Vegas Baby!

Plane fatigue had certainly set in by the time we reached Las Vegas. The flight from Palm Springs was one of the roughest we have ever experienced. Beads of sweat developed and then began to run down the gentleman's head sat in font of us. Reassuring looks and words came from the flight assistant who was to make the trip a further 3 times before hopefully calling it a day and finding a less nerve wrecking career. Em now reflects on it as the plane of death and the memories of reaching for the sick bag still linger.


We loved Vegas as soon as we landed and were swept away to our hotel in a taxi by a native New Yorker. A former salesman now fulfilling a childhood dream to drive a cab for a living. He informed us the MGM Grand was currently the biggest hotel on the strip with over 5000 rooms, I forget the exact number. Our lodging on the 27th floor impressed immediately. We deserved a good view after the disappointments of San Francisco and L.A. The heat outside was still intense, the air conditioning working overtime to create a fake climate inside the hotels, keeping everybody cool. Everything you could need was inside, there was no real need to venture outside apart from to walk down the building site that is the Las Vegas strip to view the other hotels. New hotels are being built to replace the middle aged ones that don't fit the image anymore. We did a bit of gambling on the slot machines and to Emma's' annoyance managed to win more than I put in.


The main reason for our stop in Vegas was to use it as a base to take a trip to the Grand Canyon. Booked on a trip scheduled to leave at 4am we were startled to receive a phone call at 3.30 informing us to be in the lobby in 5 minutes or be left behind. We made it and took the looks and scowls from the fellow passengers who must have had some inside information regarding the pick up time. A smooth flight out over the Hoover Dam and parts of the Canyon in what appeared to be a bus with wings provided some stunning landscapes as the sun rose in the distance.


I'm trying to recollect the feeling I had of viewing the canyon for the first time up close and personal. Obviously the scale of the place and the colours strike me first, but I was also surprised by how green it was. Vast planes of trees stretching out along the tops of the canyon. The coach tour was a rushed affair with little time to really sit back and take it all in. We could have spent the whole day watching the shadows change as the sun moved to the west. The flight back to Vegas was an experience we're trying to forget. The pilot looked like he was having fun, we on the other hand struggled to hold onto our breakfast.



Cheers.

Palm Springs

I'm sure we will never visit the Greyhound station in downtown L.A. again in our lives. The guide book didn't lie when it said the area was a little seedy. The journey to Palm Springs was eventful, two major looking crashes on the outskirts of Los Angeles followed by the baggage doors of the bus opening thirteen miles from our destination. Thankfully no bags were left scattered over the highway and after some makeshift repairs the bus dropped us off in the searing heat of the desert. Unknown to us, the Greyhound station in Palm Springs closed the week before. The new drop off point was in a small car park next to a row of small stores miles from anywhere. Well that's how it felt and looked. Luckily the payphone had a yellow pages enabling us to call a cab. The heat was like nothing we had ever experienced, the closest thing I can think of is when you open the oven door and get that blast of heat. Only here it was constant, we were in the oven.

Relieved to be at our hotel we just relaxed, waited for the sun to go down a little before venturing out. It was Thursday and the main street closed and became a market full of fresh fruit and vegetables, art & crafts and the odd eccentric musician performing on his electric double bass. A fan blowing his receding blond hair from his shinny tanned face. We didn't get up to much in Palm Springs, abandoning our plans to the Joshua Tree National Park due to the heat. We'll try that again one winter time in the future, for now though we just relaxed recharged our batteries and swam in the pool. A nice change after the hectic times in the cities and in preparation for Las Vegas.

Cheers.

Los Angeles

If you can recall the post for San Francisco you’ll remember that getting down to LA from Monterey was a pretty stressful experience involving a mixture of mini buses, coaches and a train. We arrived at Union Station and it’s beautiful central lobby around 9:45pm. I didn’t take any pictures due to fatigue and a desire to get a taxi as quick as possible so we could settle down at the hotel.

We were tired and hungry and needed some food so we tentatively headed out onto the crazy streets of Hollywood. We made our way through the mix of fellow tourists, street performers, bums, degenerates and muggers to the McDonald's over the road. Not a choice we would usually settle on but we were tired and not in an adventurous mood. The characters inside were just as, if not more crazy and unsavoury as those on the streets with the odd family and tourists thrown in. A Big Mac and some Chicken Selects was followed by a brisk walk back to the hotel to witness a couple of arrests of the perviously mentioned muggers. Lovely place this Hollywood.

We only had one full day in Hollywood and didn’t have much planned. Look at the stars on the sidewalk, the hands and footprints. The Chinese Theatre, Sunset Strip and the shops on Melrose, maybe a hot dog at Pinks. Through the day LA turned out to be quite a pleasant place, I’ve always wanted to see The Chinese Theatre since Star Wars had it’s premier there in 1977. Melrose featured some superb paintings on the side of stores and shops, Pinks was sadly too busy but we found a nice little New York Pizzeria full of Godfather and Sopranos posters and pictures of famous customers from Ray Liotta to Jennifer Love Hewitt.

In the evening we took in the atmosphere of Hollywood Boulevard from a safe distance, looking down from the balcony of the Highland shopping Mall as a street performer entertained the passing crowds below. I wish we could have stayed longer, travelled round and experienced more but we had to move on the following day. The Greyhound bus to Palm Springs was next.

Cheers.

Pacific Grove, Monterey

We are currently relaxing in the desert preparing for our penultimate trip to Las Vegas. It's 111 degrees outside so we're lounging in our room until it cools a little, which gives me a chance to fill you in on the trip from San Francisco to Monterey.

Sunday 24th June.
This was the day we were kind of dreading. The journey to Monterey required us to catch a bus from downtown San Francisco to the train station in Oakland. Trains aren’t good enough for San Francisco unfortunately. The train in Oakland would be coming all the way from Seattle, part of it’s two day journey to Los Angeles and would drop us off at Salinas where we would then catch a mini bus which would take us to Monterey. To say it was a stressful journey would be an understatement and I’m not going to remind myself by writing about it any further. So lets just say we arrived at our hotel safely situated two blocks from the Pacific Ocean. Our lodgings were a little unusual and the welcome a little tepid but we’re two blocks from the Ocean. We had nothing planned but to chill out and relax for the rest of the day and the following before we headed to Los Angeles. We enjoyed a meal at a nice european restaurant. I actually took a risk and had a bit of salmon from Alaska. Not much of a fish eater I actually enjoyed it. The service was good but deteriorated slightly once we ordered a $25 bottle of wine. The wine list was forty pages thick and we showed our dissatisfaction of the waiters snobbery with our tip. As we walked back to the hotel the sun was setting so headed on down to the beach for a better view. This seemed to be the thing to do as a scattering of cars and people sat and watched as the sun disappeared in the distance.

Monday 25th June.
Nothing much to tell you about today really, we walked down the beach, visited Cannery Row in Monterey bought some gifts and tat and walked back up the beach. The pictures can describe the day better than I ever could.





Cheers, Los Angeles next.

San Francisco

I’m currently typing this entry on the train to Los Angeles. It’s been an interesting day. We left Pacific Grove, Monterey this morning and caught the shuttle bus to the desert town of Salinas to catch the train to Los Angeles. A nine hour journey. A good chance I thought to catch up on documenting our travels. Things on the road don’t always go to plan. Our train has been delayed by six hours due to a derailment, pushing the Los Angeles arrival time back to about two, three o’clock in the morning. Not ideal in our book, we were a bit scared about arriving at 9 pm never mind 3 in the morning. Luckily we had a chat with Donna at the ticket desk who helped us out and booked us on a different train scheduled to arrive in LA at 9:45 pm. Good enough. After a 3 hour bus ride through the vineyards of California we are finally on a train heading to Los Angeles. So I need to jump back a few days before all this happened and San Francisco.

Our two year old guide book informed us it was more convenient to fly into Oakland than San Francisco. Enabling us to catch the Air Bart and connecting Bart train at the Oakland Coliseum which would have us in downtown San Francisco in 15 minutes. Of course San Francisco had now updated it’s transport system from the airport and it would now be more convenient to land there and commute into downtown. After a squashed ride on the Air Bart and the help of a presumed homeless lady to buy a couple of tickets to get downtown we arrived at our hotel. Thankfully only half way up one of the notoriously steep hills of San Francisco. In our room we are greeted by a nice view of a brick wall and the fire escape. We’re only on the third floor so cant see past the next building. The first night we just had our usual walk round to find our bearings and check out the local neighbourhood, find a place to eat.

Friday 22nd June.
Our two year old guide book did help us out this time, following it’s advice to book tickets for Alcatraz in advance. The tours were sold out for the next few days so we were pretty relieved to have followed it’s guidance this time. It’ was only a ten minute boat ride to the island so not long enough for Emma to get sick but the boat rocking from side to side did it’s best to unsettle her. Alcatraz was simply great, a fantastic experience and quite beautiful in parts. Outside that is, not the cells which were cold and small. The audio tour allowed us to wander at our own pace and informed us about the prisons history and the attempted escapes. We continued to walk around the viewable areas of the island, keeping our eyes open for the bird crap. It’s a bird sanctuary now after all.

Saturday 23rd June.
The other place we wanted to see in San Francisco was the Golden Gate Bridge. Morbidly it’s one of the most popular places to commit suicide, we didn’t see any jumpers, well only a couple of knitted ones. It was a beautiful clear day, we walked to the middle taking pictures as we went. By the half way point we decided to turn round and returned to buy some souvenirs in the gift shop. We hung around took a few more pictures of the impressive structure then headed back downtown, saving our legs on the old cable car which took the strain on the steep ascents of the San Francisco neighbourhoods.

In the afternoon we took a trip down to the Castro district which turned out to be completely bonkers as Em put it. It was gay pride weekend, so this predominantly gay neighbourhood with bustling and made it difficult for us to find our way round to some of the really nice cafes and gift shops. An experience non the less. Returning to downtown we went for a drink at ‘Cafe Zoetrope’ located within the Sentinel Building, home to Francis Ford Coppola’s production company. The cafe features memento’s from Coppola’s career. We sampled a glass of Francis’ own wine served to us by bartender Peter who let us stand behind the bar. With his rose tinted glasses he was a real throwback to the seventies and looked like he had just walked from the set of The Godfather. Great wine by the way.

Cheers for reading, next up Monterey.

Seattle, part 2

June 21st
Breakfast on the roof deck of the hotel is a great way to start your day. The staff in the Starbucks in the lobby are possibly the friendliest we’ve ever known. The same could be said about Seattle in general from our short experience.

First tourist activity of the day is to visit the O Deck of the Space Needle for some views of the city and the surrounding mountain ranges in the distance. A little hazy to have a really clear view but you could see all of downtown, the harbour and Puget Sound. Beneath the Space Needle is an area called the Seattle Centre, home of the Sci-fi and Science museums. A fun park which had a very 70’s look and feel to it. Possibly not updated since then which maybe the explanation.

We later made our way downtown on the Monorail. A quick three minute journey, cutting through the buildings and above the streets. Wish it went on for longer and through more of the city. Yesterday down at Pikes Place Market we found a groovy looking cafe/store which made it’s own cheese. Never ones to turn down a unique cheese toasty (grilled cheese) this was to be our lunch time destination. Sat on a couple of milk churns, enjoying our toasties within the busy market place. A couple of stores down stands the first ever Starbucks featuring the old logo, store front and interior.

Our afternoon plan was to take one of the harbour cruises. Whilst waiting for the boat we looked round some of the stores on the pier, that was until we entering one of the stores our presence setting off the alarm. Following a polite interrogation we were told we couldn’t look around the cheap store full of nik-naks and other bits of souvenir tat. Once on the boat we received some great views of the city skyline, the public announcer and guide pointed out landmarks and places of interest. It was pretty interesting but a little overpriced for the experience.

For the evening we had read about this place called Bruno’s. we checked it out and thought we should have dinner there. It was a strange, old fashioned, italian, mexican place. full of character which was probably the attraction. We think Bruno himself served us and frankly as weird as the place was we couldn’t complain about the food or the price. 12” pizza and 2 beers for $18. That’s about £9 in real money. It’s a shame we only had two days, loads more places to go and see. I think we’ll be back in Seattle some time in the Future.

Cheers, San Francisico next.

Seattle, part 1

The flight to Seattle turned out to be pretty smooth, the kids kept quiet and our ipods provided the soundtrack to the journey. We arrived around 9.30pm waited for our bags anticipating one of the sleepless children to loose an arm on the baggage claim.

Seattle looked absolutely beautiful from the taxi, the car travelling alongside the skyline with the harbour to our left. We checked in around 10.30pm, dropped off our bags and headed to the roof deck for a panoramic view of the city. The Space Needle illuminated and standing tall. It was wonderful to be finally hear. Both being followers of the Seattle Music scene in the early nineties it’s a place we have always wanted to visit.

Number one place to visit in the guide books is Pikes Place Market. A huge market place full of fresh food stalls, mainly seafood. The most famous being the Pikes Place Fish Market where they throw your order from the front and wrap it up for you. It’s a bit of a show. All through the market are small stalls selling homemade arts and crafts. I bought a really nice journal, sketchbook made from hand made recycled paper with a leather cover. There’s just tons of stuff and a great views of the harbour.

We went to one of Seattle's micro breweries and had a couple of really good beers. Shame the food wasn’t up to much. Cheap burgers at double the price, not a great day for food. Spent the evening at a ball game and introduced ourselves to garlic fries which were superb and put the obligatory hot dog to shame. The Seattle Mariners stadium was a work of art with a retractable roof so none of the games can be rained off. Tonight it was sun all the way. We had seats on the top tier behind home plate. The stadium was about half full, great family atmosphere. Later in the game we moved round the side so we could see the city skyline and the sun go down. Sadly the Mariners lost despite the crowds best efforts.

I thinks that’s enough for now, I’ll try and write some more tomorrow.

Cheers.