Tuesday 13 September 2011

USA - California




the UNITED STATES left a deep impression. the first one we got though was not the best: three hours at immigrations. Apparantly, there was an error in the system ?! But later on we found out that it always takes soooo long to "immigrate". However, once we got our asses out of that huge horrible queue we jumped on our little beautiful escape camper van. Millions of people admired our vehicle, asked us if they could take pictures etc. and Adam always assured them that he did
the graffiti arts himself :)Our baby drove us around for 2300 miles, a proud number in only 13 days. The first few days we were on the BIG SUR, popular for surfers and nature fans. So we saw these really cute and huge elephant seals, getting their names of their funny noses. The landscape was really nice, reminding us a bit of good old Ireland...In these first days we also tried for the first and the last time wildcamping. We spent a night at a Walmart parking lot, together with 5 other campers. We found it a bit scary though and for this reason we only did it once...
Next stop was the biiig huge Redwood forest park. It was just incredible to see these huuge big trees, comparedto our car which looked super tiny. We did some nice nature walks, but once we had enough from the big fellows we went to foggy San Francisco where we met our friends Birgit and Tobi. Of course we wanted to celebrate our meeting with a nice cold beer. Adam picked for this special ocasion a nice Irish bar. But although our faces are full of wrinkles, our hair and beards are grey and getting white, the guys didnt believe that we are older than 21 and without a "plastic" ID NO drinks (not even alcohol free beer). I never saw Adam that disappointed in our
trip. At least in China town we could enjoy a beer together in a fancy cHinese restaurant.
After two days in San Francisco we had to find out that it can get bloody cold even in summer and that sunny california should get rather the name: foggy california - at least on the coast.
At least in the interior it got a bit warmer, when we went to the Yosemite National Park, our really favourite place in California. It was so beautiful that we thought we must be in a Walt Diseny park for nature. Unfortunately, we are not the only people who think that and for this reason the park was endlessly crowded. We even got once stucked in a Traffic jam for one hour ??!!! Uuuups....We would have rather expected that in busy Las Vegas, which was our next stop....Post continued by Adam

Las vegas believe everything you have heard...New York, Venice, the Eifletower everything can be found in this exciting oasis.For me it was even more exciting, what better place than vegas to catch up with my brother, his girlfriend and of course Adrian. This meant sunning by the pool and drinking beer all day long (it was 45 degrees). It was some craic and yes it was pretty easy to spot the paddies. You lose track of time when you are inside one the mega hotel casinos.. especially when you have consumed a gallon of beer.

Alas we only really had one evening with the guys its was far too short but cest la vie and it was back to LA at 4am to drop off the rainbow coloured campervan. We spent a couple of nights in Downtown LA - yeah you were all right guys, it was a bit rough but not quiet as bad as we expected.There seems to take place a renewal of some kind some hip coffee bars have just opened also some decent bars and are a hostel was
quirky which is always cool. Our final destination was Venice beach, yep it really does have your above average amount of freaks they even have a walk in freak show (i kid you not!) some other fine examples of daily life was a guy advertisng- with a ripped piece of cardboard "kick me in ass for $5" the next day he had progressed to " kick me in the nuts for $10 " yeh you get the idea but it had an endearing quality the place.Next Destination is central America...cant wait

1 comment:

  1. hi, had another look at the California pictures. Nice memories, especially now the winter is coming... Hope you guys are doing well while we are freezing here. :-) Tobi and Birgit

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