Dear All,

Hope you are hungry for some blogging as we have 3 long weeks in the USA to fill you in on plus pics from Fiji (to accompany previous blog) and USA (see 2 new photo albums).

Having planned 2 weeks in the California area starting with 3 nights in LA, it was soon clear that LA was far too much fun for two people refusing to grow up and we would need a little longer plus time to incorporate additional stops along the Californian coast and San Diego into our route... Hence we have enjoyed 3 very full weeks going from the truly sublime to the ridiculous - the sublime being the LA sunshine, Californian sunshine, hot Arizona deserts, Yosemite and Grand Canyon scenery and the ridiculous being celeb spotting in LA, rock night at the Key Club on the Sunset strip, everything about Las Vegas, the SNOW in Yosemite and Flagstaff and possibly the unluckiest parking ticket ever...

Saturday 28th March - Nadi, Fiji to Los Angeles

As previously mentioned, we arrived in to LA on Saturday afternoon, more than 8 hours before we left Fiji (10pm Sat 28th) - by crossing the dateline. For the first time, we managed to sleep during the overnight flight and passed through LA security with no problems. This was a surprise given the experiences of other travellers arriving into LA, plus Liz's habit of getting stopped on the way into each country - e.g. so far, once for looking nothing like her (healthier looking) passport photo and once for 'drug trafficking' ha-ha (carrying her various antihistamine, stomach etc pills in her luggage). We headed to our hostel in Hollywood on the Walk of Fame and spent a few hours exploring with a nice couple we had met in Fiji (Alex and Jess). That night the hostel put on 3 bands and had a keg of beer going for free so we enjoyed that as much as possible.

Sunday 29th March - LA

We set off on our LA city tour that was run by our hostel. We drove through Sunset Strip and Mulholland Drive to a stop off at the Hollywood sign. We then stopped for a short while outside the Kodak theatre (home of the Oscars) and Graumanns Chinese theatre where there is an abundance of nutters dressed up as characters getting tips for taking your photo with them. Most were rubbish but is was funny seeing Gene Simmons (Kiss) having a coffee break in Starbucks and Jesus walking around!! We then hit Beverly Hills and the homes of the stars. A fun, if somewhat voyeuristic ride, checking out the homes of the rich and famous. We saw the Beckhams driveway and roof and Michael Jackson's new place which still had its Xmas decorations up! We also saw some other fun stuff such as the Fresh Prince's house, the school where Britney filmed 'Hit Me Baby' and the Playboy mansion. After this we headed to Santa Monica via UCLA and stopped for over an hour in VeniceBeach. Again a home of the slightly weirder LA residents but a really fun place packed with stalls and interesting people. Our final stop was the exclusive shopping area of Rodeo Drive where we stuck out like a sore thumb in our travel attire! Needless to say we came away empty handed! Later we treated ourselves to a night out on the Sunset Strip with some Norwegian guys (Kjarten and Glen) we met on the tour. The Standard, House of Blues, Viper Room and Cat Club were all visited and appreciated (especially by Liz see tomorrow!)

Monday 30th March - LA

Liz stayed in bed until 3pm nursing her first serious hangover since Fremantle so I walked along to Hollywood again on my own for a few hours me time! Later we both walked back to Hollywood again where we stumbled across the promotion for Ricky Hatton's next fight. We waited outside with some keen Mexican fans (of Hatton in fact) and watched boxing names and other stars come in one by one. Most notably we saw Mickey Rourke (The wrestler) and Mark Wahlberg (aka Marky Mark) from a short distance as well as Ricky Hatton once he eventually arrived. Later we again went out with our new Norwegian friends this time to the famous Rainbow Inn on Sunset before making our way to 'The Key Club' to see "Steel Panther", a ridiculously over the top 80's hair metal tribute band who play and entertain every Monday night. They were a mix of stand up comedians and musicians playing all the old 80's favourites. A real good laugh, if a little shocking! The best bit was the 'surprise' special guests. Denis Rodman, Benji Madden (Good Charlotte/Paris Hiltons ex) and Derrick from Sum 41 who all took to the stage with the band.

Tuesday 31st March - LA

Today we caught the bus down to Santa Monica. We explored the pier and the beach before hiring some roller blades and heading off, slowly to Venice Beach again to soak up some more 'crazy' and to see the sights such as the basketball courts (famous from films such as White men can't jump and American History X) and muscle beach. After treating ourselves to lunch for once, we bladed back to Santa Monica, a lot quicker, and explored the shops.

Wednesday 1st April - LA

We did a lot of organising in the morning then set off on the bus to Warner Brothers Studios where we joined the VIP studio tour. The tour was really good, taking us behind the scenes of many movies and TV shows. We saw the actual, live, sets of the Big Bang Theory and The Mentalist as well as the set for the Adam Sandler Zohan film. We just missed seeing a star as Charlie Sheen drove out of the car park right behind us. He had been filming Two and a half men. My favourite part was seeing the old set for ER, well part of it and Liz was excited to see the preserved set of Friends. They are going to demolish it soon now the series has ended. That night we decided to treat ourselves to some food out and wanted to see the final few bits of Sunset strip we'd missed. We shared the biggest plate of Nachos (a starter!) I've ever seen in the Saddle Ranch and after selling a fantastic sob story to our waitress managed to get a free desert which was amazing. She must have thought we looked thin, which we do compared to most Americans!! During dinner we watched people riding the bull (featured in Sex and the City, apparently).

Thursday 2nd April - LA to Santa Barbara

We got up early to get down to LAX to pick up our car. We picked up a blue PT Cruiser which was cool and headed out of LA. We stopped in Malibu to try to spot some more celebs but the weather wasn't so good and the beach was pretty dead. We drove on to Santa Barbara where we wandered around for a bit on the pier and shops. Did some grocery shopping and cooked before again hitting the main street for a stroll. This was Liz's favourite place, with a gorgeous parade of shops, bars and restaurants all in a stunning mexican/californian design.

The best thing about leaving LA was finally shifting our Fiji-bellies which had blighted our last week - leaving Liz 10lbs lighter than UK weight and Phil able to see his ribs!!

Friday 3rd April - Santa Barbara to Monterey

In the morning we took a free tour round the historic Santa Barbara courthouse before pushing on up the californian coastline. Wow what a drive! Miles of stunning coastline with stormy crashing seas. Right up there with the Great Ocean road if not better as we got some real height around the mountain ranges. We stopped a few times for photos, once at the mock Scandinavian village Solvang, and to see a colony of Elephant Seals on the beach. We got to Monterey after dark and chilled for the rest of the night.

Saturday 4th April - Monterey to San Francisco

The hostel put on free pancakes in the morning which was great, you had to cook them yourself but that was easy after a few tips. We quickly took in the sights of Cannery Row in Monterey before hitting the road for a scenic drive to the exclusive and pituresque village of Carmel. Gorgeous beach with big waves and views of the famous Pebble beach golf course made this a very worthwhile detour. We then hit the road to San Francisco airport to drop off the car. We then navigated the BART (underground) system and got ourselves to our base in downtown San Francisco.

Sunday 5th April - San Francisco

Today we rented bikes at Pier 39 and cycled to and across the Golden GateBridge. The sun was shining and the ride was excellent with great views of the bridge, the bay and the city from the other side. We carried on down to a little up market town called Sausalito before jumping on the ferry back to San Fran. After returning the bikes we went on to Pier 39 where we watched the sunset whilst checking out the famous sea lions that bark and argue by the side of the pier.

Monday 6th April - San Francisco

First stop was the CoitTower which is situated at the top of Telegraph Hill. We took the lift to the top which gave us fantastic views of Alcatraz and the bay and the rest of the city. We followed Lombard Street to the famous 'crooked' part and then on to Fishermans Wharf.

Tuesday 7th April - San Francisco

We got up quite early and jumped on to the cable car at Powell Street to take us down to FishermansWharf as we had pre-booked an Alcatraz tour. Once on the island we donned our headphones and followed the excellent audio tour around the cell blocks and other buildings of the former prison. Being a bit damp and rainy made it even more atmospheric as we saw the isolation cells in particular. After the tour we took a bus to Golden GatePark where we wandered around various paths taking in the surroundings. The funniest part was when we stopped for our homemade sandwiches on a bench and got swooped on by a huge flock of pigeons who clearly thought we were going to give them our food. They obviously didn't realise that we were hungry travellers living on a budget and that every last bit of those sangers was going to be eaten!! Kinda freaky situation though as they all flew right on top of us, the sky darkening above us... In the evening, we treated ourselves to a cheap dinner in Lori's diner.

Wednesday 8th April - San Francisco to YosemiteNational Park

In the morning we picked up our latest car, a Dodge Caliber, and set off for Yosemite. The drive took nearly 4 hours after a stop off at the supermarket to pick up some supplies. Our accommodation, Yosemite Bug hostel, was billed as rustic. We were staying in a 12 bed cabin dorm which looked pretty cool from the outside and also felt pretty cool on the inside too! Still, we settled in for the night ready for an early start Thursday.

Thursday 9th April - YosemiteNational Park

The drive to the park itself was gorgeous so when we got into it we were blown away. The sheer size of the valley walls and the beauty of the waterfalls took your breath away. We walked to the base of the Yosemite Falls, then took a trail to the very posh Ahwahnee Hotel (sneakily had our sandwiches in front of an open fire) and on to the MirrorLake which unsurprisingly reflected the mountains beautifully. Every turn was another photo opportunity for Liz who has taken on the role of official photographer these days. She took some great snaps which you will be able to see in the USA photo album shortly.

Friday 10th April - YosemiteNational Park

We drove in to the park again for a second day. We stopped off at the 'Tunnel view' look out which has the best views of the entire valley then drove 35 miles over the mountain to the Mariposa Grove. On route we drove through a snow storm which was weird given that we'd been on the beach in Monterey only a few days before. After a 2 mile walk we arrived at the grove of giant sequoia trees. To make it even better though there was snow covering the ground so the trees looked great amid the wintry background. We followed a trail to see a fallen tree, the largest tree (Giant Grizzly) and a tree which has been cut out to let people walk through. Americans like things big and there trees are no exception as these were about as big as they come! On return to Yosemite Bug we both managed to get free 5 minute massages. This was nice and definitely softened the shoulders which have become somewhat hardened from carrying a rucksack every day.

Saturday 11th April - Yosemite to Las Vegas

This drive took around 9 hours, a lot longer than anticipated by ourselves! Needless to say the Coldplay CD we picked up in San Fran took a battering to pass the time. Liz also did her first real road driving in USA and passed with flying colours, not veering on to the wrong side once... When we got to Vegas we opted to self park (instead of tipping a valet) which proved a tricky 45 minute battle, along with the other thousands of people arriving for Easter weekend in Vegas. We checked in and after freshening up hit the strip for a look around. We watched the amazing fountain show at the front of the Bellagio, the Sirens of T.I. (Treasure Island) show and the erupting volcano at the Mirage before getting an early night at around 1am! They're not kidding when they say its 24 hours in Vegas!

Sunday 12th April - Las Vegas

After a well deserved lie in we headed out on to the strip not really knowing where to begin. It's quite an intimidating place to a rookie and especially ones on such a tight travellers budget. We basically decided to head up and down the strip going into as many casinos and hotels as possible seeing what they had to offer. The best ones we found to be the Bellagio, New York/New York, Caesars Palace, Flamingo, The Venetian, MGM Grand and our own Luxor. We didn't start any real gambling until we' got all the way back to the Luxor where we claimed our $10 free slot play money and hit the slots. The $10 wielded a return of $9.90 but we managed to grow this to $24.80 thanks to some inspired spinning by Liz (Plan B career move - gambler). I then proceeded to lose all of this due to my desire to play Black jack and the fact that there were no tables playing for less than a $5 minimum! Our $30 lasted 4 short hands but yes that does mean that I won one hahaha. The best thing about Vegas is of course the free drinks though and being travellers were became skilled at pretending to play to get free booze (for just the price of a tip).

Monday 13th April - Las Vegas to Flagstaff

The best part of our deal at the Luxor was that we got $25 credit to spend in the restaurants. This meant we paid about $2 in total for the enormous breakfast buffet they put on. Eggs Benedict, Pancakes, Waffles, Bacon, Hash Browns, Fresh Fruit, all appeared on our plates and we even managed to smuggle some bagels out in our pockets (Plan C career move- thieves)! After a brief stop at the famous 'Welcome to Las Vegas' sign and to check out the Little White Wedding Chapel (nothing to report) we hit the road to Flagstaff. After a short hold up around the Hoover Dam and a drive through the hot Arizona desert we eventually arrived to find Flagstaff very different to what we'd imagined. The famed Route 66 town was more alpine than desert and was some 15 degrees colder than it was in the hot and sunny Vegas. Our hostel was really nice though and the guy there very helpful, even giving us his supermarket card to save money...

Tuesday 14th April - Flagstaff / Grand Canyon

Nothing can really prepare you for your first sight of the Grand Canyon. It is truly awesome in size and impossible to take in. The drive from Flagstaff gave no clues as to what we'd find but after parking and heading to the rim we were not disappointed. Pictures and words don't do it justice but having seen the third largest canyon in South Africa, it was nothing to the size of this! We walked the south rim for a couple of miles towards the Bright Angel trail and jumped on the free bus and see some other viewpoints along the south side. The bus dropped us at Mohave point and we then walked back to Hopi and Powell points taking in as much as we could and getting lots of pictures. After 5 hours at the canyon we drove back to Flagstaff and had a look around the town and rewarded all our hard work (?) with a hot chocolate each.

Wednesday 15th April - Flagstaff to San Diego

Today was a driving day, which started once we had scraped the SNOW from the car, having fallen all night (who would have thought it snowed in Arizona, just miles from the hot desert). It took nearly 9 hours to get to San Diego with Liz doing the majority of the driving after I was struck down by an evil stomach overnight! It was cool to drive through the desert via Phoenix though down to the route 8 which then hugged the Mexican border for nearly 300 miles towards San Diego, where we took great care to park the car legally...

Thursday 16th April - San Diego

We awoke to a nasty surprise as our car had a parking ticket on it! It turns out that we couldnt park there every other night between 3 and 6am - due to road sweeping, and sure enough it was that 'other night' we parked there, relieving us of $40. Anyway, we headed out to BalboaPark which was a lovely park full of museums and theatres for the city. We visisted the rose and cactus gardens and just took in the nice weather and beautiful Spanish style buildings. We then drove to the very exclusive CoronadoIsland where we walked on the beautiful beach and took a nosey around the Hotel Del Coronado (setting of 'Some like it ho' with Marilyn Monroe). After this we drove up the coast to La Jolla (pronounced La Hoya). A really Californian beach-based town with lovely parks on the sea front and a colony of seals again just basking on the beach in full view of all the tourists. We even saw a tiny baby pup and a very protective mother making sure no other seal got close. We then drove down to Pacific beach which has famed sunsets. After walking on the cute pier which has holiday cottages to hire on it, we sat on the beach armed with our camera ready for the sunset which is reported to draw applause at times. Though there was no applause on this occasion, the sunset was gorgeous and the moment was exactly why we chose to go travelling. On returning to San Diego we went for a short walk through the very cool and vibrant Gaslamp district. Endless bars and lovely smelling restaurants tempted us but our budget only allowed us a slice of pizza each as a treat.. Rock n roll!

Friday 17th April - San Diego to Vancouver

Early start to get going before the dreaded parking enforcements started and to get to LA airport in plenty of time for our flight. Driving through Orange County, we stopped off at Laguna beach en route which was a stunning place. Million dollar homes everywhere and beautiful beaches and coves. You can see why the rich live there. Newport beach was a similar kind of place with thousands of boats moored in the very expensive looking harbour.

Leaving LA at lunchtime, we arrived in Vancouver 30 minutes early, flew through customs and our bags were among the first out. Adam (our host in Vancouver, friend of my good friend Glen) kindly collected us from the airport and drove us back to his lovely house in Coquitlam where we met Sara his fiancé and Bella and Chika the dogs, before chilling for the evening. A welcome rest after a few months constantly on the move.

Saturday 18th April - Vancouver

Adam kindly escorted us down town as he was working in the morning so after getting us to the waterfront we walked to StanleyPark, a huge park with great views back to the city and out in to the bay too. We walked around the well known sea wall path then cut in land to BeaverLake where we took an early lunch. We then walked back in to the city along Robson street and did some window shopping, buying a new waterproof jacket having left the previous one in Vegas. We then walked along Granville street to GranvilleIsland, home to the buzzing market, before getting the bus back to the city and Sky Train station. That night we settled down to watch a film "Knowing" with Adam and Sara.

Sunday 19th April - Vancouver

Today we have taken it very easy. With no one in our room, or making noise or making us check out by 10am we managed a nice lie in. When up we just pottered around watching TV and using the internet. Adam then kindly drove us to see some local sights. A gorgeous lake and beach area, then to his parents house with the most stupendous views ever! After a brief chat with Derek and Julie we went to another lake side park with stunning views. Tonight Adam has cooked up a cracking curry and I've managed to update this blog so thus far our stay in Canada has been great.

We plan to head to Vancouver Island this week before heading north to Whistler to visit our friends Mell and Chris for a few days. We'll then head off towards Jasper and Banff before ending in Calgary where we fly on May 8th to Chicago.

Hopefully you've stayed with this blog, apologies for its length but it had to be done. We'll make sure pictures are added tomorrow but we have put some Fiji pics up and also a couple more from Auckland.

Hope all is well back home

Love, the current reigning champions in-car games such as i-spy (road, desert, sky or catus - thats it), who am i, animal or vegetable (Liz doesnt get minerals) and word association games...

Phil and Liz

xxx