We arrived in the outskirts of LA at around lunch time on Sunday 20 May. Driving into the city on the highway, even with a GPS, is terrifying - the highways and traffic are nothing like you've ever seen before. At some interchanges it literally looks like someone has just scribbled with crayon all over the GPS screen. Also, everyone speeds, so you can't even just chill in the slow lane. You are constantly weaving around traffic, trying to make sure you're in the right lane at the right time. I can see why it constantly ranks number one for worst traffic in the world.

Our CouchSurfing host, Luis, was only arriving home at around 16:30 so we had some time to kill. It was a gorgeous, sunny day so we decided to head down to the beach... along with the other 16 million people who live there :-/ Needless to say traffic was pretty bad and there was no parking so we just drove back to Luis' place, stopping at a Denny's on the way for a giant "starter" portion of nachos :-) He is a youngish guy involved in a non-profit that basically helps get recent immigrants on their feet. We felt very welcome comming into his home and we enjoyed chatting for a while before he went out. We had a quick (and much needed!) shower and then drove to the nearby grocery store for some food and the laundromat to take care of the gigantic pile of washing that had accumulated since San Francisco! We headed home and chatted a bit more before going to bed.

Monday was Disneyland Day!! It had been on our list of things-to-do since the beginning, so we wanted to make sure we got there on a nice day. We packed a daypack, punched the address into the GPS and off we went. After a bit of a "scenic detour" we arrived shortly after the park opened. We parked in what is the biggest parking garage I have ever seen, and caught the shuttle to the entrance. There are actually two parks there now - Disneyland and California Adventures (opposite each-other) - so we got the ParkHopper pass, which allowed us into both for the day. We decided to hit California Adventures first, and began the intricate process of maximising ride-time and minimizing queue-time. Fortunately there were'nt too many people and we were lucky with our Fast-Passes (free ticket that you pick up at a ride that allows you to come back later and skip the queue) so we were actually kept pretty busy. We went on the Toy Story ride, Grizzly River Run and Monique was very brave and rode California Screamin' (the big rollercoaster) twice! We were so glad that we had brought lunch (the tickets were expensive enough, you should see the food prices!) which we ate near Paradise Bay before dodging the mass of strollers (prams) on our way back to the original Disneyland.

Disneyland really is an amazing place. Even before you get inside the walls you can sense that there is something special here. Everything is clean and just so thoughtfully and professionally done that, once inside, it really is like stepping into another world. I think even the oldest adult can be made to feel like a kid again, so I can only imagine what children must feel like here. We didn't waste too much time admiring the scenery though and picked up some Fast-Passes for some of the more popular rides. We did the Jungle Cruise, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Innoventions Centre, saw Mickey & Minnie's houses, Indiana Jones, Splash Mountain and then watched the street parade. We popped back accross to California Adventure to ride the swings and see an amazing water & fire & light show called World of Color (puts the one at the Bellagio to shame.) Afterwards we walked back to Disneyland to ride Space Mountain and see the princess castle all lit up at night. By now it was late and the rides were closed, so we strolled back along the main street and walked back to the car. We had such a great time that day and I'm sure we will remember it for a long time - It truly is "The happiest place on Earth."

Tuesday we slept in a bit and then set out on a mission to find a backpack for Monique (until now we had been travelling with one bag, but had bought a few things for camping that we may want to use later on our trip.) So we headed straight for WalMart where they had one more left that was perfect :-) Afterwards we had a quick McDonalds lunch and then drove to meet Luis, who was just finishing up some meetings and then had the rest of the afternoon off. We picked up a freind of his name Abigail and then he took us to his secret beach spot near Malibu beach (we drove past the place where they filmed Baywatch.) We chilled on the beach for a while, watching the paddleboarders and dolphins playing. When we'd had enough sun, we went for fish tacos at this cool roadside seafood place, which we had never had before but were actually really yummy. After that we drove down to Venice Beach, which is quite an artsy part of LA. We wandered along the promenade, checking out all the cool shops and stalls and also watched some really good skateboarders at the skatepark. We went home to shower and chill for a bit and then later that night we went out again for more tacos! - this time to a "mom & pop's" taco truck that was voted to have the best tacos in LA. They post where they're going to be on twitter so you need to be a local to know about it. Really good and really cheap - an excellent meal for our last night in the city :-) We went back to pack while Luis took Abigail home.

Wednesday we were up early to say our final goodbyes to Luis before he left for work. We went to pack the car and were greeted with a bit of a nasty present - a parking ticket :-/ (With all the traffic and complicated traffic rules here it was almost inevitable - turns out you can't park outside on the street between 10:00 and 12:00 on Wednesdays, and it was about 10:15. Pity it was out last day in the city, we were almost home free!) Not great but it was a hired car so we had to pay :-/ We were planning to visit Holywood/Beverly Hills area that day and, fortunately there was a traffic department on the way, so about 60 minutes and $60 later, we were free to continue with our sight-seeing. After a bit of driving around we managed to get a decent view of the Holywood sign and then walked along the Walk of Fame for a while. We drove down Santa Monica Boulevard looking for a petrol station to fill up the car and then headed for the airport. LAX is truly enourmous and we got lost trying to get to our car-hire company's drop-off point. Once we had said farewell to our trusty car (carried us almost 2000 miles) we sat and finished off the last of our wine :-) before catching the free shuttle to the internation departures terminal. Our checkin counter wasn't open yet so we just sat on the floor and waited. At around 22:30 Monique went to check again where we needed to checkin, since our flight was due to leave at 23:30. The man couldn't find it and asked "Are you sure you are meant to fly today?" Dum dum dummmmm. With a sinking feeling we checked our itinerary and then Monique burst into tears - we were a day early at the airport!! What a bunch of dumb-asses!! We're still not sure how that happened, but anyway, rather a day early than a day late I suppose. We found a nearby cheap hotel and caught the free shuttle service there. The room was big and the bed comfy and we settled in for some admin time before going to bed.

Thursday was not very interesting - we came down for the complementary breakfast (which was great!) and asked for a late checkout so we could go back for a bit more sleep :-) After checking out we spent the rest of the day in the lobby writing blog posts and doing photos stuff. At around 19:00 we got the shuttle back to the airport, only to discover that our flight had been delayed until the next day, so we would be spending another night in LA :-/ Fortunately, the airline was paying for the hotel this time. Unfortunately, said hotel (La Hacienda) was not exatly amazing. Still, we were thankful to have a hot meal ready for us and warm bed to sleep in.

Friday we retuned again to the airport at around midday. We checked in our luggage and moved through security. Kevin beeped going through the metal detector and received an extremely thorough pat-down by some big guy - those TSA guys still don't mess around. It was all quite professional though and soon we were in the waiting lounge. We learned that our boarding had been delayed by another hour, but pffft, we were just rolling with it by now. We eventually boarded the plane and were glad to finally be on our way for some down-time in Fiji!