A windy New Orleans

I write this post from the very nice bar at the Loews Hotel in New Orleans.  Jazz music echoes through the hotel however the atmosphere is quiet.  The music is a little muffled by the TV's which are all on the weather channel.  We are currently expecting Hurricane Isaac which is about 80 miles off the south east coast of Louisiana... where New Orleans happens to be!  The staff are smartly dressed and polite.  They also seemed relaxed but with a hint of apprehension (I believe the hotel management invited the staff to stay at the hotel with their families and pets - which I think is fantastic). 

Six or Seven years ago I watched on TV the disaster that Hurricane Katrina bore on Louisiana and Mississippi so I can certainly understand their apprehension. Isaac is not as powerful as Katrina but it is big in size but I have just read that $15 billion dollars has been spent on building, repairing and strengthening the levies and barriers. I hope that they work and I'm sure they will but I understand that New Orleans is below sea level so I guess it is always going to be a struggle to keep the waters out.  Anyway I'd love to tell you more about New Orleans but we can't leave the hotel until probably Thursday... hopefully (its Tuesday lunchtime right now).  Its OK... the barman makes a sweet 'Zen Garden'... mmmmmm.

p.s We have a great view of the Mississippi from our hotel room on the 14th floor so I'll try to update on whats happening.  Oh... and poor mum who was suppose to be here this afternoon will not make it past Dallas as all flights in and out of New Orleans are now cancelled.  Hope to see you tomorrow mum!

R.

Adventures in the City of Angels...

Probably about time I updated the blog! What day is it???  :-)

We arrived in LA on Tuesday night local time, and decided to spring for a limo given that the cost wasn't that different to a taxi... Caitlin and Estella were impressed!

Our hotel is in Glendale, on the way to Pasadena in the North East corner of LA. It's a little 2 story place built in 1924... before elevators were widely available by the looks! Oh well... all this climbing up the stairs is probably doing us good. There's a nice little Jazz bar/restaurant underneath the hotel http://www.jaxbarandgrill.com 

Cruisin through the Hollywood hills with the top down!

We've spent the week braving the insanity that is LA traffic... It's not too far to Universal Studios and Hollywood etc from here, but a bit of a hike to Disneyland, as we found out on Friday. We might go down to Anaheim tomorrow night so we can finish our Disney adventures without worrying about night traffic on the freeway.

Yes, that's a chandelier on the street... Glendale (or more specifically The Americana at Glendale) is a bit "Pleasantville"!

Universal Studios was awesome - we all agreed that the Simpsons ride was even better than the high-tech 3-D Transformers one. Between us we managed to make most of the rides... We couldn't face the lines, but worked out a loophole... we could buy 2 front of line passes, and one of us could stay with Estella at the "Kid Check" area, then swap over... so neither adult had to wait, and Caitlin got 2 rides on most of them! Sweet.

Estella has proven to be the biggest wuss we've ever seen... We even had to leave the Shrek 4-D movie with her screaming in horror... Oh well, Caitlin more than makes up in the daring department!

Disneyland was fun, but hard work... temps in the 30s, with bugger all shade, and awful long lines everywhere. At least they let you pick up a "fastpass" on the busiest rides, so you can come back an hour later without waiting. 

I'm quite surprised to find that most of the themepark menu options are reasonably priced and pretty healthy, but even without sugar, Estella managed to pull off a mega-tanty nice and early in the day when I refused to pay double the normal price for a princess dress for her - Oh, and did I mention they don't sell beer at Disneyland! (Well not in the main park)... Screaming kid, hot day, long lines and no relief... it didn't get off to a good start! Still, we had a lot of fun in the end, and are all looking forward to going back for California Adventure Park over the next few days.

Santa Monica Pier

Oh my god... We went to the Getty yesterday... Beautiful place, with an amazing restaurant (best food of the trip so far in my book), and they had a Klimt exhibition... We were all enjoying the gallery until Estella went into absolute meltdown mode... Ended up with security chasing her and Rach out after she tried to handle the artwork... Oooops. The tantrum didn't end there of course... Not before we'd carried the screaming beast out of the gallery and down the steps to the tram (which takes you down the hill to the carpark), and one of the nice ladies who work there came over and somehow defused Estella.

 

Today we took a trip to Downtown LA, and wandered around the fashion district... reminded me of the markets in KL or Singapore a bit... then over to Beverley Hills for a look at the other "fashion district". After lunch on Rodeo Dve, Estella put on her new Princess Rapunzel dress, and hit Hollywood Blvd!

:-) Everyone was very impressed to see a "real" princess out in public!!! Will copy the photos over in a moment and post them tonight.

Will also try to keep up the posting, instead of trying to cram it all in at the end of the week.

Having a great time!

Steve, Rach, Caitlin and Estella

Aloha Amigos...still on the North Shore, Oahu, HI.

Aloha,

Sunday afternoon on the North shore... we are worn out from walking, beaching, swimming and ledge jumping!!  No ledge jumping for me...  too many teenage boys to weave through to get to the edge... thats my excuse anyway.  I'll post pictures of Steve and Caitlin jumping off the ledge.  Caitlin shamed all the adults and older kids who were standing up there too scaredy to jump!

Yep, that's Caitlin mid jump!

Earlier we spent the morning walking and swimming albeit very briefly at the Waimea Falls.  The walk through the very well looked after gardens in the valley was worth it but the pretty small pool at the bottom of the falls (the pictures are a little more exciting than it is + $37 for 3 of us to go in).  Special mention has to go to the over zealous lifeguard(s), they told me off as Estella was about 3ft away from me... not in the water... not even near the water but sitting down with a life jacket on... it was weird.  They wouldn't let Caitlin hop in without a life jacket -13+ you have to be.  I could dive in and be across the other side in about 4 seconds.  We know America is a litigious society but at this place they are OTT... made it uncomfortable ... no problems, off to the beach again!   Worth a look around the beautiful gardens but if you have seen any waterfalls or swimming holes in Australia you would be disappointed.  Don't prioritise the falls but if you love nice gardens the mile walk in is worth it.

But the beaches.... I'm not so much a beach person but even I haven't resisted being on the beach everyday since we have been here.  I have never seen such great snorkelling off the beach and I've sat on a few beaches!  Turtles everywhere... apparently you can go to jail if you hurt a turtle here and as a result they cruise in the shallows and surf the waves... its a beautiful sight.  It's difficult to explain the north shore but there is no where too fancy looking, the best mexican I have ever had was out of a van on the beach, chooks weirdly wander everywhere, parking is a nightmare, the weather is pretty much perfect day and night!

I'd like to come back, rent a place directly on the beach with a few mates and just chill out.  Snorkel, do nothing, snorkel, drink beer, have a snooze, eat, drink beer, go for a swim... the next day would be much the same - I'm sure you get the picture.  You'd have to toss a coin about who gets in the car to go get more beer and food but at $20 for a carton of Corona you can be the big spender!

The most stress, and I wouldn't exactly call it stress is looking for a place to stay at our next location.  I read that the key to happiness at disneyland is a good strategy therefore I am going 'Walt' and doing some more planning.

So, any good ideas for the next 5 weeks based on the following places and datelines would be appreciated.

California (we have plans for LA for at least five days.. except a hotel which I will try to finalise by tomorrow) so cruising out of LA from about the 13th August to 26th August around really a 500 kms radius I guess...
Nawlins aka New Orleans 26th August - 3 September
New York (and maybe east Canada) 3 September - 18th September
Then...Europe for 8 weeks... I can't think that far ahead but will take all advice given as I haven't been back there since AD (after darlings... or demons...).

Maholo.

XXOO
Rachel

North Shore

Nice.

I can see why people come to Hawaii to retire... Forget Waikiki or golf courses or gated communities (although we are staying in one for the next 6 nights, complete with 3 pools, tennis courts and a fancy resort next door)... This is a beautiful part of the world.

We've been a bit stressed the last couple of days, as our "she'll be right" approach to booking accommodation - we booked a total of 3 nights for our entire 5 months away - started to look fatally flawed when we found out that Hawaii was facing an influx of defense (sic) personnel and end of summer holidayers. Most of the big accommodation websites had nothing at all available this week. Yep... Nothing! Still, our initial fear that the only thing we could get would cost us $400+ a night (or sleep in the hire car) gave way to a happy find... A two bedroom (kids upstairs in the mezzanine) apartment for $125++ a night right where we wanted to be in turtle bay.

We're 10 minutes away from the famous Banzai Pipeline (yes, THE pipeline for those surf guitar tragics out there), but this time of year the surf is pretty small. Rach and Caitlin even saw some turtles off the beach while "diving" off the beach in 6 foot of water without even the need for snorkels and flippers - just the trusty old Zoggs.

Will post some photos soon... Just doing this update from my phone while having a quiet beer on our "lanai" or verandah.

Life's ok.

Cheers
Steve

Tech tip for Aussie iPhone in USA

To use your iPhone with decent data speeds, go to AT&T, ask for a prepaid gophone microsim. They'll say "doesn't work with iPhone" tell them you want one anyway and don't take no for an answer. Pay $25 for voice and text (doesn't cover calls to Australia - they are extra) and $25 for 1GB data. Find some free wifi, click to register the SIM, then go to www.unlockit.co.nz and choose the AT&T APN settings.
That's it. 4G working nicely on my iPhone 4S, but no ability to create a hotspot (yet).

Aloha!

Greetings from Hawaii! We arrived Sunday morning about 9am local time ( about 3am Monday WA time!), and took a day or so to get over jetlag and acclimatise, but nearly there now... although I'm still the only one awake this morning at 9.13am local time :-)

I think we had the oldest plane in the Qantas fleet, but we made it...

I expected Waikiki to be insanely busy and over-developed, and to some extent it is, but I can see why it's so popular. The beach is fantastic... way too crowded for me, but beautiful clear blue water at just the right temperature. We've been very restrained with shopping so far, but prices are pretty good.

One thing I'll say for sure - don't bother buying duty free alcohol before you come here!... Check this out:

Yep... $12.99 for a 750ml bottle of CC... The small bottle to the left was $6.99, but I paid $9.99 for one duty free in Australia before we left... bummer

We're staying at Aqua Bamboo Waikiki at the moment, which is a nice little hotel a couple of streets back from the beach. We can see ocean glimpses from our balcony on one side, and off to the hills from the other side. Probably the best view on our floor is from the outdoor laundry just outside our room!

So far, we've been for walks, had a couple of quiet drinks at a beachside bar, eaten at Denny's diner (pretty average really), the Cheesecake Factory (awesome - great menu and service...no it's not just a cakeshop) and BBQ with John, Sarah and Gianna, and checked out Ala Moana shopping centre.

Today we're organising our travels for the next week... hoping to head up to the North Shore for a few days. Will post soon.
Steve.