Wow. There's so much to tell you guys since I last posted a story.
We left Canada feeling pretty happy that the time was right and were seriously excited, but a bit nervous about seeing America.
The flight was a few hours late and we ended up wlking lengths of the airport, just so as to get some excercise. Once we arrived in San Fancisco, we did really well at figuring out the transportation and rode in an underground train to the centre of town.
I found it pretty scary on the train being around all the city folk, and even scarier in downtown San Francisco.
They have those ridiculously steep hills in SF and we ended up walking for about 100 miles up hill with our back packs on before finding our hostel, which was situated right in the roughest, most horrible part of town.
The next morning, we walked the 100 miles back down the hill and explored the town, finding it way too hectic and not really to our liking. We went back to our hostel that night feeling pretty much like we wanted to get the nearest flight out of there.
The next day, we gave the town a final chance, put on our walking shoes and went for a proper hike.
It turned out to be a good move, because once we were out of the ghetto we saw some really cool stuff. There was the pier, the golden gate bridge and some really nice state parks and recreation areas.
Since then, we've hired a car and been on a road trip. First we stayed in Sausolito, which is a nice quiet suburb of SB.
Next we followed route one south past some beautiful scenery.
We stayed in a place called Santa Maria for one night and Santa cruz the next. Thoroughly enjoying the view as we followed the ocean road the 320 miles from San Francisco to Santa Barbara.
We stayed in Santa Barbara for a couple of nights and regretted giving the car back on our first day there, because everything in Santa Barbara is really far apart. It's a really pretty town though. Very green and well kept with lots of musicians on the streets.
Now we're in Los Angeles and it's our first morning here.
Last night we checked in to the grottiest motel I've ever seen. It was absolutely filthy, there was porn on the tv in our room and the man in the room next door was beating up his girlfriend.
We sat on the bed for 5 minutes and decided that it would be far too traumatic to stay there for the night, and we'd rather lose our money than lie in that bed that smelt of wee.
We reported the wife beater to the front desk and the police, told them the room was gross, didn't get our money back, felt a bit depressed and spent a bit more money on a much nicer place down the road.
We've both perked up this morning having had a good nights sleep and a hearty breakfast, so today we're going to visit Hollywood.
After that, we're going to find a quiet place to stay for the next few days before heading to New Zealand.
This is a proper adventure and we're having a great time. We're learning things about ourselves as well as seeing new stuff. I think the biggest lesson we've learned so far is that the city isn't for us, but that's fine. We're going to do the tourist thing for the rest of this week and enjoy it.
Hollywood, were we come!
