Gringo Tour 08/09 - Part 11

After the USS Midway - we trekked for one final time back to the Horton Plaza for some late lunch. The choices were pretty dire - and we both had some italian fast food which was a bit mediocre (in a fast food trough sort of way). We then headed back to the Airport, then walked over to the Sheraton, then back to the Airport (via the hotel shuttle)....

There has been heaps of news about the massive air delays/cancellations over Xmas in the States on CNN (either plane cancellations or plane running off the runway or plane on fire or Andersen Cooper with Kathy Griffin for NYE ads (which make me want to shoot myself)).... so I was a little worried about our flight being delayed. It wasn't too bad - it was only late by about 30 minutes which meant that we arrived at Las Vegas at about 10:30pm.

The Southwest flight was pretty good. It was a bit Virgin Blue-esque in terms of the friendly, jokey service - but instead of the drop dead gorgeous Virgin Blue people - it was more like the AA-esque old people.

When we stepped off the plane and out of the gate at Las Vegas airport - you are surrounded by slot machines. Ant and I exchanged glances and then began giggling like little Japanese school girls. And to top it off - people actually are playing the slot machines at the Airport (including the baggage carousels).

We had to wait for our bags for a bit at the carousel - but it wasn't too bad because you could check out all of the cheesy Las Vegas shows playing at all of the hotels. It sort of feels like every hotel in LV has a Cirque De Sol show on and that everyone has a French Canadian freeekish fetish going on. Although Ant and I aren't Cirque De Sol fans - so we wanted to give them all a miss. There were ads for "Fantasy - the hottest showgirl show in Vegas" playing at the Luxor (giant pyramid hotel in which we had booked) and "Chippendales Strippers" and "The Thunder from Downunder" strip show... Ant and I again started giggling like school girls.

If you didn't know - I have this incredibly unholy obsession with the movie "Showgirls" - the story of Nomi Malone who comes to Vegas with the dream of being a star... of a sleazy stripper show. It was made by the people who made Basic Instinct and they made it as a serious movie - but with lines like "She looks better than a 10 inch d##k and you know it!" and "Ohhh... Nomi - you are the only ones who could pop my t#ts right!" and sex scenes where she looks like she is getting attacked from the shark from Jaws (or as my Razzies book calls it - "When Flipper meets Stripper" - it is totally hilarious and one of my all time favourite... comedies. So I was in 7th Heaven finally being at Las Vegas (where the movie was set). I feel like a "Sound of Music Spin" happening again.

Anyhows - after a couple of sound of music (aka I'm happy) spins in the airport terminal - we headed to the $US6 shuttle. We had to wait for a bit in the shuttle (while the operator was madly waiting for more tourists to arrive) - but an American on the bus got medevil with him - so we left. There was this skeezy guy on the bus who kept asking Ant and I all of these skeezy questions - but I did my best impression of "I'm not listening and I can't hear you".

The Luxor Hotel (which is that giant pyramid/egyptian themed hotel located on the Strip) was just on the other side of the airport (! - seems to be a common theme on this holiday) and just past the "Hooters Hotel" (!) looked rather impressive at night - with a giant white beam of light sprouting from the top of the pyramid. We arrived at one of the tower entrances (there are a couple of towers - but we had booked a room in the pyramid itself) and we made our way to the hotel reception - which was more like a line at Disneyland (!). Ant waited in queue while I sat with the bags outside the "Fantasy" exhibit - which instructed guests that you could meet the Fantasy Girls every night and then went into really cheesy "It's my fantasy!!" 80s cock-rock (sung by a woman) music. Wasn't Fantasy the name of the show in Showgirls?? Or wait - it was "Goddess"....

Ant walked over to me and announced that they didn't have any king rooms in the pyramid (despite us booking one) so we have a room in the tower instead. We walked past the casino floor (full of slots... machines) and around a conference center (geez this place was big) and found the lifts (it felt like the ghetto part of the hotel). Our room was on the 3rd floor with a view of the carpark (! not happy jan) and we dumped our bags, I went to the loo and And did his nah-nah and we walked back to the lobby and demanded that they recheck us into a Pyramid room. They put us into a "twin" room in the Pyramid which wasn't a twin single - rather a twin double - which wasn't too much of a problem. We made the 10km hike back to the tower, collected our bags, walked over back to the Pyramid, Ant pushed over a family (maybe?!) and we caught the 1B lifts (there are mutiple lifts which go up at a 45 degree angle around the pyramid) and went to the 24th floor (which was a little better than the 3rd in the tower). The room was a slanted on the window (due to the pyramid shape) - and the room was a bit basic with a bit of egyptian decor (klass with a k) but it did the job. Ant was freaking out about the walkway from the lift to the room - there was a 24 floor drop from over the balcony and the balcony went to our hips... A bit vertigo-esque. All of the pyramid hotel rooms ran along the edge of the building - so each floor became smaller and smaller (although there were 100+ rooms on our floor). It was quite architecturally impressive if not tacky.

Because we were both excited to be here - we decided to head out to the strip and have a little look around.

The casino in the luxor is not overly big - it is in the middle of the ground floor and is mostly made up of slot machines (like most casinos here!). There was an "entertainment" area on the second floor where the Fantasy show and Carrottop (! - what a loser) was playing. There was also a couple of restaurants, nightclubs and a food court (with a Macca-Dees!) and at least 3 Starbucks. There was a mini pyramid inside the main pyramid - and a NY-esque style town (where the food court and the theatre was).

We headed along an indoor walkway (where I did another I'm happy Sound of Music twirl) to the adjoining/sister hotel - the Excalibur - a sort of Disneyland Castle on steroids and cheese with a "ye-olden English Knights" theme. The all you can eat buffet was called "Round Table" and everything else had cheesy Knights-esque names. There was even a wedding chapel called "Canterbury" something... It looked a bit more run down than the Luxor and seemed to be a bit more family orientated (amusement games downstairs and no night-clubs).

We headed outside from there to the Strip (where it was raining). The Strip is chock-full of Casinos and Hotels (nothing much else except the occasional dodgy looking Travellodge or Mc Donalds). Across the street from the Excalibur was "New York New York" - a hotel built with heaps of famous mini NY landmarks and buildings including the Brooklyn Bridge, Statue of Liberty, Empire State Building (no Twin Towers... good taste) and a roller coaster which runs along the top. We had a quick walk through NY NY Casino (Lots of slot machines, a skeezy "Ugly Coyote" bar or two, crazy aqua massage thingys, more starbucks and a "strip mall" NY theme thingy).

We headed outside again (still raining) - where the famous MGM Grand was across the road. We stayed on the NY NY / Luxor side of the Strip for a bit - where there was the Monte Carlo casino (with some cheesy 60s looking Magician headlining the Monte Carlo or something.

Next door to the Monte Carlo was the mutha of all construction sites. It must have been about a km long and there looked like there would be about 6 skyscrapers as part of the new casino. As a foot note - I was reading Wikiepdia - and I think this was the site of the old "Stardust Casino" which the Showgirls show was set in (may it rest in peace... sob). It was imploded last year (2007) and is going to be the site of multiple casinos.

Because it was getting late - we decided to head back to the luxor. As we were a little bit hungry (had a somewhat crappy dinner at the San Diego Airport) - we had some... dare I say it... Golden Arches. I had a $1USD (plus taxes) Mc Chicken Hot & Spicy - and Ant had a small kiddie meal. I hate the States and the taxes situation - where it is kinda like Taxes Surprise everytime you buy something... Just include it as part of the stated price and be done with it dammmit!!! I also bought a bottle of water (which was kinda expensive but cheaper than the $3US asking price in the hotel's vending machines). Of note - this Golden Arches was open 24 hours, had breakfast till 11am (! thank gawd for some common sense) and didn't serve coke - rather pepsi products (probably the only Mc Donalds in the free world which does so). Ant thought it must have been something to do with getting a agreement with the hotel (which has Pepsi stuff everywhere).

As it was getting pretty late (and we had a late night the previous night in San Diego) - we decided to hit the sack... Until next time...

Gringo Tour 08/09 - Part 10

We got up early enough so we could check out by the check out time. A lot of US hotels have late check in (sometimes 4pm...) but usually always have late check out (most are midday) which is so much better than Oz with 10am check outs... Did I mention that our Sheraton had a Starbucks in the lobby (damn them all to hell!!!! AGGHGH!). We avoided Starbucks and the expensive in-hotel breakfasts - checked out - walked to the airport and went back to the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf in town for some breakfast and half-decent coffee (take that Starbucks!). I wasn't so sure about the clientele @ the Coffee Bean because it mostly consisted of hobos who would order a coffee and sit there all day long...

This was our last day in San Diego - but we had a full day of sight-seeing because we weren't flying to Las Vegas until 8:40pm with Southwest Airlines. Ant really wanted to check out the USS Midway - a decommissioned US Aircraft Carrier which was docked in San Diego bay and was turned into a quasi-museum. The entrance fee was $17USD which was a little cheap - but surprisingly it was worth it. You could check out (just about) every nook and cranny in the ship (probably excluding any highly sensitive classified equipment which I'm guessing would have been stripped out by the Navy before opening this thing up to the public).

When we boarded the ship - I was doing my Cher impression of "If U Could Turn Back Time" - but Ant corrected me saying there was a warship in that video... ohh. I didn't realise Ant was a ship spotter as well!

On the first floor of the ship - there was a bit of a museum to the Midway (which was in service from the second world war until the end of Gulf War I). It didn't look like it ever got into any trouble except when a Turkish ship collided with the Midway - killing a couple of sailors (due to some oxygen plant thingy on the ship exploding). You could also explore just about all the areas of the ship too - from grunt messes, to the high class officers messes to the laundry area to the quarters and so forth. Of course - all of the non-commissioned officers (ie: grunts) had sh##house accommodation (where I think a 4 ft munchkin would have problems fitting in the bunk bed) and as the ranks got more superior - so to the accommodation. The Ship's Captain had the bling-iest accommodation - with a big bedroom, study and bathroom.

On the deck of the ship - there were heaps of old decommissioned aircraft - including Seahawks and FA-18 Hornets (which are still in use in Australia...!). I got a pose-y shot on a missile (a la Dr Strangelove aka How I learned to Love the Bomb) and you got a pretty heck darn good view of San Diego from the ship (golly gosh).

We had a guided tour around the top of the ship (where there was the captain's deck (or is that star trek?), the aircraft landing control thingy and other stuff - but I had felt like throwing overboard some annoying kids who were little s##ts and kept flicking at all of the switches on the ship... grrr.

There were also a range of simulators on the first deck which simulated navy ships or fighter jets (which go upside down - yay!) but all had a steep price so we gave it a miss... There were also some ejector seats which you could sit in and watch "the Navy's funniest home videos" - with (I kid you not) - Kenny Loggins' Highway to the Danger Zone song playing... Yeh. Until next time...

Gringo Tour 08/09 - Part 9

We had a bit of a late awakening and had decided to go to the gyme before we head to town. The gyme at the Sheraton was even more impressive than the gyme at the Bonaventure. It had brand spanking new Life Fitness equipment with exercise bikes with touch screen TVs (sweeet). Ant made a comment that it was even better than the ANU gym (sorry Len!). Right next door to the gyme was a Wii room (another first) although there were a couple of 25 year olds hogging the machine playing Wii baseball.

We showered and headed out to the airport to catch the 961 bus to town. We arrived into town around midday and we wandered around the Gaslamp District for a little while trying to find breakfast (latino time ahoy). I tried to point out to Ant that the Gaslamp Quarter mostly contained irish themed pubs and bars, as opposed to somewhere where you could get breakfast. We had a bit of a public hissy-fit and both of us eventually cooled down and I picked out the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf outlet which was kinda near the Horton (Hears a Who) Plaza. It was cheap and pretty good - and their coffee wasn't too bad either (for the states).

We caught a bus to Balaboa Park (a hugeish park near the centre of San Diego) which houses one of the world's best zoos - the San Diego Zoo. We arrived there pretty late (2ish) and the Zoo shutted at 4ish - so we didn't have much time to dawdle. It was a little expensive to get in (about $35USD) but it was well worth it.

The zoo was pretty excellent - with a lot of big-ish exhibits and lush surroundings. Highlights include the gorillas (never had seen them before and we got up to a foot away to them (just a sheet of glass and us), pandas (where there was this annoying line to see them and people taking flash photography at them), the hippos (! It was excellent being able to see them swim from underwater), all of the monkeys (so many lil' monkeys everywhere), some little asian dog things (looked like dingo puppies and were very cute) and the koalas (!). I took some pictures of Ant in the cheesy koala gift shop lined with heaps of cheesy koala toys and bags (not made out of real ones). There was also this weird Dr Sesus memorial thingy next to the pink flamingoes (why isn't there a Divine memorial next to the pink flamingoes!?!). Dr Sesus used to live here in San Diego (hence the Horton Plaza Hears a Who thing) and maybe he had a book with pink flamingoes or something. We had an excellent time and did stick out a bit (lots of families everywhere with loud obnoxious kids and hick-hillbilly families who looked fresh off the set of Jerry Springer. The San Diego zoo is defintely up there in terms of the world's best (maybe the only one I can think of which may be better is the Singapore Night Safari zoo which is excellent in terms of seeing active animals at night).

We headed back into town and were feelin a little hungry (it was about 5ish and we hadn't had any lunch). I wanted to have another kabab at the Horton Hears a Who Plaza but the store was shut down (maybe due to lack of hygine standards or something). So we had to make do with a Philly Sub (sounds like a horse). I had some really greasy Italiano Sub which was hand-grilled on the fat stove. Ant had the "light and lean" mashed potatoes with plastic cheese... Mmmm.. heartburn.

We headed back to the hotel to dump our stuff and then back into town and caught a bus to the general direction of gay-bar-villes. It was getting pretty late (almost 10ish) and we were getting a bit worried about finding a place to eat. We stumbled on an old-USA style diner (which appeared to be managed by an old jewish family). I had a chicken pie and a light bud (light bud is low on carbs not alcohol content) and Ant had a rye sandwich - which were all completely over the top in terms of portion size. They had those little old jukeboxes on the table - I popped in a quarter and played some hokey old Four Tops song (which is on Singstar).

At about 11ish - we headed out onto the street and found a gay "video" bar - but before you can say "Debbie Does San Diego" - no it wasn't a porno video bar - rather a video bar playing really bad music from the late 80s and early 90s. Although I'm a 80s/90s bad music luver - this stuff was pure sh#te (hello - Toni Childs). We had a couple of drinks (more Bud Lights) and at about midnight - all the tables in the room were folded out to reveal poker tables and all the locals partook in some (what looked like illegal) poker. This bar was pretty strange - not in a weird Blue Oyster / Police Academy way but in a weird San Diego-bad videos illegal poker sort of way.



Because we had to get up somewhat earlier the next day (our last in San Diego) - we decided we might take our fourth cab trip for the holidays back to the hotel. We hailed a cab down and Ant was under the impression that this shouldn't cost more than $10 given we were just over a hill away from the hotel. But this taxi ride (which lasted almost 15 mins) felt like it had taken us to the far-flunged reaches of the universe. It was most defintely the scenic route back to the hotel and cost us almost $30USD (which is like 1m AUD) so we weren't very happy pappy. Have I mentioned how wacky US radio is?? Our cab ride from KBF Resort to the Amtrak Station was pretty funny - in the fact that the cab driver was listening to left-wing talk back radio - and I swear - it sounded just like a funny radio station of the Grand Theft Auto video game. The station ID promo went "Are you sick of all those extreme right wing lunatics...?! Then get the facts with (can't remember the shock jocks name) at (insert station name)." The San Diego Cabbie was listening to a religous ABC Classic FM equivalent with non stop 14th Century christmas songs - old skool style beeches. Until next time.

Gringo Tour 08/09 Part 8

Ant had booked our hotel (Sheraton) through Hotwire - a US internet company where you get discounted accommodation rates but you don't know where you are booking into until you have paid for the room via a credit card. The hotwire "area" was quite big (for the San Diego harbor) but we ended up booking the Sheraton which was right next door to the airport (!).

We had thought about a plan to try and catch a bus from the Amtrak station at San Diego to the airport and then get a free Sheraton shuttle from the airport - but it was absolutely pisshing down and we didn't really know where to go to catch the bus (also Ant seems to have a morbid fear of umbrellas because he didn't bring one with him on the trip).... so we hailed a taxi right next to the station.

The taxi ride was fairly quick and cheapish (a bit over $10USD). Upon arrival at the Sheraton - it seemed like one of the classiest (not spelt with a K) hotels we have stayed at for some while. Even though the building is a bit 80s - the interior has been completely renovated (recently by the looks of it). Our room was pretty awesome - a big bed, a big flat screen TV, a recycling bin (! - a first for hotels), a water saving shower head (! - a first for hotels in the states - the LA hotel had two non-saving shower heads!) and a balcony facing the pool and nearby marina...

We headed out to the concierge desk to find out how exactly do we get to town. The woman replied saying "Do you have a car? If not - just catch a taxi!". (a somewhat typical American response - with no suggestion of catching public transport). We asked whether we could get a bus - and she said that we should take the Sheraton Shuttle to the airport and catch the local bus from there.

The biblical showers had eased and it wasn't raining anymore (just really overcast). We decided to walk (!) into town along the marina and harbor. The hotel was just about 500m away from the Terminal 1 (how convenient!). The walk into town only took about 45 minutes. The footpath was in quite good nick and Ant had spent most of the time plane spotting at the nearby airport.

Along the main touristica part of the harbor - we got touted (first tout for our trip). There was some manic woman who was riding a bicycle cart thing who said we could get a lift to the Gaslamp Quarter of San Diego. We said no. But she must of interrupted that "no" means "keep bugging us for another 5 minutes". After we ditched the tout manic woman - our stomachs were hungry (it was about 2 or 3pm and we hadn't had anything substantial since our 7am IHOPs) and we wandered downtown to the vicinity of "Horton Plaza" - San Diego's big downtown shopping mall.

Upon arrival to the aforementioned plaza - it was a "Westfield shopping centre"... joy (cough cough). Horton Plaza was one o those weird "outdoor multi-level malls" where everything was pretty much exposed to the elements (including the OH&S slippery stairs everywhere). We were really getting close to Xmas (it was going to be in a couple of days time) - and the San Diego mall felt a little bit busier than LA malls - but you know - a normal day in the Canberra Centre still felt busier than here.

We made our way to the top level where there was a kinda food court (more like a food balcony) which had Cinnabon (which made sugary donut stuff), a pretzel shop (these pretzels are indeed making me thirsty), a Ben and Jerrys (an American ice cream chain - nutritious) and a Panda Express (think fast food franchise version of those dodgy chinese lemon chicken RSL deals). We settled on a Mediterranean Grill - which had really yummy kebabs which were much more delicious than the Australian varieties.

We had a bit of browse around the mall. We bought some dilly/toiletry bags at Macys which had mis-scanned at the checkout ($10 cheaper than already discounted price). I could finally say goodbye to my krusty old dilly bag which was over 10 years old and had been harboring new strains of e-coli or something. I also bought a t-shirt at Nordstrom (a big jewish-sounding department store which is all over the states). I had also bought a couple of DVDs at Sam Goodys (a sort of Virgin/HMV megastore which had a pretty good collection of new and used stuff). Ant checked out the Abercrombie and Fitch shop (sort of a really popular gay-esque store selling "frat-house" clothes). They had a big vaporizer machine out the front blowing out the scent of the new A&F cologne. But Ant and I thought it stunk like essence de $2-man whore. Ant was a bit underwhelmed by the selection and prices (some of this stuff is cheaper in Australia). Plus he thinks that the A&F brand isn't as exclusive as it once was because they are beginning to sell the stuff at crappy DFOs in Australia.

It was beginning to get dark (gets dark around here about 5ish) and we checked out the Gaslamp Quarter. It felt a little touristy (heaps of bars, restuarants and upper-end hotels) but was quaint enough - with gaslamp-esque lamps aligning the street (although I'm sure they were powered by electricity). We stumbled across a big old theatre in the Quarter where there was a 6:45pm session of "Australia" showing. I had this perverse desire to watch Australia in the states and was a bit surprised that it was still showing (thought it had tanked in the states). We bought some tickets (which were about the same as non-discounted cinema tickets back home in Australia). The theatre was quite quiet - and we were thinking - we might be the only ones here! But alas - there were a couple of guys sitting down the front (so a total of 4 people watching Australia...). I was trying to work out if the guys in front were gay. San Diego is a big military town (Marines and Navy are based here - obviously because it is right at the border between the US and Mexico) and there are a town of gay bars in town (obviously). The guys looked like marines or something and were sitting a couple of seats apart - but they were together.... but they were watching Australia... I couldn't tell. The trailers were running overtime - the movie was supposed to start at 6:45pm but it was closer to 7:10pm by the time the movie started. There were some weird propaganda army ads with "3 Doors Down" signing a song about a "Citizen Patriotic Solider" or something - which reminded me of Starship Troopers (want to be a citizen??).

I actually enjoyed Australia - I wasn't really expecting to given the dodgy reviews and the type of movie that it was. Perhaps the first hour or so felt a little jumbled (maybe if they re-edited with more - it could have been a much better film) but overall I liked it. Ant thought they could have separated it into two movies (the droving first half as one movie then the Darwin/WWII as a second film).

Because the film is almost 3 hours - we didn't leave till almost 10:45pm. We found a little pizza shop and ordered a Medium Pepperoni pizza to share between us for dinner (latino time baby). We hoped on a local metro bus to the airport (only $2.25 for a one way ride, $5 for an all day pass... cheap as) and got off at Terminal 1 (the closet terminal to our hotel) - and crashed for the night (after a bad sleep at KBF Resort with that little 5 year old s### that woke us up... Till next time..

Gringo Tour 08/09 - Part 7

After arriving at the KBF Resort - we headed a mile or two down the road to get to the Buena Park Mall - a hugeish one level mall which was the size of Tasmania. But because it was almost 10pm - everything was shutting. We quickly checked out our first American Wal-Mart (last time we went to a Wal-Mart was in Nanjing China...). It was big, massive and I did a Sound of Music twirl at the front door in excitement. I bought a box set of Sth Park which was cheaper by $5 than Best Buys from the other day.

We hadn't eaten dinner yet (we seemed to be in Latino time) and the choices were fat ("Fatburger" - no joke) or gross (McDonalds). We decided to try our luck at a Chicago based franchise (which we hadn't heard of) which had excellent hot dogs and burgers (I had a chicken burger which was tasty and not too fatburger) and Ant had a hot dog and fries.

On the way back home - we had to quickly check out "Sears" (in a sort of road accident sort of way). Sears is the clothing equivalent of K-Mart (ie: St Vinnies has better clothes) and everything was pretty tacky and cheap. Ant and I love that line out of the Mean Girls movie ("I'm a size four". "Try Sears").

We had to get up fairly early the next morning because we had tickets on the Amtrak train from Fullerton (not the apartments) to San Diego. I had set the alarm at 7am but we didn't need it because our next door neighbors' kid decided to have a mindblowingly loud temper tantrum at 6am. Ant and I put up with it for about 20 minutes before Ant went Emo and banged on our interconnecting door... red-head ranga style. It put a stop to the whining.

Because we had spotted an IHOP down the road (aka International House of Pancakes) the other day - we had to keep up with our American tradition of having fat fat sugar sugar huge huge pancakes at IHOP (and for me - the bottomless coffee). We were greeted by a very camp "Juan" who was a bit surprisingly lacking when it came to the service (we waited for about 10 mins for the bill but he didn't come so we just walked to the front counter). I had the "light and lean" three stack of pancakes (3 is a small portion in America) - whereas Ant had the five blackberry pancake meal (which was calorific to the max). Although Ant's Blackberry IHOP pancakes were calorific - they weren't as bad as some of the stuff on the menu (ie: eggs, bacon, 5 pancakes and sauce - it was the kids meal).

We headed back to the KBF Resort to grab our bags and got the front desk to call for a cab (yes - a taxi in the states...). Ant attempted to find a bus route that would go past the Amtrak station - but alas - he couldn't find one - so we had to cab it. Although we thought it was fairly close, and that cabs in america were relatively cheap - it cost us about $25USD with tip to get to the station. When we arrived - it was pissing down (almost biblical style). We raced into the Amtrak Station (which was quite cute) and had to wait for about 20 mins for our train to arrive. We decided to check our bags in (instead of carrying them onto the train). It didn't seem like a great idea when we were waiting on the platform and Ant could see our bags getting drenched from the rain...

The train trip to San Diego was OK - although we thought we had reserved seating - we didn't so we had to settle on a couple of seats facing backwards for the trip. The view from the train was fairly impressive most of the way - the train ride was pretty much on the edge of the Pacific Ocean and you could easily see the beaches and ocean. The PA system people were fairly crazy - when the Food Cart man was speaking over the PA - he sounded like his cookies had more than just choc chips in them. And when we arrived at San Diego - a really camp guy screamed out "Whell here is what all of you have been waitin 4...! San Diego!".

We got off the train (sin bags) and it was absolutely pissing down (biblical style). We waited around for our bags to surface - but about 15 minutes later - a guy appeared on a kart thingy with our wet bags. We watched slowly as a decrepit Amtrak old woman and the fat man piled, one by one, all of the bags of their kart onto the ground. Then they wanted us to produce tickets and get them to find them - but Ant in true ranga style pushed a couple of old people out of the way, grabbed our bags and got the hell out of the station. Till next time...

Gringo Tour 08/09 Part 6

After the racist boat ride - we decided to test our wits and sanity by going on the Old Wild West roller coaster - the very same coaster where someone died a few years ago. Last time I was in a Disney-related themepark (the Magical Kingdom @ Disneyworld to be exact) -this ride had been closed for maintenance not that long after the death at Disneyland at California. However - this ride was back in action and after a short queue (5 minutes) - we were off and rearing on the ride. Of note - they were letting people with broken legs on the ride. They were also letting trailer park trash on as well (complete with "Jesus Rocks" t-shirts).

We got one of those quick passes to the Indiana Jones ride - where you get a quick pass ticket to come back to a certain ride during a certain time and you get to by-pass the queue. As the Indiana Jones ride is probably the most popular ride at Disneyland (probably due to its relatively newness) - we had to come back at around 2:45-3:45 for the ride.

We quickly popped on board the "Jungle Cruise" - Disneyland's second most racist ride (complete with "stewpid" native people getting poked up the poop shoot by rhinos). Ahhh those colourful natives! Also - the ride mysteriously seems to go through Cambodia, Africa, South America and Central America - all on the one boat ride. Not like Disneyland to let some facts to get in the way of a themepark ride... Also the attendant was fairly animated. Although I sort of get the vibe that most people who work on these rides and repeat the same jokes 1000 times a day could be potentially sucidal.

We were sort of feeling a bit peckish - so we headed of in the general direction of Tommorrowland - Walt Disney's skewed vision of the future with rocket ships and plastic houses and such... We got some expensive crappy burgers from a place where a "Light Saber Jedi Training" Show was on. I couldn't see it but I heard dodgy Darth Vader pre-recorded voices appear over the PA. When I peered over some shrubbery to see the show - it looked fairly lame (some 3 year olds with those plastic light sabers pretending to battle Darth or something).

We then checked out the "Innoventions" building which is in a big circuluar revolving building - which was not so subtly disguised as a bit of marketing for several companies. As you enter the exhibit - you are placed in a kitchen with an overweight (and very camp) Disney attendant (half of the people who work at Disneyland are gay) who takes you through various "dream" houses (colonial style, modern psychofrenia style) but all were really "nightmare" homes with no taste or style. It was a 5 min presentation that none of us could escape and it was all just a shameless plug for some american building company. You are then forced to watch another camp dweeb who talks about what sort of entertainment he likes to do or something - which was another 4 minute shameless plug for some electronic company. After the detainment of guests for 10 minutes (where you start to wonder why I paid $69 US to go to this stewpid themepark) - you get let loose in a technology gadget room (which was more tolerable but still just shameless plugs for Microsoft). They had these flat coffee table computer things - but Ant was trying to find the direction to the Amtrak station from our hotel for tomorrow's trip to San Diego. I tried to ward off little brats who attempted to move the map on the computer. There was this other screen where you could write things with your hands. I wrote "FUK" and walked away. Ant said that he heard some middle-aged woman going "How mature!!".

After that we checked out "Honey I Shrunk the Auidence" - you know - one of those movie-tie in 3D films at Themeparks - although this one was tied in with those kinda forgotten "Honey I Shrunk/Blew/F##ked the Kids" series. I'm not sure what happened to Rick Moranis (did he die of a coke overdose - or is his career just dead) but I'm sure all of the tweens and tots would have no idea what the fudge this film is about. We were put into a holding pen for 10 minutes before the film started - where we were subjected to more toture techiniques (aka shameless kodak promotional videos). These were all absolutely corny - with all of these middle-america kodak moments. One story was about this black kid looking for his lost dog called "Champ" and he took his picture around the neighbourhood - but before you could say "Child Rapist" - he knocked on the front door of what looked like the neighbourhood rapist. I was screaming out "run away kid - he is going to touch you inappropriately!" (in front of shocked families and such). I swore I was going to get kicked out... The 10 min Honey I Shurnk the Auidence movie was pretty hokey in a themepark sort of way. It had all of the requisite "fake rats under people's seats" and "wind effects" to make it seem more realistic. Although I'd wish they bring back the 3D Michael Jackson film (Captain Eo - from the disturbed minds of George Lucas and Michael Jackson) which was much gayer and cheeser.

Speaking of distrubing George Lucas - we then went on the "Star Tours" ride. Although the indictive queue time said 10mins - our queue took about 20 mins because the queue splits off into two and there were two simulators for one queue and just the one for our queue (hence our queue moved at half speed). We were subjected to the ad-nauseum repetivtive robot story - where a couple of robots who were lazy (and possibly mexican) were kept getting shut down by the main computer for not being productive enough. Idiotically - they just reboot the robots (instead of blowing them up) so they repeat their laziness routine - just to be shut down again - just to pish off all those who are standing in the queue). Star Tours was one of the first simulator rides (that I can remember) - but I don't think it has really stood the test of time. Maybe Disney could use some of my $69 USD entrance fee to redo the ride and make it more violent and agressive... raaahhh!@

We headed back over to the other side of the park (Adventure Land to be exact) for our Fast Pass onto the Indiana Jones ride. It was sweet passing all those suckers who had lined up in the long queue. The Indiana Jones ride is pretty sweet (a sort of on rails ride going through some random Inca/Aztec/(Insert Ancient Civilisation here) cave thingy) - but my favourite ride of this kind was the Spiderman ride in Universal Studios - Islands of Adventure (over in Orlando) - which was a similar sort of deal except you had 3D glasses and some of the effects on the ride were pretty amazing (like being flung off a skyscraper only to be caught in a spider web at the bottom).

We treked over to the cheesiest place in the world - "It's a Small World" ride in Fantasyland (not to be confused with Fantasy Lane - the adult shop in Canberra). Because of the vicinity to Xmas - the It's a Small World ride had been "remixed" into a xmas version - so instead of repeating that annoying "It's a small world after all" song for 10 minutes -they intersperse it with "Jingle Bells" and other xmas songs to make it a little more bearable. Although I found the "Xmas" remix to be a little more racist than normal - because it had everyone (including those who don't believe in Santa Claus or Jesus) singing xmas carols. Ohhh Disney and your somewhat "Nazi are our supergods" mentality.

We did a couple of Fantasy Land rides including the Dumbo flying thingy (I got to sit in the pink dumbo yay!) but avoided the Teacups - as they had almost made Ant throw up last time we were at Disneyworld.

We headed back to Frontierland (aka Racistland) for our next fast pass at Splash Mountain - which ended up not being such a hot idea to go on at 5pm at night (LA was dark by then and it wasn't warm). The ride attendant had Ant and myself sit at the front of the log (big fat mistake) - which had meant all of the weight in the log was at the front which meant that the splash down was going to be 10 times worse than having some light kiddies in the front. Before we set off - Ant made a comment saying - because we are at the front - will mean that we won't get that wet.... Wrong. On the first little splash down (in the middle of the ride in the dark) - the front of the log started filling up with water (I had water around my ankles). On the drop down - I did a "America's Next top Model' pose (which actually worked quite well on those photos) but Ant and I were drenched, cold and miserable after the ride.

We headed back to Main St USA (the fakest place on the planet - maybe just behind Rodeo Dr) and Ant attempted to get a hot chocolate - but it had looked like you needed a fast pass to get one because all of the queues where 20 minutes long. We headed back in the vague direction of Racistland / New Orleans Square (which was sort of a half decent attraction now since the real version had been washed away or something) and hopped on the Pirates of the Carribean ride (which was really heated and warmed us up. It had looked like the ride had been tweaked just a little bit with a animiatronic version of Johnny Depp appearing in bits of the ride - in a shameless attempt to cash on the movie.

We then went on the Haunted Mansion ride - which had been re-worked (now includes Nightmare before Xmas characters) and re-mixed for Xmas. There was some bizzare plot (something about a cross-dressing trannie named "Sandy Claus") and nothing made much sense. To be honest - I think I preferred the old cheesy Haunted House sin movie characters I haven't seen before. I was a bit surprised Disney didn't try and cash-in on the "success" of their "Haunted Mansion" movie with Eddy Murphy. I would have loved to see an animatronic version of Eddy - swearing at the kiddies on the ride doing break dancing to Axel F music from Beverly Hills Cop.... or something.

Ant and I then headed back over to Tomorrowland - where we had Fast Pass tickets to some Toy Story shooting ride. Although when we rocked up - the ride was broken. Yay. We went instead on the Autopia ride (which had been rejigged with "Cars" characters - again another movie I haven't seen). The queue was quite long (this is one of Disneyland's more popular rides) but it is sort of funny driving little gas guzzling cars around a fixed track. Although Disney needs to convert these babies into electric cars to make them somewhat more green (think I was overdosing with exhaust fumes around the pit area.

We then headed on (I know this sounds lame) the monorail. But this was again another ride which had been reworked since the last time I had been here (15 years ago). It was the Monorail version 4.0 or something and it went through the new California Adventure land and Downtown Disney. It was also a lot faster and sexier than the previous slow cluggy monorail. The track was different than before (I seem to recall the monorail used to cut through space mountain - but it doesn't do this anymore).

After the monorail - I thought we might as well try our hand with queuing up for Space Mountain (the "scary" ride... cough) but as soon as we got there - the ride was broken (getting flash backs of being there 15 years ago and queuing up for 3 hours at Space Mtn only for the ride to break down... yay!).

However that Toy Story shooter ride was open so we went on that one. You basically sit in a little "haunted mansion" style wheely thing which you can control and you both have laser guns and shoot aliens or something (not of the mexican variety) - maybe some of the Walt racisim is rubbing off on me). There is a score depending on how many aliens you kill - I was blasting my guts off and put Ant's score to shame. But as we left the ride - my score was pretty shameful according to the high scores painted on the exit door.

It was about 9ish pm and we both decided to call it quits (I was still wet from Splash Mountain). I think we had a pretty good day - I can always go to Disneyland and enjoy myself (part cheese, part childhood memories) and I think we did a pretty good recovery given that it would have been pretty dire to go to Knotts Berry given the masses and its clientelle.

We headed back to the KBF resort - where there were the reminents of the white trash leaving the park. We collected our bags from the front desk and went to our modestly furnished room on the sexy bottom floor. KBF Resort was kids central - and Ant and I did look a little out of place. Gays normally do at themeparks - but we do visit them (take a look at "Gay Day" at Disneyland - where the park is overrun by drugged out queens mixed up with the normal families... it would be a blast). Till next time...

Gringo Tour 08/09 - Part 5

After a quick stroll down Rodeo Drive - which was decked out in xmas festy cheer - we found another bus into town - but instead of going back to Downtown - we went back to West Hollywood and found a Tex-Mex Gay Bar to have dinner. The 2 for 1 margaritas went down like a treat and so did the over-sized tex-mex burgers with oversized quantities of chips (or french fries).

After dinner - we browsed through a couple of shops. Ant bought the "really classy" Dantes Cove complete series box set on DVD. If there was a gay equivalent of the Razzies - I'm sure Dantes cove would pick up a Life-time achievement award for the worst ever gay TV series or something.

We headed back to Downtown to our hotel - and took a few pictures of me posing in the hotel lobby in front of the elevators and water features. Did I mention that the hotel had little plaques saying that "In the Line of Fire was shot at these elevators" or "Forget Paris was shot at these elevators". I think the hotel is a quasi-tourist attraction or something. Well I've heard of In the Line of Fire and True Lies - but I've definitely forgotten "Forget Paris" with Billy Crystal.

We had to get up at the crack of dawn the next morning because we were leaving LA and heading for "The OC" to Knott's Berry Farm (you know - the snoopy themed theme park near Disneyland). Not only were we heading there - but we were staying at the Knott's Berry Farm Resort... yeh.

We caught the 8-something bus out to the O.C (90 minute bus ride) and it was absolutely chockers. Ant and I were taking up two seats each (one for us and one for our oversized backpacks). Ant was being way to kind when he offered his bag seat up to some weird bald guy who didn't seem to want to move when there were vacant seats nearby - despite Ant nursing his 20kg bag.

When we arrived at Knott's Berry Farm (which felt a whole lot like Orlando with wall to wall sizzlers, IHOPs (aka International House of Pancakes) and fast food joints along the freeway) - we were a little disorientated because although we knew where the theme park was - we didn't know where the resort was. Although we did pick up that it was quite busy around the themepark - a little overly busy if you know what I mean.

When we arrived at the front gates at KBF - it looked somewhat like a war zone. The military were there (with a tank no less) and too - a horde of redneck crazys - all armed with cheap looking presents... WTF?! On closer inspection - there seemed to be some "Toys for Tots" promotion whereby if you bring a gift - then you get free admission to the park (I've confirmed this at - http://www.family-vacation-getaways-at-los-angeles-theme-parks.com/Knotts-Berry-Farm-Christmas-2006.html). I don't know if this is some ploy by KBF to get people into the park because of the GFC - but it seemed to be working. I don't want to sound like a bitch or anything but most of the people here didn't appear to be able to afford the $50 entrance fee for KBF.

Ant and I located a map - and worked out where the resort was (around the side of the park) and headed out there. To call the Toys for Tots queue - "massive" would be an understatement. It had felt like half-3/4 miles long and wrapped around the front bit of the park to the front of the Resort. And it was really hard work carrying the backpack and going against the flow of the queue in order to get to the resort.

Once we got to the somewhat runned down resort and the inappropriately named "Amber Waves" restaurant (see the movie Boogie Nights for more details) - we attempted to check in - only to be foiled and not be allowed to get our room until the afternoon. We dumped our bags at the bellboy and made a bit of a "on-the-spot" decision to not go to KBF (just because of the masses of people wouldn't make it very fun to queue heaps for rides) - so we decided to catch the metro bus to its final stop - Disneyland and do that instead. I guess I was a little disappointed in not going to KBF (haven't been there before) - and it looked like it had its more than fair share of vomit inducing roller coasters and rides which I heart.

It was almost 11:30am by the time we had reached Disneyland - and it decidedly felt a lot quieter than KBF. I hadn't been to the California version of Disneyland for some time now (California Adventure and Downtown Disney didn't exist). We just went for the Disneyland only tickets (instead of the two themepark hopper tickets which were 50% more expensive and I hadn't heard the best of things about the newish California Adventure).

We started things at Disneyland a bit easy by going on Mark Twain Riverboat - which did a lap of the Frontier Land (the most racist of all Disneyland lands) river doh-dad where we got to see an animatronic Native American tribe welcoming the new european settlers with welcome arms (of not the gun variety). The Disney version of "frontier America' was a little glossy and seemed to avoid any facts or things that might upset the kiddies. To top off the racist Frontier Land - I had Ant took my picture in front of the Indian war chief (who looked like an extra out of the village people). Well until next time...

Gringo Tour 08/09 - Part 4

After the kewl LA Downtown Markets - we attempted to find a bus which would take us out past UCLA to the Getty Center (american spelling - f##k yeah!) - remember - we are big public transport freaks in LA. We were a bit lost in following the bus system maps so we thought we might take our chances at the tourist info centre (which was sort of near our True Lies Hotel).

There was this old grannie (who seemed to have a thick bronx accent) who was quite helpful - but we pretty much had to interrogate for 5 minutes her to get a complete covenanted LA Metro Bus Map (felt like Raiders of the Lost LA Bus Map). We followed her directions to the bus stop (which was pretty close to our hotel) and 10 minutes later - our bus to UCLA rocked up.

All the LA buses have these small LCD screens which play non stop "news, entertainment and sport" - but really - it keeps replaying the same "Paris Hilton got burgled" story which no one really gives a s@@t about and the "Snuggler" infomercial ad (a very unattractive and quite flammable blanket that you can wear - but only in the privacy in your own home otherwise you might get eggs thrown at you). And most of the stuff on TV was fairly latino orientated. Ant said to me that in the near future - Spanish speaking people in California will outnumber English speaking people... or something.

After a fairly long bus ride (in which I'm 95% confident I saw the D&D Advertising Building from Melrose Place along Santa Monica Blvd) - we got off near Bel Air. All the shops felt neeyce and different in a sort of Manuka sort of way. We had to reconnect to another bus which took us directly past the Getty Center (US spelling f##k yearrrh! Gonna save the muthaf##King day nowwwh!).

According to my Mum's guide - the Getty Centre is one of the top 10 tourist attractions in LA. It is built on top of a mountain/cliff and has fairly distinctive architecture. I was getting these 60s/70s Blofeld/James Bond Villains vibes from this place (I could imagine Blofeld stroking his fluffy white cat while his goons attempt to dispatch Sean Connery). To make things even more Blofeld/Dr Evil esque - you ride this automated electric train from the carpark to the Centre... (Very Austin Powers 1).

When we got there - we made a quick pit-stop at the "cheappy" cafeteria where we picked up some decent Chilli Beef Soups for not much $$$. The Getty Building is fairly spectacular (in a sort of Cameron Offices on top of a cliff way) and we took plenty of Kodak Moment shots of the place. Inside the Getty Center is a eclectic museum of art works - most of them older-school renaissance to impressionist work. The Impressionist Room was worth the admission (did I mention that the Getty Centre was free?) - Ant was wondering how much all of the artwork would cost in that one room alone. We had spent a good 3 hours at the Getty Center and by the time we had finished - it was getting darkish (around 4pm).

We headed back into town - and took a stroll around the Bel Air bus stop. As I previously mentioned - the shops here were quite neeyce and different - but you could actually live here and do shopping/groceries (unlike Beverly Hills where you can't buy a pint of milk from the Channel shop), We had a bit of a browse around "Best Buys" - the sort of Dick Smith Powerhouse equiv in the States (actually - we think that Dick Smith ripped off the idea of the store from Best Buys - just like Big W tries to rip off Wal-Mart). I bought a couple of DVDs (Drawn Together) and a few PSP games to keep me entertained.

We headed back on the bus to Downtown - but decided to get off at Beverly Hills to have a bit of a wander through it and Rodeo Drive (like any good tourist should). Rodeo Drive sort of feels like a reech beech "Main Street USA" equivalent street - although I'm not talking about middle America Main Street USA - but the Disneyland variety where everything feels a little fake. We headed into a department store - which was very quiet (hello GFC) apart from the cocktail bar on the top floor. They say that alcohol and gambling get more popular in a recession and I guess this was adding fire to that theory. We made our way past a gaggle of store attendants (who were definitely more busy into each other than helping any customer) to make use of the facilities before we rushed out of the store. Ant did his patented "push rich women out of the way" move and we were on a way. To be continued....

Gringo Tour 08/09 Part 3

After our meal at a Vietnamese Pho Soup restaurant near the Beverly Center (incorrect American spelling) - we caught some public transport back to some random Metro train stop (where we bought some ice creams - ooh mah) and then caught a train back to Downtown (which is so dead at night) and crashed for the night. Although it was probably about 9pm at night - it had felt like 3am due to the timelag.

The next morning - we woke up and did a bit of US television. Highlights include all of the daft infomercials including a Time Life "I Can Only Imagine" Platinum CD collection ("uplifting" jesus soft-cock-rock CDs for only $9.99 plus postage - my fav song - "God is In Control" (que sound of whip cracking)) and mindless non-stop CNN dribble.

After spending 16 hours on the plane being spoon fed copious amounts of grog and food (of the non-weight watcher variety) - we decided to head down to the gyme on the fourth floor of the hotel for a bit of a workout session. The gyme in the hotel was pretty amazing - brand new equipment with all of the cardio having small screen LCD TVs where you could watch Time Life Eternal Collection ads and mindless non-stop CNN dribble while you worked out.

We did a quickish breakfast (at the latino time of near midday) at Macy's Plaza in Downtown. Downtown felt rather deadish and so did the shops (even though this was the last Saturday before Xmas). We had some sugary muffins and stuff from a so-called bakery (no American bakeries serve bread only sugary cakes) and I had a somewhat half decent Cafe Latte at a Gloria Jeans look-a-like "The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf" - although it was better than Gloria and less hard-core Christian-y.

We wandered down a few blocks in the vague general direction of the Downtown markets where we hit the "Jewelry District" on Broadway. It started to feel a lot less like sterile LA Downtown and more like... Mexico! I know I'm sounding like Ja'ime but Ant and I were the only white people in a 10 mile radius around here.... not that it was a problem or anything. We wandered along a toy district - heaps of stores run by Mexicans with cheap trashy toys - and I was getting the distinct de-ja-vous of being in Peru of all places. The building architecture was fairly interesting - a lot of run-down art deco buildings. Some places had a old school Manhattan vibe but in a more spread out LA sort of way.

We hit the markets and it was well worth the walk. It was chock full of people (more so than any other place in the States thus far including the Beverly Centre) - and there was heaps of interesting foods and stuff. There was definitely an emphasis on dinky-dye Mexican food. We couldn't help but think that this is a bit of a pre-cursor to Mexico. There were hardly any tourists - but I would definitely recommend this for a bit of a different LA experience. Until next time...

Gringo Tour 08/09 Part 2

Our flight to LAX on Qantas Business was quite sweeet. The service didn't feel like the normal Qantas "consult with the union manual" economy service - rather it was really good (they serve you immediately after pressing the call button) and we both enjoyed it. The movies were a little dire on the flight - Tropic Thunder was the most ridiculously bad movie I've seen in a while... really bad. The best bet is to just watch the trailer for the "chucking a Vietnamese child off a bridge" scene because sitting through the rest of the film is just torture. We both managed to get a bit of sleep on the flight (3 hours - new world record). Maybe this was due to the copious amounts of champagne and red wine we had??

Upon arrival at LAX - we had to queue for a bit in the "alien" queue. All of the flight crew were jumping the alien queue - and that sort of pissed both Ant and I off a bit. We thought it was a good idea to "hide our Cuban visas" from the American authorities - just incase they thought we were "I heart Che" commie pinko bastards or something.

Last time in LA - we caught the "Super" (rip-off) "Shuttle" which was about US$30 each for a short bus trip to West Hollywood. Ant did a bit of research before we left and discovered the Fly-Away Shuttle which was about US$4 - which dropped us off at Union Square (only a couple of metro train stops away from our hotel). When we boarded the shuttle - we tried to pay the bus driver our $4 - but she said - "just pay at Union Square"... as you do...

The bus trip to Union Square was fairly easy and I'm sure we passed over the top of South Central via a highway... At Union Square - I did a good samaritan thing and paid for the bus ticket (no one really bothered to check whether we were going to pay or not).

Union Square (we had been here before on our last trip) is a nice old-mission style train station - complete with the requisite vagrants that usually come with train stations. We were thinking that we had to hike to our hotel (the Westin Bonaventure - aka True Lies/In the Line of Fire hotel) - but there was a metro stop just nearby the Westin - so we took that option.

The LA train metro network (if you have watched Speed - you would be somewhat familiar with the metro - except I didn't see Sandra Bullock handcuffed to a pole and Keanu and that bad guy duking it out with bombs and stuff) is a fairly efficient train system - not too disimilar in style to the "nuclear fall out" train subway network that is Washington DC metro. I think it is a bit of a misnomer about LA that the public transport is really bad. Ant and I reckon that it is pretty good - with both trains and buses covering a large area and running fairly constantly (never usually have to wait more than 15 minutes). I know I'm going to sound a bit like Ja'ime from Summer Heights High but public transport in the states is usually populated by low-socio economic people or something. How random..

We had a short stroll to our 4 star Westin Bonaventure hotel in the financial district of downtown LA. I mentioned True Lies and In the Line of Fire - because there were a couple of scenes from both movies which were shot at the hotel (True Lies shot the "Arnie riding a horse through a hotel lobby and lift" movie here and In the Line of Fire shot the money shot scene where the president is being shot whilst riding the elevator by John Malkovich or something...). The Westin Bonaventure looks more like a giant space ship / office building with huge circular pillar things with those outdoor/indoor glass elevators on each pillar than a hotel. Speaking of shooting stuff - there was a camera crew shooting a scene on a nearby bridge with the makeup trucks parked out the front of the hotel whilst Ant and I were walking from the train station. Good old Hollywood.

When we entered into the hotel lobby - we had thought we had entered into some strange time-space continuum warp which we had entered into the Melbourne Crown Casino water fall lobby thing - with tacky water fountains/water features everywhere (including ones that spurted water over a walkway to a lift). There was also this really tacky Christmas mock-up model of the hotel all decked out xmas style with snow and stuff (not the typical hollywood "snow" but the perisherblue variety instead).

Amazing - we checked in at about 7am and both decided to crash in the hotel room for a couple of hours to catch up on some sleep. Our room was a little small and dated but it was comfortable and we had a view of some lifts (which kept Ant happy because he loves not only True Lies but In the Line of Fire as well).

I woke up at about 11 am and felt really dehydrated (maybe it was something to do with all of the grog on the plane) - so I wandered out in an attempt to find some shops. Downtown LA was a bit like the CBD in Sydney (only if the Sydney CBD had been built in the late 80s/early 90s) - no real life (or shops) so finding a drink was a pretty hard task. I found this strange indoor/outdoor mall which had a Macys and a truly horrific/depressing food court which made me feel like I was in Peru or something. I found this "California Pizza" food chain thing and ordered the free-world's most expensive Pepsi Light (US$3 which is about 20 Aussie pesos).

After Sleeping Beauty (aka Ant) woke up from his self-induced coma - we headed out to the streets of LA and caught a train to Hollywood and Vine. The musical "Wicked" was playing at a theatre just outside the metro stop but the tickets were super expensive ($USD90 which was about 50% more expensive than the Aussie tickets) so we decided to give it a miss.

Hollywood hadn't really changed much from the last time we had been there - there are still the crazy people, the prostitutes and the scared and confused tourists... That's pretty much the only people on Hollywood Blvd (ie: no locals). We were sort of feeling a little hungry and both decided to stop at a place called Baja Fresh - which was some Mexican chain where I and the front counter guy had problems communicating with each other. It wasn't as bad as my experience at a Subway at Key West in Florida - where I attempted to order a "Meatball Sub" and the woman kept thinking I was asking for a "Maple Sub"... but it was close. Americans heart food options and combinations/permutations and every meal comes with about 1000s different sauces, sides or dressings which makes it a bit of a daunting experience for an Aussie. The guy at the front counter sort of mumbled in a thick hispanic accent "white beans, brown beans or black beans". I got him to repeat what he had said - I still didn't understand him - then I just sort of mumbled - "the last one please." Our meal was pretty huge (another thing about american food portions) - it had come with two soft tacos, salad, rice and beans and the free-world's largest coke (probably about 2 ltrs big).

After our Baja Fresh experience - we decided to wander in the general vague direction of West Hollywood - LA's gay district. We wandered along Sunset Blvd for a bit (we were the only pedestrians in sight). There were the standard big "f##k off" billboards along the Sunset Strip and various yuppies/bums/crazy people as well. We decided to visit a Mc Donalds in a little strip mall - where we almost got run over by three HUVs in the carpark (it was obvious that no one had every walked to this Mc Donalds before). We were planning on going to Knotts Berry Farm (eg: the snoopy themepark) and had read on its website (when we were back in Australia) that you could pick up a coupon at "participating "So Cal" Mc Donalds" for a US$17 off an adult ticket at Knotts Berry. We collected the aforementioned coupons (we also collected 2000 calories with a Mc Donalds Sundae) and kept walking down Sunset (ironically it was sunset @ Sunset).

Everyone here at America has big cars. My mid-sized Nissan Pulsar would be considered to be a "micro" car here in the states. come to think about it - a Holden Commodore would be considered to be a medium car in the states. Maybe everyone drives around in big cars to haul their big oompa-lompa a##es around everywhere because of their up-sized food portions...?

We headed down to Santa Monica Blvd (after about 1.5 hrs walking) and stumbled across the "gay district" of LA - which is pretty small all things considered (eg: population, california is rather progressive). Ant thinks that the gays here in LA are fairly closeted as most are in Hollywood and are next to their big break or something. We checked out the gay bookshop (where there is a better selection at the Sydney Bookshop on Oxford St than here) - I bought a Razzie's Guide to Bad Cinema (which described the sex scene my fav all time movie - Showgirls -as "Flipper" meets "Striper" which is fairly accurate) and Ant bought a couple of double-entendre T-shirts.

We strolled up and down the somewhat small gay strip and decided to head in the direction to the Beverly Centre (the somewhat famous LA mall where "Scenes from the Mall" was shot). As we were waiting for the bus - a box full of catalogues had fallen off the back of the mail truck into the middle of a 6 lane road - complete with crazy SUV drivers. A panicked woman shouted at Ant - "you must pick up the mail". Ant looked at her and said "are you crazy bitch?" - well they probably weren't his exact words but neither of us were willing to risk our lives (and our ability to claim travel insurance) by attempting to rescue some crappy catalogues for Walmart or something.

A short bus ride later - we reached the Beverly Centre - where it felt incredibly dead quiet - sort of like a zombie/post-apocalyptic mall movie.... apart from the (I kid you not) "Hunky Santa and the Candy Cane Girls" show. For about USD$50 - you could get your picture taken with "Hunky Santa" a skantly clad santa with a six pack (but with a need for a paper bag to hide his shameful face). Occasionally - Hunky Santa and his posse - the Candy Cane Girls put on a show. Correction - Hunky Santa just posed a bit and the Candy Cane girls put on these Xmas inappropriate contortionist shows with ribbons and things. Anyway - the mall was pretty much dead (maybe something to do with the GFC aka Global Financial Crisis) apart from the Apple Store which was dead busy.

Ant and I were a bit underwhelmed with the shopping at the Beverly Center (or should that be "Centre") and so was the food court - so we headed to a small Vietnamese Pho soup place next to the centre for dinner.... Until next time

Gringo Tour 2008/09 - Part 1



Blogger - how retro - unless you host a music blog (I heart Discodust and Hyperbole and Ohhcrapp or something)... Anyhows - I'm writing to you from the Brisvegas International Airport - hanging around for a while waiting for our flight to LAX.

Ant and I are off again (haven't been anywhere together since our Eastern European tour last year - and yes - NZ doesn't count as an international holiday). We are spending almost 5 weeks touring the west coast of the states, mexico and (don't tell the american immigration peeps) Cuba (I heart Fidel)... Although this time the flights are all bling bling business to and from the states... Doing our bit for global warming.

We had to get up at the crack of dawn (well it was before the crack of dawn) to catch our 6am flight from Canberra to Brisvegas. Because we had recently upgraded our flights from economy to business - they automatically upgrade the connecting domestic flight - so we both had a bit of a taste of the Business class Qantas club domestic lounge (new at Canberra). So all the plebs now sit out in the old lounge while all of the sexy people get trashed and throw mobile phones at Qantas staff at the Business lounge. It was neeyce, different and unusual (not unusually you from Britney which I had in my head all day long).

The flight to Brisvegas was OK - you get toast in Business... Wow...

Interconnecting at Brisvegas airport is a bit of pain - you need to catch the Sky Train (aka intersuburban Brisvegas train) which claimed you were reducing your carbon footprint - yet the train had the aircon cranked up global warming style.

Brisvegas International airport was a bit of a mess - lots of random people and stuff every - it was like so random...! Ant grabbed a Brisvegas International Airport guide - which was entitled "The Time of Your Life". It might be the "Time of Your Life" if you lived in Brisvegas and were getting out.

Because we are reech beech tourists in Business class this time round (screw the GFC) - we got so called "express" tickets through immigration and security. Although it wasn't so express when about 2 flight loads of Arabic flight hostesses decided to bypass the express queue and security and made us all wait around for a while. Ant got an extra pat-down by an unsexy security guard - thrown in for good measure. I also had problems at Immigration - Border Security style. I forgot to write down my passport number on my departure card - and the customs lady said "we are having issues processing Nicholas' passport - please wait around the back".

We wait around where we were told to - and we start to debate why they were having trouble "prcessing my passport". Ant thought that the magnetic strip on the passport had failed and I thought to myself - how am I going to get a new one...?

An immigration man came round 5 minutes later and said that the customs girl didn't think I looked like my picture.... but he let us go... Maybe they were thinking that I was into identity theft like Sandra Bullock caught in the Net... or something.

So here I am - barely getting through Brisvegas Customs - coming to you live from Brisvegas Interational Qantas Club (which is fairly underwhealming) - having to hang around for another 5 hours before our flight to LAX...

Until next time...