Jun 2006

We arrived at 3am local time after a mammoth 11 hour flight from LA on which I had about an hours sleep! I even watched the whole of "Failure to Launch" and "Casanova" and still didn't nod off which wasn't too happy about! However, the Air New Zealand flight was pretty nice and the food was good so no complaints about the airline itself, just my insomnia!

From there we had to get a little domestic flight out to the island we were staying on - Malolo Island - at 9.30. Thankfully the airport had very comfy sofas where I managed to catch a couple of hours sleep while we waited to check in for our flight. Had I known quite how small our flight was going to be, I might have caught the boat instead but having survived it I'm very glad we did it! The plane was barely bigger than my Nissan Micra and only fit 6 people plus the pilot but the views from the plane were unbeatable...Andrew even managed to take pictures! It only took 15mins to fly from Nadi airport on the mainland but the airline kept us waiting for an hour before they actually took us (word to the wise, if you ever find yourself in Fiji, avoid Sun Air like the plague!) This was our first introduction to the concept of 'Fiji Time'. Things basically get done when people can be bothered to do them! While annoying when you're waiting on others, the principle was highly enjoyable when applied very long lie-ins!

When we got to the island (which wasn't Malolo but Malolo Leilei which means small Malolo and is, unsurprisingly, a smaller island just next door) we were met by Rick from the Funky Fish Resort where we were staying and he took us by speedboat to the next island over! It was an amazing ride...we could see right to the bottom of the crystal clear water and even see the fish is the shallows! It totally made me forget I was exhausted!

The whole of the week was just a jumble of incredible experiences...we kayaked out into the sea along two coral reefs, stopping to spot fish along the way. We saw sun fish, angel fish and these cute ones that looked like little black nemo fish! We went snorkelling along the inner coral reef too and got up close to the little guys. Despite being convinced I was about to be eaten by Jaws the entire time, I'm so glad I did it...it was just breath-taking to be doing it, I'm only disappointed we didn't have an underwater camera to capture just how beautiful it was! To fill time between sunbathing and eating, we walked to the nearby resort that actually had a shop (ours didn't) and bought some gorgeous Fijian art plus we hiked up a hill to get pictures of the island and the sunset. The only bad thing about the week was the bugs! I ended the week with between 55 and 65 bites all over my legs and arms which itched like crazy! But my tan makes up for it I guess!! We also learnt loads about Fijian culture from Rick, the events organizer, and Joe the barman...it was a fantastic experience! It was sad to leave. The resort was so friendly as there was only about 20 other guests and the people who worked there were so fun! At the airport we stocked up on reminders before we headed off to a new city in another new country!

New Zealand is brilliant! It's winter here so it's raining a lot but that can't stop me loving Auckland! We're staying in a hostel in the middle of the city and everything is dirt cheap! As we're back to real life, we're back to living on Subway sandwiches and here they're even cheaper than America! Our first one cost $17 NZ for 2 foot longs...that's about £2.70 per sandwich! THEN we found a little food mart that has a Subway in that gives you vouchers for a free 6inch upgrade...so now our two 12inches cost $9.70 which is £3.30 FOR 2!!!! It's the greatest place in the world! We shopped at a supermarket and got some ready meals, bread, beers, chocolate and crisps for about £15! I want to move here!!

We went to the travel agent this morning and we've booked some great things for round the country... horse riding round the Lord of the Rings locations, white water rafting and whale watching to name a few...

But we'll have to tell you more later as my noodle ready meal has arrived courtesy of Andrew and I'm starving!

After Tampa and Busch Gardens we flew to Las Vegas and it was paradise! The strip is amazing and glitzy and baking hot! It was around 100 degrees for our whole stay there but there was so much to do I didn't really get a chance to sun bathe!

We took at tour out the Grand Canyon which rocked and we drove through the desert to get there and it was so huge and dry (obvious I know but I’d never really seen anything like it)! It is a rather spectacular hole in the ground and we took a stupid amount of pictures (about 200 I think - thank god for digital cameras)! It was a really long day though...took about 17 hours round trip and we had to be up a 5.30am and I am really NOT a morning person...AND my ipod went crazy half way there so I had nothing to listen to either! (Thankfully my ipod is now fixed and I'm happy again)!

We got the nerve up to play a table game on the second or third night...I can't remember which. We got $30 in chips and played Craps (the one with the dice) - Thank god for A-Level statistics as I was actually able to understand the odds and with Andrew as the "hot shooter" (he got to throw the dice - and he actually threw them at the casino employee and on the floor before he got them on the table but the boy did good)! We came away from the table with $68 which was a rather healthy profit! It was such a total rush and I can see how these guys were spending all night at the table! I can't wait to go back again when we actually have a disposable income to waste!!

We found a brilliant way of getting free food from one of the casino chains by signing up to their players cards so we didn't pay for any food the entire time we were out there and by some crazy stroke of luck, we also won $150 from free draws in the free food casinos too! (I won $125 of that I'd like to point out)! All in all we walked away from Vegas about $20 in profit (not including accommodation unfortunately) so we felt it was well worth the visit! We are so desperate to go back and I think that's the first thing I'll be saving up for when we get home!

We did the Greyhound thang overnight (17hours on a coach) to San Francisco via LA bus station (not recommended - smelled like pee and was full of homeless people). We got to San Fran at about 9am completely exhausted and dying for a shower and had to walk through the gauntlet of bums to get to our hotel. At the time we assumed that it was just that street that may have been a place that the homeless hung out but as it turned out, the whole of San Francisco is infected.

It was probably my least favourite city as everywhere we went were accosted by homeless people which was a bit scary but mainly really sad. A lot were pretty truthful - they asked if we could spare money to by drugs and booze - so I sort of respected that but mainly they were just really pitiful. One of the crazier ones followed us down the street shouting that he hated us "white mother f****rs" - Nice huh?

Chinatown was good - it's the largest Chinese settlement outside of Asia according to the tour brochures - and we made it there on our first night and had an incredible meal! Two huge plates of noodles and beef in black bean sauce and two beers for $20 (about £12)! It was amazing - I haven't been that stuffed in a long time!

We stopped in an Irish bar on the way back to the hotel and didn't realise it was getting dark and then we accidentally walked back a slightly dodgy way- I get the feeling we were sort of lucky not to have been mugged or stabbed! After that we decided to be in before dark!

For the next few days we bought a City Pass which gives you access to loads of things for $50 - over two days we went to 2 art galleries, an aquarium, a science museum and took a cruise under the Golden Gate bridge and around Alcatraz. Plus we walked the whole of the bridge and back again - something like 1.2 miles each way (I can't remember but I needed to wee the whole way over so it seemed longer)! I'm really glad we did that before seeing xmen3 or I probably wouldn't have set foot on it!

It was a really lovely city in the daytime if you could avoid the bums - it's the hilliest city I've ever been to! Having lived in Norwich for so long, hills were a bit of a shock to the system! We got so much exercise walking up and down the hills all the time, it was brilliant!

We meant to leave on the Tuesday but we found out that the Arctic Monkeys supported by We Are Scientists were playing Wednesday night and decided that if we could buy cheap tickets on eBay we would stay another night. As luck would have it we managed to pick up 2 tickets at the last second for 99 cents (that's about 52p!) so we stayed!!
The gig was amazing! We Are Scientists rocked and the Monkeys were brilliant (it was slightly like being back in HMV again listening to those same albums on repeat but I survived it)!

We left for LA the next morning and we're still here now for another 6 hours or so! We've been staying in a wicked little retro hostel which is stupid cheap! It's $50 a night for both of us and we have a private room, a private bathroom and our own kitchen! Its got a good atmosphere too - there was a courtyard party on Saturday night and we got a tad wasted and chatted to a couple of really cool people - one of whom we may meet up with in Melbourne in a month or so!

We've done quite a bit here in Hollywood (that's where we are - not in LA cos it's too scary) We saw Xmen 3 in Graumanns Chinese theatre where they have all the film premieres and has the hand and footprints outside it, we took a tour of the stars homes and saw the outside of Tom Cruises pad and Nic Cages cars and stuff - it wasn't brilliant cos we couldn't take any descent photos through the tinted windows The consolation was seeing a real life star though! We were on a walking tour of Hollywood Blvd and checking out film locations and learning the history when our tour guide says - "and there's a star now. Hello sir" - and who turns round and says hello to us but Alfred Molina!!! Doc Oc said hello to us!! I almost swooned! It was so cool!!

We also took a tour of the Kodak theatre where they hold the Oscars and got to ride in the lift the winners take when they have their Oscars and hang out in the VIP room which was cool too! I wanna work there!

To top it all off, last night we were invited to a test screening at Sony Studios! We watched a film called All The King's Men starring Sean Penn, Jude Law, Kate Winslet, James Gandolphni, Mark Ruffalo and Anthony Hopkins! It SUCKED! and we had to fill out comment cards afterwards (they didn't want to interview us as we weren't American so apparently our opinion doesn't count)! We all know how harsh I am so I wrote all over the paper all the things that were wrong with the film! It was so much fun! In the "would you recommend this film" box I wrote only if I hated the person and in the "was there anything you didn't understand" box I asked why so many good actors could make such a crummy film! I even filled up every available space where there were no questions with my own comments! I think it's safe to say I probably wont be welcomed back to Sony Studios again! But it was SO MUCH FUN!!! It would have been perfect if we could have found Adam Sandler’s car (we walked past Happy Madison’s production HQ) and we would have keyed it!! That would have been a perfect night!

Anyway, that brings us up to now and we're just waiting to get the bus to the airport to jet off to Fiji for a week...how tough, huh?!

I wasn't actually that far off the mark when I joked about them not having the Internet in the States. Of course they do, but in most places, its stupidly expensive (e.g. $15 per hour in Orlando) or in a really incovenvient place (such as the two mile walk in Tampa!). Before we left the UK we'd managed to book most of our hotels and travel arrangements for the majority of our stay in the US. This however did not include San Francisco and Los Angeles - we figured we'd easily find internet cafes to do it as we went along. Due to this lack of access however, we found ourselves scrambling around for accommodation just days before we were due to arrive. Cutting it far too close with San Francisco, and not being able to check the reviews out on the Net prior to our stay, we thought enough was enough and bought a computer. Practically every hotel we'd stayed in previously offered free Internet access if you had your own laptop, so we guessed it would be the same for most of the rest of the world..maybe. We hope anyway.. but at just under $600, it was a pretty good buy

Anyway, we will attempt to make up for the massive backlog that has now materialised due to our previous lack of access, but it still may seem a bit rushed.. afterall there is around 4 weeks of stuff to catch up on! For now, I'll just list the places we've been since our last update, so you might find entries for them soon!

CHICAGO (3 days)
ORLANDO (13 days)
TAMPA (5 days)
LAS VEGAS (+ Grand Canyon) (5 days)
SAN FRANCISCO (5 days)
HOLLYWOOD (LOS ANGELES) (7 days)

Oh, we'll also bung up a load of photos soon too!

Andy.