Las Vegas the home of Nightlife! Plus some canyon to the north.

Posted on June 14, 2010 by Travis

On our third day in Los Angeles we decided to start our journey to Las Vegas. A road trip through Nevada’s deserts through to Las Vegas, I was sure it would be just like Fear and Loathing (minus the bats). Well, it wasn’t. It was just one long concrete highway with nothing to see or do along the way.

In Australia, if you drive anywhere far, you could easily find something interesting to stop at, a big kangaroo, an old town or some random sign pointing to places you have never heard off. America is different, the large population has turned everything into efficient multilane highways.

On exiting Los Angeles we were presented with the San Bernardino Mountains through which the highway winds around, presenting some amazing views. On the high peaks in the distance you could even see snow. Three hundred kilometres north east of Los Angeles we come across an unusual road sign Zzyzx Rd, apparently this is the alphabetically last place name in the world.

In four hours, we arrived in the evening at Flamingo Hotel, Sonya recommended Flamingo hotel as she had stayed there when younger, and it was also fairly inexpensive at $70 per night. Stepping out of the hotel we were greeted with the famous bright and overly excessive lights of Las Vegas.

Whilst I didn’t see a point in gambling, we both agreed that we should see at least one show, and we thought there was no better choice than experiencing Cirque du Soleil. Cirque du Soleil has a total of seven shows at various hotels is Las Vegas, we chose Mystère which was $72 each for reasonable seated tickets. The show was great, a lot of elaborate costumes and all the acts I had not experienced before. The clown during the audience’s seating at the start was also very funny.

After the show Sonya insisted we try Serendipity 3 for an evening sugar hit, we ordered a ‘Can’t Say No Sundae’ and their famous signature ‘Frrrozen Hot chocolate’. The Frrrozen Hot chocolate was a let down, essentially a cold chocolate drink, but the sundae was fun. The sundae mimicked those you see in the movies, huge, with bananas, cream, nuts and a cherry on the top. Sadly, we couldn’t finish it.

For the rest of the night we decided to checkout The Venetian, one of the most extravagant hotels which with a Venice theme featuring indoor canals and huge Italian Renaissance murals.

Day Two – The Grand Canyon

The Grand Canyon South Rim is roughly four hundred kilometres from Las Vegas or just over a five hour drive. From what I had read, the South Rim offers the most spectacular views, so I wanted to try and get there. Unfortunately, we woke up a little too late and by the time we got passed Hoover Dam and the addition of the slight time difference I calculated we would have arrived very close to sunset. So Sonya convinced me to drive to the Grand Canyon West Rim, two hundred kilometres from Las Vegas or a little under four hours. Sonya made the right call.

A little bit from Las Vegas we reached Hoover Dam, what an engineering marvel. A huge mass of water on one side and a huge drop on the other. There was construction of a new bridge over the river which I thought was also very impressive. Hoover Dam also marks the crossing from Nevada to Arizona.

Even though the South Rim dominates then West Rim, it still offers amazing views. Another drawback of the West Rim is it has been highly commercialised especially with the creation of The Skywalk. The Skywalk is a glass bottom platform that extends a little over twenty metres from the Grand Canyon wall all one thousand and four hundred meters up. The whole experience is fairly expensive at $71 per head, but is worth it if you are short of time, like us. Now, I say this a lot, but I have never seen Sonya so scared when walking over the glass bottomed Skywalk, having to hold onto the handrail the whole time. After the Skywalk the tour bus takes you to Eagle Point, which offers-breath taking views and isn’t so crowded. We started our drive back to Las Vegas as the sun was setting, not bad for a day trip.

That night Sonya introduced me to In-N-Out Burgers, for six dollars you can buy burgers, fries and drink to feed two, the best value I had seen on the trip.

Day Three – Mexico

Yes, we drove into Mexico. We had a whole day to drive back from Las Vegas to Los Angeles with an afternoon flight the next day, for some reason I thought it would be a good idea to drive into Mexico for a little bit, like I have said, I like to cram as much as I can into my holidays. The Mexican city Tijuana is situated on the America-Mexico border, and located roughly four hundred kilometres from Las Vegas, or a five hour drive.

The Mexico border was just like the movies, plenty of cars and people walking across, what I didn’t realise was how easy it was to cross and get into Mexico. Now call me naive, but I had this image that Tijuana would be a transition between America and Mexico, I did not expect that as soon as you crossed the border you would be hit with the poverty and dirtiness of Mexico. This combined with the GPS map finishing as soon as we entered made me very uneasy. Through luck, we managed to find a place that had a very basic map, and then found a shopping centre. After browsing the supper market, in my opinion one of the most interesting things to do in a foreign country, we had some Mexican food at the food court and then made our way back to the border. As expected, the border crossing into America wasn’t as easy, with passport checks and even confiscation of some of our food. We were glad to be back.

We reached Los Angeles late at night and checked in a budget hotel. In the morning we made our way to the airport and departed America on a sixteen hour flight to Dubai.

Hollywood – not quite the home of glitz and glamour

Posted on May 5, 2010 by Travis

If we were going to do the whole America thing, how could we not do Hollywood California. We decided to spend one day wondering Hollywood and one day visiting Universal Studio. This worked out to be all that we needed, with the third day starting our drive to Las Vegas.

We booked a rental car for the whole period, which made things so much easier and enjoyable. From the airport the GPS navigated us all the way to our accommodation; Motel 6, which we were pleased to find was just walking distance from Hollywood Boulevard.

It was night time when we arrived at our hotel; we walked down Hollywood Boulevard, enjoying our first view of the Walk of Stars and a quick burger at Johnny Rockets, now about my tenth burger on the whole trip. We decided that we may as well do the infamous Genius World Records to end the night, with the VIP ticket including Ripley’s Believe It or Not! and the Hollywood Wax Museum costing total $27 per person. Guinness World of Records was worn and out dated (they still don’t have the Burj Khalifa in their tallest structures section), not even worth the $9 entry.

Day 1 – Universal Studios
We woke up early for Universal Studios, this was a fun day. Having now visited two Disney theme parks, it was good to get a change of characters. Plus Universal Studios is a full functioning movie studio, housing many current movie studios, sound stages, sets, backdrops and even office buildings. On entering we were greeted with Betelgeuse from Beetlejuice, Marilyn Monroe, Shrek and Frankenstein all who we naturally took photos with. Sonya then recommended we first go on the famous Studio Tour.

The tour started at Stage 25 and passed the office bungalows (as Universal Studios calls them). Passed through some street sets including Courthouse Square which was famously used in the Back to the Future series, but now for Ghost Whisperer. It was cool seeing a whole street and then rounding the corner and finding it was literally just a large painted wall. Toward the Fast and the Furious set (merely two cars on individual robotic arms) was a large collection of movie cars, including the Jurassic Park Jeep and Back to the Future Delorean

We past the Jaws Encounter, Desperate Housewives Wisteria Lane, Whoville from How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Norman hiding another body at the Bates Motel and the latest set form War of the Worlds featuring an actual Boeing 747 chopped up into pieces.

After the tour we headed to the Simpsons Ride, the ride which was just a simulation, distracted me from the stunning visuals. Though they did a really good turning it all into a working Krustyland theme park and it was neat seeing a life size Kwik-E-Mart.

A series of escalators took us to the Universal Studios Lower Lot, were we visited Jurassic Park, the ride was very close to that in the actual movie, with a large T-rex at the conclusion. Other highlights were the WaterWorld show, where we both got drenched (yes, the soaked warnings on the benches are accurate), House of Horrors where real actors do there best to scare you (it worked well) and Terminator 2: 3D (a combination 3D and live action show).

After leaving Universal Studio we visited Los Angeles Chinatown for dinner and then the Hollywood Wax Museum. The Wax Museum was very impressive, with amazing details on all the wax sculptures. My only gripe is Angelina could have been improved so I didn’t look like I was standing next to a cross-dresser.

We finished the night with a drive down Doheny Drive which climbed up Hollywood Hills, the way down offered amazing view of the city.

Day 2 – Hollywood Sign, Santa Monica and Pasadena
We started this day driving to Mount Hollywood which has a good view (though a little far) of the famous Hollywood sign. Griffith Observatory also sits on the city facing slope and offers amazing views of Los Angeles, we even went back at night.

From the Hollywood sign we drove south-west along Mulholland Drive to Santa Monica and the famous Santa Monica Pier which has a small amusement park and restaurants. After a picnic lunch we headed to Pasadena. Pasadena is roughly sixteen kilometres north east of Los Angeles or forty kilometres north east from Santa Monica. We walked around City Hall and through its amazing courtyards, from there we walked south to the Pasadena Civic Auditorium‎.

Back in Hollywood, we finished the night with Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Which was only a little better than the Guinness World of Records, and then a night time view from Mount Hollywood, spectacular.

Day 3 – Grauman’s Chinese Theatre and then on to Las Vegas
The morning of our last day in Hollywood, we decided to stop by Grauman’s Chinese Theatre which is famous for its numerous handprints, footprints and autographs set in the concrete in the forecourt. We took the obligatory photos of our hands in the celebrities’ handprints.

Conclusion
Let me just say, Hollywood itself isn’t great. The first things you notice when walking down Hollywood Boulevard are the countless adult, tattoo and drug paraphernalia shops lining the streets. But this with the griminess of the streets, the poor costumes of the street performers and the randoms trying to sell you a ‘star’s home’ tour all work together nicely. I don’t think we would be visiting Hollywood again for a very long time (perhaps never) but it was good to have visited it once.

New York – Round II

Posted on May 3, 2010 by Sonya

After three days in sunny Florida we headed back to New York City. Aside from the weather, the cultural contrast was immediately apparent. New York is like any big city really – plenty of people from all different cultures, many different spoken languages, foods etc. Florida was probably a more concise representation of ‘America’ in it’s many typically American fast food eateries and lifestyle.

30th December

We arrived back at M’s apartment midday and headed to the MoMA where we were meeting Mandi. She had managed to get free tickets for us from a friend so we decided to spend the afternoon there perusing what we had missed the previous weeks. Quite a bit, we realised. The whole Picasso-Cubist era and the French impressionists such as Monet.. as well as the beautiful architecture and design sections. And of course, plenty of abstract art such as the white empty shoebox, and the four yoghurt lids. Highlights would have been Monet’s waterlilies, Salvador Dali’s Persistence of Memory (so tiny!) and taking creative photo’s of M looking ‘aggressive’ next to Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup work (she works in advertising for Progresso Soup!!).

That evening we went to a little bar in the West Village. It was so warm and cosy inside and it felt like being at someone’s house. Travis unknowingly ordered a girl’s drink, the apple cider. HAHA.

New Year’s Eve

The following day Travis and I headed for towards the Upper East Side, and dropped by the UN building and then over to the MeT. It was NYE and the subways were extremely busy. We headed back in the early evening to Mandi’s apartment as we were meeting a bunch of Mandi’s New Yorker friends for dinner that night. Dinner was in Chelsea at a trendy, modern Thai restaurant where I had a green curry chicken and a glass of shiraz. The tables were long and had benches on either side which made it difficult to get in and out of your seat. Another surprise was my trip to the toilet, by which I came across a guy… unisex toilets, very Ally McBeal. After dinner, and after agreeing we would catch up with some of M’s friend’s later at a house party, we went to a bar in St Mark’s, near Sing Sing where we had entertained ourselves with Karaoke a week earlier. Had a blast there (how could one not, with 5 shots at $10!), meeting up with a few of Mandi’s other friends. Ended up staying there for the count down, then heading to another club for some dancing. It was a bit of a crazy night, but definitely memorable – that’s for sure. And we didn’t quite make it to the house party.

New Year’s Day

The following day we had a lazy morning, before heading to Chinatown for some greasy dim sum to satisfy the uneasy stomachs. Tasty, but definitely not quite comparable to Perth standards (or maybe we’re biased?) On our way home we stopped by some Chinese grocery stores to pick up snacks for our quiet night in. We also stopped by Magnolia Bakery, only just across the road from M’s apartment, a place that is perennially busy with cupcake lovers. We bought the red velvet and a chocolate buttermilk cupcake as well a yummy gooey banana concoction that looked deadly. Given we had already chosen to splurge upon the point of no return we also bought a tub of Ben and Jerry’s – some exotic combination of flavours we couldn’t dream of finding in Perth.

2nd January

So thus, that indulgent night concluded the New York chapter of our trip. The following morning we packed our bags, took a walk along the Hudson River in West Village and had breakfast at a intimate little diner, where the quirky waiter mumbled to himself about world politics between orders.

Outside the beautiful brownstone apartment, we said our teary goodbyes, Mandi hailed us a cab and we were off on the next part of our American adventure.

Orlando, home of Disney World and NASA

Posted on March 6, 2010 by Travis

I like my holidays to be jammed packed, trying to do and see as much as possible in the small amount of time we have.

Orlando, Florida, was an example of this.

We left New York on Boxing Day and returned a day before New Years Eve giving us a full three days of tours, rides and theme parks. We decided to spend two days visiting Walt Disney World and the last day visiting NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre.

Disney World is huge, with four main parks and an additional water park; you need to spend at least a whole day visiting each one. There are even ten day passes available! As we had previously visited Hong Kong Disney Land, which is essentially a combination of Magic Kingdom Park and Animal Kingdom Park, we chose to visit Epcot and Hollywood Studios.

As expected, having visited right in the middle of the holiday season, it was extremely busy with families.

Day 1: Disney World – Epcot

The Epcot theme park was interesting, a lot of sciency rides and attractions; our first was a go at a Segway, which was really fun. Sonya didn’t quite get the hang of it. A lot of the more childish attractions, where actually quite enjoyable, like the Innoventions – Test the Limits Lab, slamming doors and dropping barrels.

One of the main attractions of Epcot, besides the giant Epcot sphere, is the World Showcase. The World Showcase is a section of the park divided up into eleven individual country themed areas, within each were replicas of the country’s most iconic buildings and landmarks, information on history, culture, and many restaurants and small themed rides. Visiting it all used up most of the day, being sunset when we left England, England even featured a replica Beetles band. The World Showcase did make us want to discover more countries, and this was all while we were already on a holiday.

We finished the night off with some of the edutainment rides, and the Mission Space ride which simulated up to 2.4Gs of g-force. We both left the ride feeling quite queasy. We also had the obligatory photos with Disney characters; Mickey, Pluto, Minnie, Donald and Goofy.

Day 2: Disney World – Disney’s Hollywood Studios

The second day was spent at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, which I thought was a lot more fun. We started the day with a live performance of Beauty and the Beast, while we waited for our Fastpass (Disney’s solution to the enormous queues) time to the Tower of Terror to arrive. As we waited in the queue for Tower of Terror, Sonya started to have childhood flashbacks of the time she cried after the ride; after all, she was only 17. I didn’t know what to expect, thinking it to be more of a horror house, especially after experiencing Disney’s famous pre-ride entertainment. The ride turned out to be a series of ‘high-speed drops’ which left me grinning the whole time all while Sonya had her eye’s closed.

For lunch we shared a giant turkey leg, which at $7 wasn’t too bad value, given Disney’s ridiculous prices. After we visited The Magic of Disney Animation, a live show that gave an insight into the creation of the dragon Mushu from Mulan. The entry and exit to the show had a lot of cool Disney artwork and stills. “A Spectacular Journey into the Movies” was a ride that toured the audience around various movie scenes, some memorable ones being The Wizard of Oz, Casablanca and Indiana Jones. There was a little gallery on the history of Walt Disney, titled One Man’s Dream, which included his achievements and various memorabilia, which was also very interesting.

For the last part of the night, I managed to convince Sonya to queue up for the Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster a “high-speed roller coaster”. It was a pain staking 80 minute long line, but the 2 minute ride was all worth the wait, I, again walking out with a cheesy grin. Sonya again had her eyes closed the whole time! And this was confirmed by the ‘memorial’ photo that gets taken during the most intense part of the ride.

Day 3: NASA – Kennedy Space Center

Visiting NASA was just one of those nerdy things I have always wanted to do, I wanted to always view a space shuttle on its launch pad, unfortunately I wasn’t able to do this due to arriving about a fortnight too early (Shuttle Endeavour was due to launch on 8th February 2010, and the shuttle is usually on the launch pad for about one month prior to launch). However, I was not left disappointed.

Kennedy Space Center, located at Cape Canaveral, located roughly 72 kilometers east of Orlando. After talking to our hotel’s tourist information lady, and being informed buses would cost $80 each, we were advised to rent a car. We were extremely lucky being able to rent a car in a days notice, due to the holiday season, we also paid and arm and a leg $135 USD for one day rental). When we casually hopped into the car for the first time, I was presented with a missing steering wheel, while Sonya on the driver’s seat, then it clicked, for that moment we had forgotten the driving sides were reversed to that of Australia. This would be fun we thought. However, Florida was very easy to drive around, as the roads were wide and long, which made things easier. I had left my GPS in New York as I didn’t think we would be driving in Orlando, but the locals were happy to provide directions.

The amazing thing about the Kennedy Space Center, is it is a working site, that huge Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) the tour bus drives past is actually where they ‘mate’ the space shuttle to the rockets, those huge dirt tracks (the Crawlerway) the tour bus drives next to, are the real tracks produced by the crawler-transporters when moving the space shuttle to the launch pad. We where taken to the closest observation platform for the Launch Complex 39 – A and B launch pads, but it was still a fair distance away, though, it was still a good feeling seeing them from afar (minus the shuttles).

One of my highlights was The Apollo/Saturn V Center, it started with a tour through the actual Apollo 11 launch control room which leads to the massive Saturn V rocket. I could have starred at those five F-1 rocket engines for hours, the size was overwhelming. In the Apollo/Saturn V Center you could also touch a real moon rock as well as visit an eerie dark museum which featured the original Apollo 11 space capsule and space suits from various time periods.

The final destination on the bus tour was the Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF) where International Space Station modules are tested. Unfortunately, it was very quite in the assembly plant as there was nobody working there.

Back at the Kennedy Space Centre park, we got up close and personal with a retired space shuttle, and finished the night visiting the Rocket Garden, a large collection of illuminated rockets.