Following our night in Needles, we got up and set off in the morning, back west through the Mojave Desert in California. What should have been a boring drive was one of my favourites of the trip, as we sped along straight roads undulating across the desert plains with good music playing, passing railway tracks with names written in stones on the embankments and surrounded by the ever-present mountains.

After a couple of hours of driving we reached the town of Twentynine Palms, just north of Joshua Tree National Park. After stopping off at the park visitor centre for some information, we decided to continue a bit west and enter the park from the town of Joshua Tree. After making our way there, and driving up through a residential area, we entered the strange but awesome landscape of the park.

Incredible rounded granite formations emerged from the desert all around us, strange towers with vertical cracks and huge boulders lying perched on top or around them. The result of erosion from groundwater when the ground level was much higher, the now exposed, smoothed and sculpted rocks are incredible to see, and a big hit with rock climbers. In between the rocks and surrounding us on all sides were the ubiquitous joshua trees, ugly and alien but fascinating to see in such great numbers.

The trees are a large type of yucca, with gnarled branches sprouting off from a main trunk, covered in spiky bark, with green tufts of pointy leaves at the ends of the branches.

We stopped by one rock formation to eat our lunch and watch some rock climbers practising, amazed by how cool it was. We had been expecting temperatures around 100 degrees as that was the temperature when we arrived in Needles the previous night. However, the thermometer was only hovering around 60 degrees and a cool wind was blowing for most of the day. It made it much more comfortable to explore the desert than the scorching heat we had encountered in Death Valley.

After lunch we moved on through the park, following the road south. Our next stop was Hidden Valley, where we scrambled up some rocks to an enclosed box canyon surrounded by the amazing rounded rocks. Allegedly a former hideout for cattle rustlers due to its secluded location and abundance of greenery in the desert, the valley was great to walk around. The variety of plants and animals in the desert is quite amazing, and the hidden valley was no exception. We saw numerous lizards and birds as well as a rattlesnake cooling off in a crack between two rocks, not to mention innumerable desert plants and flowers, many unlike anything we had seen before.

After walking the mile-long trail through the valley we got back in the car and continued south, taking a turnoff to drive up to Keys View, which gave us a view over the valleys south of the park, including Palm Springs and its surrounding towns, miles away.

From the viewpoint we drove back down and made our way towards the south entrance of the park. Our last stop on the way was the Cholla Garden, where a massive area of land is covered with fluffy-looking but incredibly spiky cholla cacti. I followed a trail through the cacti, being careful to avoid their barbed spines, before we carried on towards the south of the park, descending into another desert valley.

Eventually we left the park and got on Interstate 10, heading west towards Los Angeles. We came off the interstate to drive through the town of Palm Desert, one of a string of towns along the freeway surrounding the verdant Palm Springs, home to towering palm trees and fancy golf courses. We managed to find our final Motel 6 of the trip near the freeway, north of Palm Springs, and spent the night there.

The following morning it was time to take on the infamous traffic as we made our way into Los Angeles. Although still 100 miles out of the city, the roads were packed from the moment we got onto the interstate. It was Memorial Day so a lot of people were off work, probably returning home from weekends away. Despite the busy roads, we made good time getting to LA and managed to find our way from the 4 and 5 laned interstate into the streets of Hollywood and eventually to our hostel, just 1 minute's walk from Hollywood Boulevard.

After checking in at the hostel and loading our bags into our room, I took the car to park it a couple of streets away in a cheaper car park. Then we went for a walk around the area, strolling along the famous Hollywood Walk of Fame with the stars in the pavement, and past Mann's Chinese Theater and the Kodak Theater with numerous people in fancy dress outside.

We had heard LA was a bit of a dump, and the area around Hollywood was definitely a bit greasy but still fun to walk around for a while. After our stroll and picking up a cheap backpack for Lucy to take on the plane as hand luggage, we made our way back to the hostel for the $6 all-you-can-eat BBQ they had on that evening.

At the BBQ we met 3 other Scots: Grant, Gordon and Oliver, who had just finished a 2 week group trip around many of the same sights as us. After chatting to them for a bit we realised we had the same plan for the evening: to go and see The Hangover Part II. Joining them and some others from their group, we walked a few streets to the Arclight Theater on Sunset Boulevard. We got tickets to the movie in the cinema's dome, where the screen is huge and curved around the far wall. We all enjoyed them film but agreed it wasn't quite as funny as the first.

After the film we headed back to the hostel where I joined some of the guys in a game of poker before calling it a night, knowing our last day was going to be a busy one.

After a comfortable sleep in the hostel we got up and got all our stuff packed back into our backpacks , which was a bit of a task after getting so used to living out of a car. Then it was time to bring the car round to the hostel and sort out all the camping gear we had acquired along the way. I had posted a notice in the hostel offering our stuff for sale but, having had no takers, we left all the gear we couldn't take with the receptionist at the hostel who makes regular trips to homeless shelters with unwanted belongings.

Having cleared out the car, we loaded it up with our bags and checked out of the hostel, before exploring LA (after a quick stop at the post office to post some souvenirs home).

We drove down Sunset Boulevard, following it west through Beverly Hills, making a few detours to check out some of the big houses up the side streets. Eventually we reached the coast and headed out the Pacific Coast Highway to Malibu, where funny wooden houses on stilts sit sandwiched between the road and the beach. I managed to pick up some snorkelling stuff in a dive shop there, with the plan of using it in Fiji and beyond (though I should have just brought my own gear from home).

From Malibu, we drove back toward LA, into Santa Monica and along the beachfront to Venice Beach. Here, we parked the car and got out for a stroll along the boardwalk, lined with food stalls, cheap beachwear shops and numerous 'herbal' outlets selling drug paraphernalia. We passed the quirky box-like concrete and wooden houses lining the boardwalk, as well as the famous caged outdoor gyms and sports courts before finding a cafe to grab some food. We enjoyed our food but no so much the freezing wind blowing in off the Pacific. However, the cafe proved an excellent spot to watch the interesting characters of the boardwalk, including various homeless or downtrodden buskers and entertainers, one character in particular who was wearing two pairs of childrens' pyjama bottoms, legwarmers, one skateboard kneepad, a baby changing mat wrapped around his shoulders and a sombrero.

After lunch we made our way back to the car and drove along various interstates which pass through the city, to make our way into LA's downtown. On entering the downtown area, I could have easily believed I was in South America or somewhere in Europe as every person on the streets was hispanic and the streets were lined with rundown buildings housing cheap clothes and goods shops with open fronts which spilled out onto the streets, their owners hawking their wares on the pavement.

Driving through all this we made our way deeper into downtown where skyscrapers dominated and the streets were cleaner and better ordered. We passed the Bradbury Building which I was keen to see, but unfortunately couldn't go inside as the parking was too expensive in the area.

After circling around downtown for a while, we headed north towards Griffith Park. Once we reached the park, via various freeways again, we drove up the twisting road to the Griffith Observatory, perched on a hilltop overlooking LA. I had been keen to see the observatory for some time, and enjoyed walking around the ornate white building and taking in the views of the city far below and the famous Hollywood sign in the late afternoon sunshine.

After sorting out our bags in the car park at the observatory and chatting to some police officers who were rather jealous of our trip, we set off towards LAX via a roundabout route so we could take in some more sights. We headed back down from the park into Hollywood and once again back onto Sunset Boulevard. From the boulevard we took a right, heading up the winding, leafy Laurel Canyon into the Hollywood Hills, past numerous houses, increasing in luxury the higher we got. Eventually we turned onto Mulholland Drive and took this famous road west, winding our way through the hills past huge mansions with incredible views down from the hills around every bend. From some points we could see hillsides covered with huge fancy houses, no doubt home to some stars.

It was fun driving trough the hills in the evening light but eventually we reached the freeway which would take us south towards the airport. With the traffic much lighter than we'd expected, we made good time crossing the city again to the airport. After a quick bit to eat in McDonalds, we drove to the rental car drop-off and said our final farewells to Miles, our little Nissan Versa who had served us so well over our 4,400 mile road trip.

With the car dropped off we caught the shuttle bus to the terminal and got checked in, a little sad to be leaving after such an amazing time in the USA, but really excited about getting to Fiji.