Hello once more, long time, no words of enlightenment. A combination of being rather busy and myself being a rather lazy man have led to this not being updated for a while. So now the task of remembering the key points of what has happened over the past 4 weeks falls to myself, fantabbytastic. Right,here we go, San Francisco; I am struggling to remember everything so will just go to the key points, Downtown: reasonably nice, at last a city centre with a decent amount of shops in it. Financial district is as impressive as most other american cities ones, some nice bronze statues and other such things. Lots of homeless people Alkatraz: catch a boat to this yay old prison and spend the day wandering around cell blocks and such like. The place itself is impressive, though I could think of better uses for a island in the San Francisco bay, and has a lot of history. Then audio tour can be slightly misleading but on the whole an Impressive sight. Painted ladies: (note, these are houses not people). Very pretty, typical San Francisco flare. Fisherman's Warf: fresh fish,good food. Also found a amusement arcade from the turn of the century. Some random things in there and all weird and interesting, all still working (some better than others) but a worthy find. Cable cars: random but funny. At one point ours stopped and there was a long discussion between the driver and ticket guy about whether they should push it for a bit. Very few modes of public transport have a pushing option these days. Other things to note: our hostel had free beer plus a beer pong table. I have played before but it seems I have really come into my prime for the sport and demonstrate a promising career should it ever be part of the Olympics. Also we drove over the golden gate bridge, got as close as we could to the bay bridge. Deposited Virginia and amazingly weren't charged any damages besides the extra millage. Los Angeles; Hollywood: Saw the Chinese theater with all footprints etc in it (surprisingly Arnies hands are significantly bigger than my own), walked the boulevard and looked at the names on the stars. Then faced an issue, what are you actually meant to do in Hollywood? After we had spent an hour seeing this we couldn't work out the answer so went somewhere else. Shopping: big shopping centres which are good for if want anything. Also Melrose and Rodeo Drive. Both good to look at and good to browse however also made me realise how exceptionally poor I am. I would have to sell everything I own and then still have to go on the game for a month, charging top dollar for my body (naturally I'm worth top dollar anyways) before I would even be able to afford to get a bag for life in any of the shops on the latter street. On the plus side there were many an exotic car dealership for me to lust towards. Venice beach: lots of skater people and homeless folk. A pretty area if you can avoid the homeless camps. Manhattan beach: Many a surfer. At this point we decided to take the plunge and try the sea. We proudly lasted several minutes before frostbite began to set in and we made a hasty retreat. I now fully understand why we were the only ones in the sea not in wet suites. Long beach: probably grand in the summer but virtually deserted when we arrived in early January. Looks nice, a beach is a beach, whats more to say. Beverly hills: looks grand and expensive, enough said. Hollywood sign: there's some park with an observatory where get good views of the Hollywood sign, plus is a nice park on the whole, worth the trip. Universal studios: went here for new years, fun place, lots of things, shops and bars. Didn't go into the theme park because it was night but looked all good none the less. Travelling: it takes eternity to get anywhere. Especially busses. Anywhere we wanted to go was generally a minimum of an hour and a half on the bus away. One day we did a couple of places and spent around 5 hours in total on the bus that one day. Our stay: our hostel was the worst hostel we have been in so far and there was a reason it was so cheap. The shoddiest place and in one of the apparently most dangerous areas, fantastic. Homeless people everywhere in LA. Also, by this stage in our trip we were both tired and in need of a rest so several days were wasted sitting around with no motivation. Good to see, but LA lacks character. Its just a sporadic mass of things not close to each other but supposedly linked somehow. Also, you cannot survive without a car. I'm sure I've missed out things for both of these destinations but you will have to do without as my memory isn't that grand these days. No doubt more will come back to me and I will inform you all one dayday. I will endeavour to be more prompt with my report on the Cook Islands, I've even written the majority of it already since our stay here is fast coming to an end but shall wait till its finished before I post such news. I like to think its the suspense that keeps you coming back. Its certainly not the writing