Keep your eye on the little red man

Our last leg for the US was driving the coast road back to LA, staying the night in Monteray and Pismo Beach.

It's a stunning coastline, apparently used a lot in car commercials. There's farmland, large fields of yellow wheat growing right down to grey cliffs, long windy roads butting against small sandy hillocks and beaches where elephant seals flop about like they're too hungover to move, lonely lighthouses and tiny towns nestled green shady forests.

Hanging out in the hotel jacuzzi (which had multiple signs about not being allowed in the jacuzzi if you have diarrhoea, ugghh) we got chatting to a girl who told us about this nice national park we should stop at.  We would have driven right by if she hadn't told us about it, but it was lovely, a really nice cliff top walk with seals hanging out on the rocks below.

When we got close to Malibu Robina turned off into a road that wound up through the hills so we could see the mansions of the rich and famous.
'Oh wow, look at that house!' she said, looking at a monstrous white, square block sitting on the edge of the hill.
'Woah Robina, road!' I said as she got to the corner and was still looking back over shoulder.
'Oops sorry,' she said hitting the brakes.
'Ummm, how about we pull over and I drive while you look at the houses?' I said.
We switched drivers and set off again, all the big ugly houses, often people get big confused with great.

We didn't have long back in LA before flying to Calgary, but long enough to visit our fave breakfast spot Bondi Harvest again.

I really enjoyed our three weeks driving around the US, the only thing I might consider doing differently is hiring a campervan over a car to make it a bit cheaper.  There aren't a lot of hostels in the US so we spent a lot of money on hotels. I wouldn't want an RV, those things look like a nightmare to park, just a small camper.

So here's some tips I and tidbits on the US.

Where to stay

AirBnB is good as is hostels when you can find them. Hostels as well as being cheap often do tours and night activities so it's an easy way to meet other people.

We booked things last minute, we rocked up to hotels without bookings and it was fine. There's Super 6 hotels throughout the US which are basic but nice and reasonably priced.

Pace yourself, it's a big place.

America is huge and there's a lot to see and do.

In Vegas we met two Adelaide couples who were planning to get from LA to Florida and back in 5 weeks. That just sounded crazy, even while they were telling us about it you knew they knew they had been a little to ambitious.

In our three weeks we travelled through only three states, we got to see a lot of things and our pace allowed us to stay extra days at places when we felt like it, but I still feel like if I'd had an extras week or so I wouldn't have done much more.

Our route over three weeks

Keep your eye on the little red man

You don't realise how much you must go by the sound when crossing the road at home. In the US their crossings don't make a noise when it changes to the green (or white as their little man is) so if you're like me and always looking at your phone or talking, you'll be constantly looking up and like 'oh shit, missed it again!'

Food for giants

Yes everything you've heard about Americans and their giant appetites is true.

But you can share meals which makes it pretty cheap. Robina and I were getting one meal between us and often still couldn't finish them and if you tell the waiters you're sharing most of the time they'll serve it on separate plates for you.

Tipping and taxes

Uggh, you cannot go anywhere in the US and just pay what the price says, even if tipping isn't expected there are multiple taxes that get added at the register, so it's always a big frustrating surprise as to what you'll pay for anything.

Tipping is also hard work, you don't really know when you're supposed to pay it or how much.

The expected rate is 15%-20% although some places suggest more. And the tip is for the service so even if your food is super shit you still have to tip. And you tip in restaurants, maybe taxis, apparently hairdressers, sometimes hotel staff and if you ask Americans what the rules are they all give you different answers and seem just as confused as us.

Oh and US currency is crap, it's all the same colour so you think you're flush because your wallet is bulging but then you find out it's all ones and you've got stuff all money on you.

Flights 

Try not to fly around too much, it's the sneaky luggage costs that get you - some airlines even charge you for carry on luggage!

Last minute flights are expensive and going through security in US airports is a pain in the arse.

Anyway, now off to hang out with Haley in Canada :)

San Fran, the smelly Sydney

San Fransisco reminded me of Sydney, with bright, warm days, hilly streets and a busy quay of people boarding ferries to criss-cross the bay. It's big and busy but a bit smellier than Sydney.

We stayed at a hostel called the Green Tortoise which was nestled in amongst the strip clubs, restaurants and hobos on Broadway, actually one of the better areas where only two blocks back large, fancy houses painted in bright colours have rooftop views of the bay.

We took a ferry out to the island prison Alcatraz (which we kept getting confused and calling Azkaban, but there were no Dementors to be seen).

There's a really good audio tour through the old prison covering the history, some escape and riot stories as well as commentary on issues with the current prison system, including the lack of resources for rehabilitation and the privatisation of prisons in the US, how the government ties themselves into contracts with vendors which guarantee that beds will be filled or the government pays a fee. What the hell kind of insane system is that?

The photography exhibition 'Prisoners of Age' was fantastic. A large warehouse room was filled with large scale photos of prisoners, beautifully shot then tagged with the persons name, age and a quote from them about what they'd done and how long they were imprisoned for.

Some of the stories were just crazy and the inconsistency in sentencing bizarre like one guy who seemed to have just been in the wrong place at the wrong time and was then locked up for 27 years!

Or the cute little old lady, but she'd been imprisoned for 30 years and said something along the lines of 'they said I hurt the little children, but I didn't. I love the children, when I see them I say 'come here, come to mommy'.' Creepy right?

The exhibition highlighted the massive increase of ageing prisoners in the system and how prisons are not able to support them and their additional needs and the additional burden on the tax system.

Back at the hostel they organised evening events so we went along for a Thai dinner and comedy night. The comedy was a bit hit and miss, but one guy was hilarious when someone in the audience mentioned a 'fleshlight' he lost it, seemed to throw out the rest of his routine and kept making jokes about the guy in the audience and his fleshlight.  For those who don't know what a fleshlight is, don't google it a work! I only knew what it was thanks to Cards Against Humanity.

After the comedy we went to a club but it closed at 2am, everything seems to close at 2am except the strip clubs which is a bit crap.

My work has an office in San Fran and I'd heard it was pretty cool so I dropped in to have a sneaky peek. It happened to be the Friday of their monthly meeting so I got to meet a few people, hear about the projects they've got going on, have a few beers and get the office tour which included showing me the disco lights and the smoke machine!

On our last day we drove out across the Golden gate bridge, stopped for the obligatory bridge and fog pics then drove down into Sosolito, pretty little tourist town, the main street lined with arty stores, wine tasting and neat little restaurants that overlook the bay, the cityscape of San Fransisco breaking through the hovering fog at the far side.

We stopped for lunch then hit the road, our plan to follow the coast back to LA.

Riding the big yellow bus

The fantastic thing about the national parks we've visited is the fact that they're all so different, the landscapes change so much, yellow deserts sprinkled with the alien-looking joshua trees, to red gold canyons to green forest and waterfalls.

We arrived at our accommodation at the end of our 10 hour drive day, which culminated in us finally reaching the snow-capped peaks we had been creeping toward all day. Going over the mountains was a struggle for our little rental, at times I could have walked faster, but it was still light when we pulled into the drive way of the Yosemite Bug.

Yosemite Bug looked like a school camp, nestled amongst the trees with dorm rooms dotted about the place and a big cafe in the middle.

We weren't expecting much from the cafe but the food turned out to be some of the best on our entire trip. We had a perfectly done steak with a tasty blue cheese sauce and vegetables which hadn't had the crap boiled out of them.

Yosemite was our last big park, like Zion it was super busy, but again really well organised with shuttle buses and lots of good nearby hikes.

Our first day we hiked to Vernon and Nevada falls, it was hot and there were a lot of stairs so when the spray from the waterfalls rained over the path with was refreshing even if it did make the path slippery and boggy.

The next day we attempted the long, steep hike to Glacier Point we had been steadily climbing the switch-backs a couple of hours when we stopped to grab water from my bag. We realised we had underestimated our water consumption and the heat so would probably run out before we reached the top.

We walked a bit further until there was some shade and a nice view, then had some lunch and started back down again without reaching the top.

Our last day was a little easier, we hired a raft and floated lazily down the river, we stopped for a swim but despite the heat of the day the water was icy and too cold to swim. At the end of the trip we got a ride back in an old yellow school bus just like the ones you see on the telly.

Now back to the city life with our next stop San Fransisco.

Ghost towns and the extraterrestrial highway

Our next stop was Zion National Park and this place was amazing, even just driving through you have to really force yourself to keep your eyes on the road as it winds down between the mountains looking down on steep rocky valley edges into the river below.

Rusty ochre, yellows and white stripped cliffs with plenty of trees, a lot greener than the deserts we had come from and squirrels everywhere, darting about on the ground not up in the trees where I expected them to be.

We parked at the visitor centre and jumped on the shuttle bus, which drives up and down the road stopping at lookouts and trailheads depositing tonnes of tourists at each spot.

We started with a short walk called The Riverwalk. The bus emptied with us, people all kitted up with hiking boots, entire families in matching shoes with the rental numbers drawn on the heel and all stomping along the wide paved path with their walking sticks. I was like wtf, the rental store has definitely done a number on these guys.

After only a ten minute walk the path stopped at the river, Robina and I were taking photos when
we realised no one else had stopped, the entire herd of tourists, literally a hundred people walked into the water and knee-deep began trekking up river.

So maybe the rented shoes and sticks were justified and of course we followed them.

This was The Narrows, we criss-crossed the river, wading down between the cliffs as they became a narrow canyon, shady and cool with small waterfalls cascading down the sides, a totally unexpected and fun little hike.

The largest hike for the day was the trail up to Emerald pools, a long, hot, steep walk, with little shade on the sandy paths, but we got to the upper pools where it was shaded and the chilly waters beneath the waterfall are a welcome relief from the heat.

After Zion we had a long drive day from to get to Yosemite (yo-sem-it-tee not yos-mite as I always thought at a kid).

The ten hour drive day, started with driving out of the hills of Zion and opening up into flat straights, in the distance were snow-capped mountains that we didn't realise our little rental car would be struggling over in about eight hours time.

A few hours in we turned on to 'The Extraterrestrial Highway', I was pretty excited but we didn't seen any aliens, just a couple of hours of long straight road, mirages from the heat and flat, yellow grasslands with a few cows and cow crossing road signs that had been 'updated' to show aliens spaceships anal-probing the cows.

'omg it's so deserted even the tumbleweeds don't come here!' said Robina.

We were half way through when we realised we were running low on petrol. Next town we said, but the next town was nothing but a single hotel with a spaceship hanging from a tow-truck out front. The town after that was also just a couple of dilapidated old buildings.

There were few cars to be seen, we saw one guy stopped off on the side of the road, going through the toolbox on the back of his truck as we passed.
'Well at least he's behind us so can stop and help if we run out of fuel,' said Robina.
'I dunno,' I said, 'he looks a bit Wolf Creek to me.'
'It's OK, Warm Springs is coming up,' said Robina, 'Google maps says it's a town.'

But Warm Springs was deserted too, three dilapidated, boarded up buildings the only proof it had even been anything.

'OK the next one is definitely a town,' said Robina. 'There's like other roads off it and stuff, it must be a town.  We're only 40 miles away.'
'Hmm that's a long way to walk,' I said looking at the fuel gauge on empty.

So Robina the optimist counted down the miles convinced we would get there while me being a little more pragmatic converted the miles to kilometres and tried to figure how long it would take to walk in this heat and remember how many water bottles we had in the boot.

But finally we rounded a corner and there it was, a real town, with buildings and people and a servo!

Heading out of town after we filled up there was a sign 'No gas for next 145 miles' - pity they didn't have those signs at the other end when we started out!