then came across a man that had 3 parrots, so I broke my don't tip the street performers and gave him a few dollars so I could play with his birds - they were adorable I know it's only encouraging men like that but I miss my animals so it was ace to have a parrot to cuddle and one that liked swinging round your finger - it amused me for ages and was worth every penny (well cent as they'd say here) they were beautiful.

We headed back to the Chinese theatre and checked our hand and footprints against the stars as you do and by now it was getting late. We grabbed a couple of beers and headed back to the hostel, past a couple of teeny children about halof George Sampsons age and absolutely kicking his ass with their breakdancing moves - there older bvrothers were standing round telling everyone the show was about to start and collecting cash - they reminded me of performing circus monkeys. Also lining every crossing were 'god botherers' as you are waiting for the lights to change this makes you a captive audience - we were tempted to go up to one and tell them to leave him alone as he was busy enouggh already...however when the one announced at the top of his voice about how we were all sinners and we should stop living our lives how we want to and repent and you are a blasphemer and will go to hell if you have ever said the lords name in vain, at which point Dawn must have read my mind and we both yelled "JESUS CHRIST!!" at the top of our voices and then laughed our heads off for 5 minutes. sorry! had to be done. Mind you this is the second incident as Dawn informed me back at the Monterey Hostel whilst I was trying to get the pc their to work I had beeing going "jesus christ" and for "gods sake stupid thing" and apparantly there had been a guy sat at the table behind me saying grace....oops.

Anyways we headed back to the hostel after this passed the neon lights and 'Kress' nightclub (as frequented by the stars of the hills and apparantly Snoop Dog was only spotted there last friday night) as our hostel is behind it. We sat down with a couple of coronas and chilled before heading to bed.

This place has make your own pancakes again for breakfast - should be interesting!