Julie's Round the World Trip

After stopping in Sante Fe for Cowboy goodies for the Rodeo we headed of to Dallas where everyhtings bigger aparently. It's now famous for where President Kennedy (JFK) got assasinated. ON the way in our city tour showed us where he was murdered, where he was pronounced dead in hospital. Our evening comprised of a good old Texan night out and the 'hauted house' which I refused to go into because that would definitely not make me happy, and would give me nightmares.

The second day was more productive...as per usual...we first went to the 6th floor museum where Lee Harvey Oswald supposedly shot the president from witht he ridiculous 'magic bullet' which managed to go through the shoulder of JFK, through the opposite shoulder (not parallel) of the drive, through the driveras wrist and then through his knee. Not only did it penetrate all these places, but it changed directrion in flight...absolute rubbish, but really interesting when you think about the conspiricy behind it all.

After a morning filled with education, we headed to the rodeo in the evening, which was absolutely crazy!!!! First off was a traditional game to stay on the bull for 8 seconds while it tried to throw the rider off...8 seconds is a lot longer than it looks. This was followed by roping and tying of a calf like they would on the farms, followed by some horse racing and more bull riding. Apart from the crazy accent of the commentators, the most hilarious bit was the interval entertainment. They first let loose a calf on a group of 8-12 years olds and they had to chase it down and get the ribbon of its back.....so funny seeing all these kids run after a very fast calf, while the little ones sort of ran in circles not really sure what to do. Then they put a sheep in with teh under 8's. This was briulliant as the tiniest kids all sorty of ran after each other or just stared into space. The best bit though was they didn't want to leave the arena and at the end the parents had to go and get them

Grear night of fun...I really enjoyed myself and was surprised how much craziness is tradition here. What a brilliant time

xxxxx

These three come as a package because I didn't actually do any activities here to go on about.

We stopped of at Monument Valley in Utah on our way to Cortez, it was an iconic thing to see, but I did just keep thinking this is where Doctor Who dies, and because I've been away so long, I still haven't seen the reasons for his death so it's sort of anb unsolved mystery for me. Our stop of was Cortez in Colorado, simply to space out the driving a little bit. Nothing much here, just some scrummy dinner that took two hours to arrive....but at least it was scrummy.

On our way into Alberquerque we stopped of in Durango....though I didn't do any of the optionals as I can't white water raft and I wasn't too interested in the jeep tour, so I wandered around Durango. COlorado, meeting some interesting people including a Texan with 3 teeth and 65 years old who wanted to 'take me back to his ranch'...apparently we'd have beautiful brown eyd (his) freckly (mine) babies....slightly disturbing.

I did see Forest Gump on the way to Alberquerque, but it was the only interesting thing about the day, because the optional in Alberquerque was hot-air-balloning over sunrise. Glad I didn't do it because I'd done it before, and apparently they didn't get in the air until after sunrise anyway.

Finally we drove into good old Texas which is mental!! We got to Almirrillo after an evil day of driving. We went to the Texan Ranch for dinner wathcing 4 guys try and eat 2kg of steak (and fail) before heading over to Buckles for a few drinks. I did have a great night but smoking is still allowed indoors over here and my throat wanted to shrivle up. I absolutely hated the smoke and made me so thankful of the laws in Britain. It was that bad that when I got back at 1am I had a shower and washed my hair and had to put my clothes in a back....they're going to be fun to clean :/

xxxxx

The first of these days consisted mainly of travelling, we did stop of in the National park to get our first view of the canyon and it looks stunning....well thats the best way to describe it, I was shocked at the size of it, I think in my head I was still thinking of the size of Petra in Jordan, BIG mistake, this one is massive and you can definitely see why they call it a wonder of the world!

Everything always happens on a full day on these trips and I was very busy today. First of I treated myself to a helicopter ride over the canyon as eveyone I've spoke too about it says it's a 'must do' and I can see why, the view from the air is stunning, impossible to describe, you get so close to the rock towers while really seeing how the water calved out the canyon. America doies like to be cheesy though, as we came over the canyon 'space odyssey' was playing, it was fitting to what we were seeing, but I couldn't help laughing a mumbling to myself 'typical Americans'

After the stunning helicopter ride I decided to do the Hike down part of the canyon with a few other brave souls. Going down should have been the easy part, but unfortunately I have an uncanny ability to trip over thin air, and the ankle that I went over on three weeks previous in Fiji...that was still swolen...I decided to swell it up again. Now, a normal person at his point would head back up the canyon because it was pretty painful, but I'm a stubborn git and a very proud one. I mean tonnes of people can say they hiked down into tyhe canyon....but how many can say they hobbled it??? I think I just refused any of my joints to take this opportunity away from me, and it was definiteyl worth it. As you headed down, everytime you were level with a layer of rock, you would not be able to see the rocky outcrops in the canyon as every part of rock that colour was in a uniform line. It was a spectacular view, but I was definitely suffering on the way back up with everyone else. It was actually easier on my ankle to go uphill, but because of our altitude everyone was struggling to breathe, but we managed it....I think I actually went faster uphill, but did take a lot more rests. After much ice and rest I headed of to see sunset which actually wasn't that amazing, before having an early night (for this trip anyway) and resting myself before our evil bus jouneys begin.

Wowza, my time in America is flying by and there's no time to lose most days, hence the blog is failing a little bit in life.

Vegas was simply incredible, that's the only way to describe it, it's the one place I'd love to go back to because there simply isn't enough time to see everything. After arriving mid-afternoon we all walked around the streets taking in the craziness, it was really hard to believe we were actually in Vegas with mini cities for casinos like mini New York, and mini Paris. We also walked through Ceasers Palace and were tempted to do a hangover moment and ask if it were the real Ceasers Palace, but resisted.

I've got to say I think I've been lacking luxery on my trip because I was absolutely blown away by not only the size of the beds and the room, but the hairdryer, millions of towels, and it was so much fun to actually unpack everything and spread out rather than keeping to your metre squared of space.

On the first evening we headed to the Vegas sign for some photos before we hit Vegas by night. Then we got a 'surprise' on the way to Fremont Street, we stooped of at Graceland chapel to see a wedding chapel, and got treated to a performance by Elvis, the he conducted a fake wedding for us, it was bizzarre but brilliant!!! I was not the one to get fake married but I did consider getting a ring to scare Dad to death when I got back, I probably would've done too if rings were free, but as they're not dear old dad won't be getting any scares too soon

Fremont street was the light show where the whole ceiling lights up and puts on a performance while blasting out Queen songs. It was really special, I was screaming along to it while staring at the roof with my new travellers, pretty darn wicked!! I am gettting a bit of stick though due to my accent because everyone on this trip is Australian and they love badly impersinating my accent and it always seems to sound cockney lol!

Our first night out in Vegas was hilarious, we went to a place called 'Pure' which is in Ceasers Palace, it was a great night with us all bomnding a lot, it was a late night, we all left at 3am with me being a leaning post because somehow I was a little bit too sober next to everyone else....basically I could walk near enough in a straight line Great times, no gambling on the first night but we'll have to see haow it goes

I walked my bottom off in the second day because I really wanted to see everything, I stopped of at little Venice, walked up the entire strip as far as Luxor, getting slightly wierded out that I've been to all these places, but at least I knew what they all stood for. On the way back I saw something that will make dad, mum and mark a little bit jealous. I stopped off to watch the Bellagio fountains and oh my god I was an emotional reck. It really didn't help that the music while the fountains were on was to the tune of 'time to say goodbye'. I had a 'girl' moment thinking about how lucky I am and how my family would love to be there, and how I'm excitred to go home but glad I've still got a bit left....seriously, you wouldn't think someone could think that all at the same time....so of course I had tears, ones I got annoyed by and couldn't understand, so I just pulled my shades down and watched the rest because I'm an idiot.

The last nights entertainment consisted of the 'V' variety performance, with hunky guys swirling in the air on ropes, some incredible tap dancers, a magic show, some hilarious comedy acts and a host that actually made me cry with laughter, it was brilliant That night was topped of by a party bus ride around Vegas in which we were to busy dancing and drinking our free champagne that we didn't look outside too much, but we had all seen it the night before. The night finished in 'Rain' nightclub in Palms and again we partied the night away.

I loved Vegas, it's everything you expect and more....couldn't have loved it mores :D

xxxxxx

After the weirdest longest day ever, I arrived in L.A, well I arrived before I set off but that's a whole other mind boggle!

For the 1st 3 nights I stayed on Venice beach, a.k.a muscle beach, I don't know what I was expecting, maybe a bit of Venice Italy, but not anything like I got. Normally everyones in shorts and on the beach but as it's been cloudy for the last few days with a tinsy bit of sun, there's been none of that, only skaters, a busy scene in the skate park, lots of freestyle dancing, and LOADS of people after free money for food. I didn't know that 4.20 existed either (and I bet you didn't). it's the 20th of April that everyone celebrates smoking weed, I don't see what they're celebrating, but as they can get it so easily in California I think it gives them something to do, and they do it for the weekend. I was offered it from a prescription for 40dollars, I really had to surpress a laugh. I think if I hadn't come from Fiji it wouldn't have been quite a shock to the system, but they were harmless enough, just annoying.

Anyway, back to the big picture. The first day I was completely wiped out from time zones and whatnot so I just got a feel for the area which I just explained. The second day was a little more productive, I walked all the way along Venice Beach to Santa Monica. It's nothing special, you're supposed to see it in the 'things to see in L.A' but to be honest it was just like Blackpool pier without the fish and chips....so therefore worse than blackpool pier. I worked out pretty quickly that you don't go around saying hi to people and smiling like you would say 'bula!' to people in Fiji. Here you either get a weird look or get asked for money or get asked out, I think one older couple have actually smiled back to me, I've now started avoiding eye contact which is a shame.

Day 2 in L.A included my trip to Hollywood, pretty awesome, but it didn't have as much there as I thought it would. I assume there was loads of other places that I 'should' see like a women giving me a card for the hollywood cemetery (i had to contain a laugh) I mean, who goes to hollywood to look at graves, no matter who's they are??? ANyway, you'll laugh at me now, at first I refused to pay for any type of tour, but in the end all I'd seen is the walk of fame and a bad view of the hollywood sign, and I was sure there was more to see. I got my tour half price (as per usual), but the reason you'll laugh is all these tours pride themselves on seeing hollywood houses, so I paid to see a bunch of homes that I'm never gonna live in nor do I care who lives there now. I did get out of it much better pictures though, including the hollywood sign and the city of L.A. Plus, she took us to Rodeo drive (pretty woman) and gave us quite a lot of info on places owned by people and where people commited suicide etc. The only one I knew much about was seeing Micheals home and the balcony he first held his kid over, and then the gate they took the body out of......yes I know its a gate, but seriously, there was't anything else to see in L.A. I think if I had more time I would've gone to the universal studios and gone backstage, but I doubt I would be lucky enough to see anything live. I did get offered to watch a Dr.Phil show, but I wasn't interested (it's like Jeremy Kyle). The only thing I was interested in was the Cirque du Soliel, but that was really expensive and I wasn't going alone in this city, I haven't got a death wish.

After two not so good says getting annoyed by people after money or other things (use your imagination) I thought I'd hate L.A. but surprisingly, I came to downtown today and loved it. If you walk round the sights here they're in the CBD so no homeless people, no creeps, it was amazing. Plus my hostel here is actually a hotel and I have my own room (by accident, there's no-one on the top bunk), I have my own bathroom and even have fluffy towels, a t.v. and cd player!!!!! I feel well and truely spoiled . After seeing downtown which includes the walt disney concert hall, a cathedral that doesn't look like a cathedral and lots of convention centres, civic buildings and fancy buildings for the banks, I have had a mini rest (sleep) and am about to meet my tour to explore the rest of America. I'm glad today went well otherwise I doubt I'd ever want to come back here, but for now, I'm excited to get some fixed company back, and see what this country has to offer....:D......