Los Angeles

18th April 2004
We arrived into LAX at 1.30PM. This place is arguably the worlds biggest & busiest airport. We took one of the many airport minibuses with a few other passengers, making the stops at several hotels before reaching our own. The Orbit Hotel on Melrose Ave was our choice of accommodation in LA. It looked as though it was in a good spot & cheap, costing us $32 per person, per night. As we entered the building we were greeted by a very friendly pin cushion. The receptionist was a lovely blond girl, at least she would of been before all the piercings. What did I expect though, this was Melrose Ave & Los Angeles, right!

After settling into our room we made our way out to the quaint little BBQ area. We had arrived just in time, it was Sunday & the hotel had a free cookout every Sunday, serving up some delicious mouth watering hamburgers. After a few hours of chatting we were going to take it easy that night so we could go to Universal Studios the next day. But with a little gentle persuasion & a lot of curiousity for the night life, we were getting dressed in our Sunday best for a night on the town. We visited a few clubs such as The Viper Room (famed for the overdose death of River Phoenix on it's side walk), the Roxy (were the middle aged goth waiter weren't the friendliest) & lastly the Saddle Ranch where we were entertained by drunken attempts to stay on the bucking mechanical bull. The night ended with me under a car on the Sunset Strip. No I wasn't drunk & hit by a car. Our ride broke down & it was let out of the bag that I was a mechanic, so guess who had to fix it.

We rose the next day bleary eyed after only 4 hours sleep, but that didn't stop our excitement for what lay ahead. We were off to Universal Studios at 8.00am. Picked up by our hotel transfer, the same one that I was fixing the night before, we were dropped off at the Universal Studios City Walk. The City Walk is an open air arcade with shopping, food & entertainment that leads to the entry of the main park. There weren't a lot of people there on the day but we decided to go with the "front of the line pass". This allowed us to skip any lines & join the front of the que. The normal ticket cost was about $52 but we payed the extra $30 so we could go on everything twice, as we knew we would be back anytime soon. This place has some great ride including the simulator ride "Back to the Future", the wet "Jurassic Park" ride, the very cool "Shrek 4D" movie, plus tons & tons more. One of the thing that I really loved was the movie lot tour, were you visit the sets of all the old & new movies.

Over the next few days we tried to hit most of the major sights. First we paced the blocks of Hollywood Blvd looking at the Walk of Fame, Mann's Chinese Theatre & the celebrity hand prints. We did a "Movie Stars Home" tour, where we got to see some of the impressive front hedges the celebrities owned. We meandered along Sunset & Santa Monica Blvds looking at the clubs, pubs & restaurants. Went to La Brae Tar Pits, famous for it's prehistoric displays of animals & also where the movie Volcano with Tommy Lee was set. For a few days we caught the bus down to Santa Monica & Venice Beach. We did a bit of shopping in the mall, rode the Ferris Wheel on SantaMonica Pier & strolled down the road to Venice Beach, where we saw the muscle men, B baller's & street performers including one man playing 5 instruments. We went to "The Improv" which is one of the the most famous comedy clubs in LA, known for launchinf the career's of many of todays comedians including, Jerry Seinfeld, Robert Williams & Chris Rock. On one particular night we hung out at a party in one of the many clubs on Sunset Blvd which we later found out that most of people there were porn stars (don't you just love LA). Another fun thing we did was buying tickets to see "Everlast" in concert at the House of Blues. That was a good night except for the cranky bar staff. After serving us several drinks they made us aware that we had forgotten to tip.... opps.

Celebrity Spotting
The first celebrities I saw in the US were in New York (The Rock, Mini Driver & Johnny Knoxville), but LA is the place to go "Celeb Spotting". My first encounter was siting in a Chinese restaurant on the corner of Melrose & Fairfax Ave. We were just finishing off dinner when we noticed the guy sitting across from us was Ryan Gosling from the movies Murder by Numbers & Half Nelson.

The next encounter was crossing a side street on Santa Monica Blvd. As we were crossing the road a car was coming down the narrow street. The driver waved us across the road but we had already begun to walk around the rear of his car. As we made our way around the back, I knew I'd seen this guy before. It wasn't until I reached the boot that I realised it was Guy Peirce. I went back around to his window, which was down & said the first thing that came to mind......"Your Guy Pierce, aren't you"? He looked at me as though I was about to car-jack him, which I later realised happens a lot in LA. He was actually quite nice & made boring chat for about 5 minutes before I though I had better let him go.

We hit the "Celeb Pot of Gold" on one afternoon walking past Mann's Chinese Theatre. There was a movie premiere on & they were blocking off Hollywood Blvd. I couldn't believe my luck! It was for the movie God Send, which just happened to star my favourite actor of all time, Robert Deniro. We hung out for about 4 hours before we spotted any "stars". The first was Greg Kinnear (As Good As It Gets), closely followed by Rebecca Romijn-Stamos & once again Guy Pierce. Finally the man himself turned up, Robert Deniro! Greeted by hundreds of screaming fans & flashing night bulbs, I can't believe I've seen one of the best actors of all time.

Disneyland & California Adventure
"The Happiest place on Earth" was a definite on our list. We spent one day wandering from one land to the next, enjoying ride after ride after ride. Disneyland is a must do, but the rides do not compare to the ones at Universal Studios. Most of the rides are aimed at children, but there are a few that get the heart racing. The best ride I have ever been on was the Indiana Jones Ride. You walk in & sit in a jeep which starts up & drives you through the movies at very high speeds. The other thing that I was really impressed with was the Haunted House". The special effects that are on display during this ride just leave you speech less. I didn't think they could do things like this in real life, they were movie quality & very believable.

We also did California Adventure which is the same price as Disneyland, owned by Disney & located 100 meters from the Disneyland entry. This place was very big, but not quiet as big as it's sister park. The rides though seemed to be aimed a little more towards adults & they also had the smoothest roller coaster I have ever been on. The other top ride was the "Mali Boomer", which shoots you vertical in a matter of seconds then slowly bounces you down towards the ground.

LA Dodgers - Baseball
One of my favourite moments was heading out to Dodger stadium, located in Downtown LA. We spent the late afternoon & evening enjoying "America's favourite pastime", Baseball. It was the LA Dodgers vs the New York Mets. We picked up a few beers & hot dogs & made our way to the great seats we had bought. Baseball is exceptionally cheap. We bought the tickets online direct from the Dodgers website for $16 each. We were seated just past first base & in the right area for any far flying foul ball. During warm up a lot of the players were hitting balls into the crowd for everyone to keep, unfortunately not in our direction. The game finally got underway with the fans from both teams yelling & screaming. It's a pretty relaxing game & one that you really don't have to focus on a lot. After a few beers & some entertaining crowd antics we were coming into the bottom of the 4th. One of the Dodgers stepped up to the plate & took a swing, STRIKE ONE! He lined up again for his second attempt. As the ball was thrown at an impressive pace there was a big crack. He smashed it, but unlucky for him it was a foul. Lucky for me though it was coming directly at me. All of a sudden there was another cracking sound, it was the ball hitting my bare hand (now I know why they all take their gloves to the match). It came at such an incredible pace that my hand was thrown back & I dropped the ball. The next thing people were coming at me from five rows back trying to get my ball! After fighting off all these seven year olds I was victorious. Just kidding about the seven year olds. I now have a LA Dodgers game ball sitting on my mantle.

Baseball was wicked fun and I would recommend it to anyone who can make it out there. At just $16 USD per ticket, why not!

Last Days
After spending two weeks cruising around LA it was time to go home. There were plans to stay longer, we even had the tickets to shoot down to San Diego for a few days, but like a lot of holidays, things happen and we didn't get to go. Instead I spent the last day pacing back & forth from music shop to music shop looking for my dream guitar. I promised myself that I would buy one for all the hard work I did to get here. My long time lover came in the shape of a beautiful "Martin & Co" guitar, complete with built in microphone, on board computer & cup holders.

The USA is such a fun place to go, especially for me being such a big fan of everything that is America. The cities, movies, rap, rock, clubs, natural wonders & everything you've ever seen on TV is here waiting to blow you away. I could never pick a single highlight of this trip as I saw so many amazing things, people & places.

I flew home on the 2nd of May 2004.