Day One - City of Angels

Our flight arrived on time in LA and we filled out our forms for immigration and customs and then joined the queue. Thank god the British are good at queuing as we were there for what seemed like a ice age after our long flight. We finally made it through and after being finger printed and photographed we made it onto our Shuttle Bus that decided to do laps of the airport for fun before setting off for Santa Monica Blvd and our hotel.

Welcome to Beverly Hills, bit different to the Sydney namesake...

The hotel is perfectly situated in West Hollywood (thanks to Janet for the great tip!), we're surrounded by cafes, bars and restaurants not the mention a few muscle Mary's! Every man is buff and you can't sneeze without spraying on a gym, tanning salon or pet pampering parlour! We were really happy that the sun came out to shine for our first day in the USA so after a shower, some food and and little nap we decided we better get up and out or risk sleeping for a week.

You can't afford anything here.

We considered doing a tour of some sort but decided against it and went for a walk to Beverly Hills instead. We walked down the super swanky Rodeo Drive (we fitted in so well in our worn-this-outfit-for-30-hours-look) and gawked at the expensive shops, the FIGJAMs in Lamborghini's and took plenty of pics.

The Divinyls: "I love myself, I want you to love meeee...."

LA is not a city designed for walking, it brings a whole new reality to 'urban sprawl' but we found walking to Beverly Hills today a real treat. The houses, the cars, the immaculate streets and lawns - we really enjoyed getting out and about. We finished up at the Beverly Center for a quick peek at the shops before finishing the loop home. We're lucky to have a great organic supermarket next door so we stocked up a few snacks (as well as a well earned 6 pack of Bud Light) before retiring for the night to watch Underbelly and MasterChef on the Macbook Pro! Day One - Success.

Day Zero - Flight to LA

We were up at 6am to strip the bed and wash sheets and towels ready for our new tenants. It felt strange leaving our place knowing it will be nearly October when we see it again, but the adventure awaits. Guy & Troy picked us up and stored yet more of our stuff that we needed in the last week. They also took us to the airport to see us off - thanks boys!

We sat around drinking over priced coffee and raisin toast for a few hours before boarding the huge A380 to LA. Whilst the take off was super smooth and the flight wonderfully quiet, the flight took 12 1/2 hours and we felt every single second. Even on the A380, economy is still economy. The food is still bad, the seats still cramped and the cabin crew still rude if not slightly vacuous. Sitting right next to the toilets listening to every flush doesn't help either.

The Qantas A380

We managed to pass the time by watching:
Lou - Avatar (again), Edge of Darkness (average), Tim Minchin Live (very funny!) and Pink Live in Sydney (entertaining as ever).
Jo - Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Loved it - I'm waiting to read the book), The Lovely Bones (thrilling) and Precious (slow but good).

We arrived safe and sound at 9.30am LA time on Sunday, technically before we left Sydney. We're all set now for all 106 days of our adventure to come....

Our last day in Sydney

Our last in Sydney started with us umming and ahhing if we should go for brunch, but it was pouring down with rain and we don't have a car. That dilemma was solved pretty quickly. Breakfast in bed it was then.

The day was actually pretty painful and seemed to go really slowly. Every time we opened a cupboard or wardrobe we'd find something that wasn't supposed to be here. We spent most of the day cleaning and cursing our now obvious hoarding disorder.

By evening we had everything organised and managed to pop over to our neighbours Lisa & Christian to say farewell to them and their twin girls. Christian also bought an iPad today so I made sure I had a little play with that too.

At 7pm, Carl & Martinette arrived and we enjoyed our last dinner in Sydney with them in Newtown. It was a really nice meal and we all had a good laugh and a chat. Carl & Martinette are storing some (more) of our stuff too (thank god!) and we helped them pack up their car before saying goodbye.

We'll be up at 6am tomorrow to get everything finished and Guy is picking us up at 8.30 and we'll pop to his place for a coffee to say thanks for also storing more of our shit! We need to be out of our apartment at 9am for the new tenants to move in. By which time, we should we on our way to Los Angeles!

Next post from the city of angels.....

The Red Pill

The more astute of you may have realised the title of the blog has changed from "The Blue Pill" to "The Red Pill". This is because I am a geek. As we leave tomorrow, the red pill has been taken.


Explanation is here if you are interested.

T-minus 2 days....

Only 2 more sleeps now until we're on our way. It's been a busy week for us both. I finished up work on Tuesday and since then we've been up to the following:

• pack up the apartment & cats and drive to Nelson Bay
• catch up with Jo's family and say farewell
• catch the COACH back to Sydney as our car is now in Nelson Bay
• catch up with Janet for dinner in Newtown
• clean the apartment from top to bottom, doing all the nasty stuff like cleaning ovens
• getting obsessed with the exchange rate
• getting final bills for gas & electricity
• the list goes on and on....

We're aiming to have it all finished today so we can have our last day in Sydney to ourselves. Hoping to fit in a brunch and a movie before we head off on Sunday.

Rock n' Roll

The final party before our trip took place on Saturday, the "Rock Star" party has been in planning by Donna for months.

We arrived at Donna's all dressed up; myself as 70's rocker Joan Jett and Jo as quirky Gwen Stefani. We were joined by many others including but not limited to Abba (Donna & Trish), Ms Connie from Sneaky Sound System (Rita), the B52's (Danielle & Penny), the Spice Girls (Jean & sisters), Britney Spears (Elka) and Lady Gaga (Di).

In all our glory...

We then all hopped into cabs to our venue of the evening, the oh so glamorous Strike bowling at King St Wharf. We had a private Karaoke room but unfortunately the people outside in the bowling alley could still see us! Donna & Trish kicked off the night with a REHEARSED, yes rehearsed version of "Dancing Queen". Don't let anyone tell you these nights are nothing if not competitive!

I love rock n' roll, so put another dime in the jukebox baby!

I remember singing "Livin' on a prayer" and Joan Jett's classic cover "I love rock n' roll" but judging by the photos of the night I must have inflicted everyone with much more than that. Even Jo got up to sing a George Michael classic. We think.

You are the dancing queen.....

If the night wasn't glamorous enough, our final destination for the night was Scruffy Murphy's in the city. *Shudders*. The less said about that the better but it wouldn't be a complete recount of the night without remembering Elka jumping up on stage with the lead singer and Jo & Trish searching high and low for Trish's bag only for me to have it the whole time!

We both need 4 months off from these parties now!

Jimmy Liks

One of our last dinner's in Sydney last night for a while - we went to Jimmy Liks in the now oh-so-trendy Kings Cross with Ant, Martinette & Nicci. We enjoyed a nice glass of wine before settling down to the set menu - 8 dishes of yumminess!

The menu is Thai/South East Asian so we enjoyed dishes like Poached chicken and crab salad with lemongrass, coconut, mint and thai basil and my favourite - Crispy Pork Hock with tamarind and tamarillo and nahm plah prik sauce.

Enjoying a nice glass of white...

When we thought we couldn't eat anymore, out comes this massive dessert tasting plate compliments of the chef! Jo knew him as he used to work at the Bank Hotel, so when we arrived she asked the waiter to say hi to him from her. Little did we know a few hours later that hello would turn into coconut ice-cream and many other delicious things. The best bit was when the table next to us asked the waitress if they could order the same dessert plate, only to be told that no they couldn't as it was a special! Oh what snobs we are!

It was a great night spent with great friends who we'll miss heaps when we're away - but a really nice way to all catch up before we leave.

Macbook Pro

How is this for trying to legitimise a purchase....we're going to be traveling for four months. Lots of places to see, hotels to book, blogs to post, photos to publish, people to keep in touch with. Surely we'll need some sort of laptop for these reasons.

We could spend $300US on a crappy excuse for a computer - a 'Netbook'. A plastic 10" flimsy thing with pathetic specs that won't be usable by the time you get home. OR we could get a newly release Macbook Pro!! Mwahahaha! Jo is very happy with her new toy :)

All Hail, the Macbook Pro.....in all her aluminum glory.

The Macbook Pro....isn't she beautiful

Now we can really go traveling in style!

The packing starts...

Oh god. Since WHEN did we accumulate so much crap!? I foolishly thought that as we're renting our apartment 'fully furnished' that our packing would take in the region of...say... an hour or two? Oh no no no no. We officially have so much crap we don't know what to do with it. A small sample of this is below.....see exhibit A.

All our crap. Well, probably less than half of it!

We've packed box after box of books, bags, EXCESS crockery, yes EXCESS crockery - we're still leaving our tenants with a fully stocked kitchen with accessories!! We haven't even finished the wardrobes yet. We have managed to chuck out another bin bag full of clothes that we haven't worn for ages.

All though, with our backpacks I'm not sure that we'll have enough space for a bit of shopping in NY that we'd hoped for. We'll be squeezing stuff in nonetheless I bet!

More Planning....

We doing more planning. If that is even possible, it feels like we've done so much already! Our focus has turned to packing up our personal things from the apartment to store at various locations of generous family & friends. Jo's been busy with this and we've got about 100 boxes scattered about the place ready to put in the car soon.

We've done a bit more hotel research and good job too as some places we're travelling too are almost completely booked out (well, of affordable accommodation anyway). We're thinking we'll book most places as they nearly all have a cancellation policy should things go pear shaped.

Our countdown is getting closer too and it all feels very daunting - Jo only has 10 more working days to go and I only have 12! I don't have a replacement yet so they better hurry up or the handover will be "See ya!" as I skip out the door on the 25th May :)

The planning starts now...

As you can imagine there is much to organise for this trip and it feels like we've done so much already.

Progress to date:
1. Resign from job (Jo) - check
2. Rent out our apartment - check
3. Decide on itinerary - check
4. Book RTW flights - check

Now were up to the part where details come in. Jo is a born planner and organiser, where as I.....well, I can do it if I have to. Details? Me? Er no (unless it's do with money!). So we (the 'royal' we) are researching places, booking cars, accommodation, working out travel times etc etc.

We've made a fair bit of progress so far though - mostly due to the discovery of a great website called HotWire. Our good friend Janet told us about it, it's a site for booking car hire, accommodation etc and it's a bit like "Accomodation Gambling" if such a thing exists. They offer hotels at very cheap prices because you don't find out the name of the hotel until AFTER you book and pay! But believe me, this has worked out great for us on all 4 occassions!

With the US mostly taken care of, we're turning our attention to Europe now and the places that will be super busy and booked up in summer. ie. everywhere.

Going Round The World!!!

It has been about 3 months in the making, been on-again and off-again and involved real estate agents and job resignations but today we have booked our long planned 'Round the World' trip! It all started one sunny afternoon back in February when an afternoon walk following a particularly miserable day at work turned into a discussion of where we could escape to.....

The World - it's a big place.

The following is the result of much musings and planning in the past quarter of a year.

The Trip:
- We will leave Sydney on the 30th May and fly to LA*
- The following 3 weeks will take us to San Fransisco, Yosemite National Park, Las Vegas and New York where we will celebrate Jo's birthday in style!
- Then onto London, arriving on the 21st June for 10 nights to spend with family (including my new little nephew!) and friends - just in time for my birthday and some good World Cup action (hopefully)
- We're then off for 2 months travelling around Portugal, Spain, France and Italy
- Back to the UK around the 14th August for another 9 nights and to celebrate my brother's birthday
- We then start the trip home, but not before we spend 3 weeks in the Greek Islands followed by a quick shopping trip in Bangkok!

Looking forward to it? Oh yes. Oh yes indeed!

* Volcano eruptions dependant