Well we arrived in Los Angeles and headed straight to our hostel in Santa Monica to only find in our hostel dorm - the whinging lady who was in our hostel back in Noosa in OZ!! Yes she was still moaning about things 3 months on and ended up going home early.

Spent 2 nights in Santa Monica, walked along the beach (including muscle beach- although it was lacking muscle at the time we went), went shopping and relaxed in a few of the cafes.

Trek America - Our big road trip in the USA

Day One

Early morning to meet our fellow trekkers. There's only 7 of us on the trip Han (Korea), Ann (Korea), Wayne (Newcastle), Carston (Denmark), Sandra (Now living in Australia but is from Poland) and us two. Our leader is Matt (known as Glazer) he's a fantastic guy and good looking too which was a bonus!!

We cruised around LA in the van that we both nicknamed the A team bus, called in at Glazers pad for a coffee with his family before we were taken to buy our compulsory LA dodgers baseball cap- just to make sure we fitted in with the locals. Went to a mexican cafe for breakfast- there was a couple in there eating that were so impressed that Glazer had brought tourists to such a small place they paid for all the groups breakfast- very generous!

Before we headed to Santa Barbara we walked up to take photos of the infamous Hollywood sign.

Spent our first night camping since our west coast trip in Oz.

Day Two

Drove along Highway 1(coastline) today. It was beautiful and this took the majority of the day stopping off at various viewing spots and also got to see elephant seals- there were loads of them and they are huge (see our pics).

Arrived at campsite which is just behind massive sand dunes. Went down to the beach and played american football and a Korean game which was a bit like sand Jenga, when Lucy lost the game she had to lie on the beach and let everyone hit her!!! Cruel but true. We headed back to camp and had dinner and toasted marshmallows around the fire Jill, Glazers cousing also joined us and we watched the UCLA basketball game on the tv with a few beers.

Everyone is getting on great despite it only being the 2nd day, Sandy is now staying in our tent as well seen as it is so cold and we had a blast in the girlie tent discussing all kinds of things (unfortunatley Wayne was in ear shot on all occassions!! ooops)

Day Three

Headed to San Francisco today, quite a long driving day but called at Santa Cruz on the way.

We arrived at San Fran and had a tour in the van before checking into the hotel. As we were all wearing our Dodger hats (compulsory) we received quite a few comments from the Giants fans during the day but most where good natured.

Our first night in San Fran was fantastic- we caught the trolley to Pier 39 to catch our sunset cruise. (passing another trolley on the way which was in full swing with everyone singing and hanging off the sides).

The cruise took about 2 hours and sailed around Alcatraz and the under the Golden Gate bridge while we drank wine and ate nibbles.? On the way back to the restaurant, Charlotte tried to dispose of her Dodger hat in the cab only the taxi driver reminded her she had forgotten her cap!

Had a gorgeous curry, got very drunk drinking cocktails in a bar and then ended up playing charades with an American couple who were in a bar- quite bizarre!

Day Four

Today was our free day in SF, so due to last nights alcohol consumption we stayed in bed till midday. Then made our way over to the ocean on the bus and walked back through Golden Gate Park- this took us most of the afternoon and then we decided to return to have another lovely curry before we met up with the guys for a drink.

On our return to our hotel Glazer showed us the midget corridor on our floor and we hung out on the fire escape overlooking the street- like the one Joey and Ross hang off in Friends in that episode! ?