san francisco: not so fake tales of san francisco

the first area we went to check out in san francisco was the haight-ashbury district. haight is well known for being the centre of the hippie movement in the 1960's and 70's. it still has a very hippy vibe to it with some very funky shops and window fronts.

and of course we had to pay a visit to the iconic golden gate bridge. we opted not to walk or cycle over it as it was pretty windy! so instead we went over it on the bus but it did give us a lovely view of the bridge and we learnt that the colour it is painted in is 'international orange', not red as you might think.  

we also visited alcatraz, which is, as someone put it to us, "the only prison in america you'd pay to go into"! we decided to do a day time trip as i thought the night trip excursions might be a bit scary. we got a boat the one and a half miles out to alcatraz island. it was really interesting and i definitely learnt a lot about alcatraz. we heard about the real story behind the 1979 clint eastwood film 'escape from alcatraz' and stories about some of its famous and infamous former inmates, including al capone. 

after we'd been to alcatraz we were at pier 33. we'd heard about the sealions at pier 39 so we thought we'd have a stroll down to see them. i was expecting to see only a few sealions laying around there so i was very shocked to be met with what must have been hundreds of sealions, all stacked on top of each other making plenty of noise and showing off. 

clams are another san francisco tradition and where better to sample them than at boudin - the oldest continuously running company in san francisco, going since 1849. i had clam chowder served in a giant, edible sourdough bread bowl! 

up early the next day, jamie and i met up with doug, who was to be our walking tour guide for the day, to explore some of the city by foot. first we were guided through the north beach area, also informally known as little italy (the italian flag is even painted on all of its lamp posts). doug took us around north beach pointing out some of its more notable areas, such as the church outside which joe dimaggio and marilyn monroe posed on the steps for photos (but couldn't get married inside, apparently, as joe had been married before) and the cafe where francis ford coppola and mario puzo are supposed to have written the screenplay for the godfather. the latter would be the caffe trieste, below.

doug even told us that both the booth that coppola sat in to write and the espresso machine from the cafe were bought by francis ford coppola and now live in his beautiful production office which is actually just down the road.

the north beach area is well known for its beat history, but more of that later as we planned a whole separate day dedicated to the areas history with the beat writers. with doug we were also guided around chinatown, which we learnt is the second biggest chinatown in the usa (new york having the largest). it certainly was large and we saw some notable places there - including the alleyway and musician featured at the beginning of 'the pursuit of happyness' film, and another alleyway with a small factory that we could sneak into to see some fortune cookies being made from scratch.

the beuna vista cafe is known in san francisco for being the first place the irish coffee was ever served in america. so we decided to head on over there and give these renowned coffees a go. jam doesn't care much for alcohol or coffee, so settled for a hot chocolate.

to end the day, we went on a night bus tour to see some of san francisco's beautiful lights in the dark. some of the views from the top of the city's many hills were amazing. unfortunately, it was raining pretty heavily which spoiled most of the photo opportunities on the night tour, but the golden gate bridge amongst the mist and cloudy sky was a really atmospheric sight.

los angeles: hollywood swinging

jam and i arrived in los angeles on thursday after a ten hour over night flight from fji and collected our car for the next few days. after that we made our way to our accommodation where we were staying with the lovely aida and will. thank goodness we hired a gps device because i don't fancy our chances of getting by without it! after a hearty meal and a good nights sleep we were ready to get into some proper sightseeing and first up was the warner brother's studio tour. the studio tour took us around some famous cars from their films and tv shows including various batmobiles, general lee from the dukes of hazard, and leo's car from the new great gatsby film. the tour also took us into the prop store which included an extra special room....

the set of the coffee house, central perk, from the tv show friends! as jamie and i were both huge fans of the show growing up it was really exciting for us to be able to spend some time hanging out in the room filled with all the actual central perk props from the show! the warner brothers tour also took us into some sound stages for current television shows (the ellen show and pretty little liars), around the outdoor sets and into the museum where we saw some more awesome props for die-hard friends fans, including most notably a bottle of monkeyshine beer made with marcel's image on the front, chandler's 'best bud' gold bracelet from joey and, of course, rachel's 18-page (front and back!) letter to ross. we also saw some really special costumes from previous warner brother shows and films. yep, that's heath ledger's joker outfit right there.

in the afternoon we went to the griffith observatory which had some fantastic views of los angeles and of the hollywood sign. 

the observatory is really interesting and while we were there we watched a short film which told us all about the building including its recent renovation in 2002. there is also a tribute to james dean on the grounds due to the building appearing in rebel without a cause. although the building has appeared in many films, rebel without a cause was the first to portray the building as an observatory.  

on friday night we had tickets to watch the lakers (los angeles' most-celebrated basketball team) play the boston celtics at the staples arena. i'll now hand over to jamie for a guest review of the laker's game:

as we made our way in to the staples center along with approximately 18,950 other lakers fans (and maybe 48 celtics fans) we were given some cool freebies from sponsors, including a lakers towel to wave in support throughout the game, and a commemorative ticket with our faces printed on. we wanted the full, authentic experience of a big game, so before anything started we made our way straight to the pretzel stand where i had a pretzel dog (a hot dog sausage wrapped in warm pretzel, of course). the game tipped off and not many lakers fans had a lot of hope; the team had lost their last 4 matches. sure enough, boston took an early lead and got better from there. by the end of the third quarter the visitors were 11 points up. even the lakers girls (cheerleaders) and towel waving for the camera from the crowd couldn't cheer up most fans. however, in the fourth quarter, things changed dramatically. the crowd really took the noise up a gear, got behind the home team and the atmosphere was absolutely electric. suddenly the lakers defence rose to the occasion and started clawing back the points. i couldn't believe my eyes. at the final buzzer, the lakers had won the game 101-92 in the best turnaround i'd ever witnessed watching professional basketball. a really magical night.

on saturday we went to hollywood boulevard and to the walk of fame, the tlc chinese theatre and to the dolby theatre (the venue for the annual academy awards). we originally planned to do a tour of the dolby theatre but unfortunately as it's only one week until the oscars the theatre was closed and not open for tours so we had to settle for walking around the outside. we did go searching for our favourite stars on the walk of fame, and their hand and foot prints at the chinese theatre though!

on saturday afternoon we drove to santa monica beach where we enjoyed getting froyo (frozen yogurt!), walking down the pier and walking along the iconic boardwalk to venice beach. santa monica had a lovely laid back californian vibe with great stalls and shops along the promenade.

as we walked to venice beach we were amused by the various modes of transport people were using to get between the two beaches. we saw people of ALL ages on rollerskates, rollerblades, skateboards, bicycles, tandem bicycles, segways and joggers - many with prams and/or dogs in tow! jamie and i were certainly in the minority walking!

i really enjoyed los angeles and wish that i could have gone to LACMA and the getty centre. i really do wish we could have had an extra day or two there. but there we go! we had to get on to san francisco and spent yesterday (sunday) driving on route 101 from los angeles to san francisco. we stopped in the cute beach-side town of santa barbara for coffee before heading on to san luis obispo for lunch. whilst in the latter we thought we should see the one listed attraction on tripadvisor: bubblegum alley. this really is as described - an alley that people have been adding pieces of used bubblegum to over the years, eventually culminating in what you see below. jam felt obliged to contribute his own piece so he could forever be a part of this historic landmark. we also happened across an amazing candy and soda shop, specialising in bizarre and original flavours. we spent ages in there browsing through everything from bacon-flavoured chocolate to key lime pie soda. needless to say, jam was in heaven and eventually came out having purchased a red velvet cupcake cookie-dough flavoured soda and dr pepper flavoured jelly beans!

we arrived in san francisco around 8pm last night - luckily there was a really trendy bar next to where we are staying so we could get drinks and pizzas once we had got here. now we are busy planning and organising the rest of this week so that we can make the most of our days in san francisco.

fiji: there's no such thing as time in paradise

well as our week in fiji draws to an end and while we still have a good wifi connection i thought i'd take the opportunity to blog about our lovely time here in paradise. we spent our first night (thursday) on the mainland near the airport in nadi as to get to waya island where we have been staying we needed to take a boat which we had missed for that day. bright and early on friday morning we got the octopus resort boat up to the yasawa islands where waya is located which took us about an hour and half as we were on a direct boat (it can take 2 or 3 on a non-direct one). when we got to the island i was blown away by it's beauty, the beach is perfect - beautiful clear white sands and crystal clear turquoise waters. the island is very pretty full of colourful flowers, palm trees and leafy green trees. it's picture postcard stuff.

we spent the week staying in our little garden bure which looked directly onto the beach and was surrounded by flora and fauna. we did have a few unexpected (i.e. crawling/scuttling) houseguests but nothing that we couldn't handle luckily!

each night everyone on the resort eats together at the same time. the entire country seems to run on what the locals refer to themselves as 'fiji time'; what this means is that something scheduled for 10:30am for example can happen as early as 10am, or, more frequently, as late as about 11:30am! because of fiji time, wristwatches become somewhat redundant, so mealtimes are generally announced by blowing on the conch which can be heard around the resort. when everybody has had a chance to hear the conch sound, we all sit on tables of eight which was a great way of meeting new people and making friends.

there were plenty of activities going on varying from voivoi weaving, fijian cookery, organised visits to the local school and fishing to name but a few. i'm a bit ashamed to say we didn't participate in any of them (despite grand plans to begin with!) but instead spent most of days reading, swimming, snorkelling and sunbathing. the pool was just lovely and the water, in both the pool and the sea, was always so warm. something i haven't really experienced before.

after dinner there were usually things going on from movie night, quiz night and party night - these were all pretty good fun and we joined in. the social experience of mealtimes meant we quickly made friends, particularly with two girls from perth, and another couple from melbourne. on party night, we also participated in happy hour, and really bonded with these four australians. there was some pretty talented dancing on the beach.

some of it was even coordinated. okay i'm not sure what move this is but it was definitely an impressive routine at the time.

we were quite sad to see our holiday friends all move on a couple of days ago, but the rest of the time we have just chilled out and had a really relaxing time, getting ourselves ready for the next part of our journey!

and i musn't forget to mention that we saw some stunning skies!

so now we are about to leave fiji and fly to los angeles tonight - we will cross the date line when we fly so we leave at 10pm thursday and arrive at midday thursday despite a ten hour flight in the middle!

auckland: the city with many faces

we arrived in auckland on monday 10th february after driving up from rotorua via hobbiton and the glow worm caves. we had a quiet night on monday night after our busy day and set off on tuesday morning to explore auckland. our first point of call was ponsonby for lunch, a trendy suburb filled with cafes, bars, book shops, antique shops and other bits & bobs. although we had a good, cheap lunch, the ponsonby suburb itself was missing a little bit of atmosphere. we went off in search of more appealing areas, so took a short drive to piha, a black sand beach just over the waitakere ranges. the black sand at piha beach is due to the high iron content (as i understand it).

jam and i had a stop in the beautiful waitakere ranges regional park visitor's centre. we climbed up to the lookout and enjoyed the glorious view across the city, ranges and beach.

in the evening we went to see '12 years a slave' at capitol cinema, a beautiful art deco cinema in balmoral. on wednesday we decided to explore a little more of the city centre and set off on a guided walk which took us down 'k' road (karangahape road to use it's full name), through st kevin's arcade and myers park, passing the town hall and aotea square, the civic theatre where we had lunch nearby and had a quick cinema pit stop at the academy cinema (another art house cinema) to see 'kill your darlings'. here's a picture of the funky st kevin's arcade.

after our cinema pit stop we went to auckland art gallery where we had a very interesting guided tour of the gallery, hearing about all the different new zealand art contained in the gallery. the building itself is stunning, a mixture of old and new since a recent expansion, and i understand that the gallery won an award for it's architecture last year. i don't think i've really done it justice in this photograph. 

we continued to the walk around auckland city and made our way to the harbour via the very pretty albert park which was in the process of being set up for the lantern festival, which was taking place in a few days time.

we had dinner at coco's cantina, a really funky italian restaurant, on k road where we feasted on meatballs and happy hour drinks. 

our last day in auckland was rounded off with a trip up to mount eden at sunset where we enjoyed some great views across the city as the sun went down. at the top of the mountain there is a huge crater 50 metres deep, formed after the last volcanic eruption from this point thousands of years ago. you can see the edge of this perfectly circular crater in the bottom corner of the photo below.

rotorua: geysers, glowworms and green hills

we were up bright and early on saturday morning to make our way to 'wai-o-tapu geothermal wonderland'. we had to be there early to see the lady knox geyser (cue my danny dyer impression) go off which she does every morning around 10.15am.

after that we made our way through the geothermal wonderland where we encountered a variety of smells, steams and colours. there was some information explaining what the different colours meant and how each was a different kind of chemical reaction. it was also explained that the colours could change depending on the amount of sun, wind, rain etc. the temperatures varied also with some areas as hot as 100 degrees. obviously there are plenty of warnings about!

that evening, after spending the day being wowed by the geothermal activity, we went to the tamaki maori village for an evening of learning about the maori culture, seeing some traditional entertainment and eating our hangi (dinner cooked underground). 

the evening was great and we particularly enjoyed learning the haka (the war dance used to intimidate the enemy before battle... and evidently before rugby matches), hearing the beautiful songs and the general lively atmosphere of the night. while in rotorua we also visited kuirau park which has a lovely lake and also some thermal activity. there's geothermal stuff all over rotorua, obviously, and you can see (and smell) the sulphur steam coming from different holes in the ground in various locations. i even saw a thermal golf course! we went to the rotorua museum which used to be a healing bath house - the natural volcanic waters said to cure diseases such as arthritis - and a nightclub, before being a museum so we enjoyed spending some time there finding out more about the interesting building, the history of rotorua and its people.

yesterday (monday) we made our way from rotorua to auckland but we thought we should probably break up the journey a bit on the way. WE WENT TO HOBBITON. it was really impressive, the set is really well maintained and organised tours run through the set smoothly. our tour guide was excellent and told us lots of information about the set and how it was used for the lord of the rings and the hobbit films. i went a bit photo crazy so i have about two hundred photos (there are 40 hobbit holes to see!). here is bilbo baggins' house, bag end!

there are two hobbit holes that you are allowed to go in so here we are in a hobbit hole!

after we'd been to hobbiton we stopped at the 'waitomo glowworm caves' where we had a tour into the caves and took a little boat our under the caves so we could see all the glowworms in the dark. it was a really amazing sight to see hundreds of thousands of tiny glowing lights only a metre or so above our heads, used by the glowworms to lure bugs for food. unfortunately we couldn't take any photos in the caves but i took a photo of the next boat coming out so you can see what i mean.

rotorua: you know what they say...

.....you can smell it before you can see it! and by gosh, you can. like rotten eggs. the amazingness of the whole place definitely more than makes up for it, but it is quite a smell. i believe this is due to all the volcanic activity in the area creating sulphur emissions or something.

well we had a pretty good day driving up to rotorua through the north island yesterday. the scenery changed so much on the drive; we passed by lakes and through deserts with snow-topped mountains in the background, through forests and by hills closely resembling something from the cotswolds. we made pretty good time and pushed on until we got to lake taupo where we stopped for a late lunch. whilst we were having lunch we perused some brochures guiding us as to the extreme/adventure sports available to take part in and we thought "you know what our visit to new zealand is missing? some proper adrenaline-inducing high-risk activity". so when in rome and all that.

after our game of white-knuckle mini golf, which jam won despite my best golfing poses, we made our way to huka falls. a set of waterfalls, which were just breathtaking.

we arrived at our accommodation where the owners have the cutest little dog that jamie and i are very much trying to befriend. although the way he is sticking his tongue out at me in this photo makes me think he is being a bit cheeky.

today we went to 'the redwoods - whakarewarewa forest' (which is just huge) with a quick stop on the way to look at the blue and green lakes, close to lake tarawera, where we are staying just outside of the town. when we got there we picked out a reasonable little walk and set off. the size of the redwood trees was just incredible. this photo doesn't really do the height justice but if i'd edged the camera up any higher then you wouldn't have been able to see jamie at all and then you wouldn't have any idea of scale.

after our 'trek' through the redwoods we thought we better spend the rest of the day at the polynesian spa where we enjoyed bathing in a variety of seven thermal pools, a combination of acid and alkaline ranging from 38 to 42 degrees in temperature - some even with mystical healing properties! - in the outdoors overlooking lake rotorua. a blissful way to end the day.