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07/10/10
As this was our 1st day in San Francisco we decided to go explore the city and the surrounding bay area. Thank goodness Kirsty and I have remained alittle active during this trip our we could have been in potential danger of having heart attacks here, as San Fran is all hills, and big ones at that. So we strapped on our hiking boots and set off to explore. We were told that the dock and fisherman's warf were must see area's in the city so we headed there 1st. Whilst walking down to them many of the famous trams passed us by. They were all packed with people even hanging onto the side of them, which was cool. Once we arrived down at the docks, we took a walk along pier 39, it has plenty of shops and places to eat on it. However we got to see some of its more famous residents lounging around in the sun at the side of the pier. There is a large number of seals that have made pier 39 their home and they spend alot of time relaxing on the dock walk ways catching some sun. It was crazy to see so many seals in the one place, and becuase they have been there so long they are now proctected by law in San Francisco. We then walked along the water front and discovered that at the weekend it was going to be Fleet Week, this is an American thing where Navy ships dock for the week and put on performances and shows as well as try and recruit people to the armed services. We discovered this because the Navy's Blue Angels were practicing their routine for the weekend shows, they are like our Red Arrows flight display team. They noise the planes were making was deafening, but it was amazing to see the different shapes and sequences they were flying in. We then walked up to Lombard Street, which is the famous street that snakes its way down the hill. It was funny seeing all the cars weaving down the hill very slowly.
08/10/10
Today was pretty chilled out we spent some more time exploring the city, looking around the buildings and shops to see what San Fran had to offer. However at night Union square at the heart of the city came alive with the sound of a 100 piece band and a cheerleading squad from The University of Southern California. Their American football team was in town to play against one of the San Francisco teams and they were holding a pep ralley right in the centre of town. Their was a guy on stage exciting the large crowd with promises of a big win and crushing the other team, and when he wasn't ranting the band played a variety of tunes that the cheerleaders danced along to. It was a brilliant sight and got Kirsty and I in the mood for some American Football. So after the ralley was over it was back to the hostel to book some tickets to watch the San Francisco 49ers.
09/10/10
Today was the official start of fleet week, so we went down to the docks to take a look at the various ships and submarines that had come into town for the week. It is such a huge event over here and there were tens of thousands of people down at the docks to see the ships and the sailors coming of the ships. There were so many Navy people in full uniform walking up and down the water front chatting and interacting with the public. We managed get a glimpes of some of the ships and the officers protecting them. They all had huge automatic guns and looked mean. After this the Blue Angles and others performed a flight show. We got to see a whole variety of planes new and old perform acrobatic stunts along with helicopters and even a passenger plane flew into the bay. However everybody was there to see the Blue Angels perform as they were the star attraction, and what a performace it was. They came rushing in over everyones heads with the red, white, and blue smoke pouring out the back of the planes, the crowd went wild. They then performed stunts like loop the loops, flying upside down and even flying straight at each other only changing dirrection at the last second. They also made shapes in the sky with the smoke and flew in various formations ridiculously close to each other. It was a brilliant show and everybody really enjoyed it including Kirsty and I.
10/10/10
Today was the day of the big game, Kirsty and I spend the day relaxing and doing domestic stuff before heading out the game. San Francisco 49ers vs Phillidelphia Eagles. Once we got into the stadium the atmosphere was electric, fans cheering and shouting their team on and booing the opposition. The game kicked off and the 49ers got off to a great start scoring a touchdown with their first possesion of the ball. At this point the fans are going crazy and everybody is having a great time, there cheerleaders are dancing and the crowd is cheering for the 49ers. Unfortunately some time after the Eagles scored a touchdown of their own, and this was a sign of things to come. They scored another touchdown and a field goal without reply and the 49ers were soon 24-7 behind at half time. The half time show was provided by a local college marching band and they performed a number of tunes to keep the crowd entertained along with marching in formation. After half time all was to change and the 49ers went on the charge and scored a touchdown and a field goal making the score 24-17 to the Eagles. The Eagles scored another field goal 27-17 Eagles, but after the 49ers cherleaders did what is called the Gold Rush (basically the cheerleaders danced around) the 49ers replied with a further touchdown making it 27-24 Eagles and the game was getting tense. Sadly as the 49ers where trying to score what would have been surely the winning touchdown in the game, the quarter back dropped the ball and the Eagles player picked it up and ran in for a touchdown 34-24 and that was the score at the end of the game. However after this touchdown by the Eagles the crowd suddenly became very annoyed and agressive. There were a couple on incidents of fights breaking out with rival fans, with police and security guards having to spet in and break them up. One fight even involved females, they take their football very seriously over here and dont like to loose. Although the huge volumes of alcohol being consumed certainly would have not helped, but Kirsty and I enjoyed the game and it was a great experience. After the game we went to a 50's diner in the city called Loui's it was really cool and served some nice food in an interesting way. We had a portion of onion rings served on a plane stand! You have to see the pictures to believe it!
11/10/10
We were shipping out to Alcatraz Island today to visit the world famous prison. The boat ride over was good becuse it gave us the opportunity to great some great views of San Francisco from the bay. Once we landed on the island we watched a short video all about the islands history, which told us how it was a military base and military prison 1st before becoming a federal prison. Then it moved onto how the American Indians had taken over the island after the prison closed as a political statement after they were constantly being removed from their homes and lands, and finally how it became a national park site. We then took the tour round the prison itself and listened to all the descriptions and recollections from both prison guards and inmates. The inmates described how it changed a man being on "The Rock" as they called it, how land and civilisation were so close but so far away. We heard stories about escape attempts, and how some of the guards and escapees had been killed in one such failed attempt in 1946. However the history books say nobody ever escaped from Alcatraz but there were 3 men who dug a hole through their cell wall into a utility hall way with spoons from the kitchen. They then made fake heads out of soap, and one night placed the fake heads on their pillows and crawled out through the holes in the wall and were never seen again. Prison officers say they would have died in the icey cold waters of the bay, but other say they went to South America because they had all been learning Spanish in prison. I guess we will never know. We also heard stories about some of the prison's most famous inmates like Al Capone, George "machine gun" Kelly, Alvin "creepy karpis" Karpavicz, and Robert "the birdman" Stroud to name but a few. Whislt on the walk through the prison we stopped and listened to one of the park rangers who was giving a talk all about Al Capone and his life. He was really entertaining and brought the stories to life. He spoke about Al Capone's connections and how he became one of the biggest gangsters in history, he told us all about his time in other prison's where he was treated like royalty and his cell was magnificent and filled with all the things he would ever need, like feather matresses, telephones, visitations from friends and family everyday. He also told us that when Al Capone was sent to Alcatraz all of this special treatment stopped and he was treated like all the other inmates and in fact the other inmates didn't like him and how they had beaten Al Capone up for not following their lead when they all went on strike from their duties. It was really interesting to listen to these stories and walk round the prison looking at the cells, the dining room, the exercise yard and even the building itself. Once we had finished our tour of the prison we walked round the rest of the island looking at the guards homes and the gardens they made. The guards and their families lived on the island and all the children got a boat to and from school everyday, which they all loved and thought was really exciting. The whole tour was brilliant and the stories and information that we heard as really an eye opening experience for us.
12/10/10
Today we rented bikes and cycled across the Golden Gate Bridge to Solcileto,which is a small town on the other side of the bay. After getting the bikes Kirsty and I saddled up and headed for the water front for a nice gentle cycle. This part of the cycle was great becuse it was all downhill and it was a lovely sunny day. After making our way along the waters edge we arrived at the 1st challenge of the day. A smallish hill which was over came with relative ease before the pleasurable free wheeling down the other side. We cycled a bit more and stopped for a quick drink of water before we took on the massive hill up to the bridge itself. So Lance Armstrong (Kirsty) and I set off winding our way up this hill. That lovely sunny day was turning into a roasting hot day by the top of the hill. However at the top there was a nice breeze and we got back to the nice cycling over the bridge. The views from the bridge were amazing and we could see the whole city and how the buildings moved up and down with the landscape. Once on the other side we stopped for a short while at the viewing point to take some pictures of the bridge. They it was downhill all the way to Solcileto woo hoo, I was like a child again racing down the hill as fast as I could it was so much fun. Once we arrived in Solcileto we walked along the shore front looking at all the lovely boutiques, shops and resteraunts. After this it was time to get some ice-cream since we had worked so hard on the cycle over. We then got the ferry back to San Francisco before getting back on the bikes and takling all the huge hills it had to offer on route to the Golden Gate park. However we takled all those hills on vain because we arrived at the park it was time to head back to the shop to drop the bikes off before they closed for the night. After this we chilled for a while before going to the bus station to get the night bus to Las Vegas baby !!!!!
13/10/10
What an epic journey to Las Vegas!! We spent many, many hours on the bus but eventually arrived and got checked into the hostel. Our hostel was at the end of what is called the 'Fremont Experience'. This was the original vegas back in the 1920's. It had some fun and interesting casinos and hotels. We spent a lot of time on the 'strip'. This is now the most popular area of vegas where you are mesmorised by the amount of bright lights here. We ventured into many of the famous and eccentric hotels and casino's here including New York New York, where the casino is a replica of New York with a mini brooklyn bridge and statue of liberty; MGM Grand; Paris, with its replica of the Eiphell Tower; Caesers Palace, based on ancient rome (also was the casino that appeared in Friends) Treasure Island, where we saw a fantastic pirates show, with dancing, bright lights, acrobatic stunts and fireworks; the Mirage; Planet Hollywood; Flamingo; Circus Circus; the Stratosphere; the Sahara; the Venetian; the two most notewirthy hotels were the Bellagio (this was the hotel that inspired Oceans 11) but it also put on the most fantastic water show where beams of water would shoot up in time to music. This happened every 15mins and it was a different song and show every time! But it was so impressive every time that we had to watch it 3 times!!! The other noteworthy casino is Called 'Encore'. This is the most fabulous and elegent and eccentric of them all!! All of the windows were gold plated and cost billions of pounds to build!! It had all of the most expensive designer shops inside - we liked it so much that we decided to go for the buffet brunch!! and oh my it was the BEST buffet we have ever seen! There was italien, chinese, japanese, indian, a breakfast station, a soup station a salad station!! Any tye of food you could possibly want! But the most impressive part of it was the desert section!! There was ice cream with an unbelievable amount of toppings availbale, cookies, apple crumple, mint choc chip cake, rassberry mousse with champagne jelly, creme caramele and many many more!!! pfffff we were stuffed! it was a most enjoyable experience!! Well as the old saying goes 'what happens in vegas stays in vegas!!' so we wont relay every detail of our trip. Well just not the gambling part of it!! heehee!!) We had a lot of fun here. We did put on our 'lucky dice beads' and headed to the the casino for a bit of fun!! There was soooo many slot machines, roulette, blackjack, and poker tables along with many other games that we had never heard of before!!! Our beads turned out to be very lucky :) So we have to thank Mr Blackjack and our lucky beads as they proved very helpful! :) Tomorrow we are taking a trip to the Gand Canyon!
17/10/10
Today we set off at 6am on our tour towards the Grand Canyon!! Yawn we are still very sleepy but it takes 6 hours on the bus to get to the Canyon as its in Arizona, so tme for a little nap on the bus. We stop at Hoover Damn and this is an impressive sight! You can see the line where the water used to be and it has dropped 120 feet in recent years, this is scary as vegas is ultimately running out of water!! We jumped back on the bus headed for the canyon. Our tour guide is very imformative. We arrive at the South rim of the Canyon - and at first glance its absolutely mind blowing!!! We can see how its one of the wonders of the world. It spans over 250 miles long. We spent 3 hours there, taking pictures and admiring this amazing sight! It was a bit scary getting pictures taken at the edge of the rocks and I did feel my palms starting to sweat!! We had lunch here and before we new it, it was time to head back on the bus! It was a very worthwhile trip and its a sight thats difficult to get your head around! We arrive back at the hostel at 9, grap a bit of pizza and watch tv and chill. Exhausted!!
18/10/10
Today we say goodbye to Viva Las Vegas and head on the bus for another 10 hour epic journey to San Diego.
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