Burlington

I'm now out of the French-speaking part of Canada, and am currently staying at Burlington, Ontario, which is just south of Toronto. Haven't really done a whole lot here so far, but I'm sure there'll be things to do soon enough.

Infected Mushroom

There was some kind of drum festival at Mont Royal, so Shelley and I checked it out in the afternoon. Unfortunately, the weather decided to be uncooperative, and rain was falling on us intermittently on our way to the mountain that is Montréal's namesake. We got there and didn't have to look too far to hear the sound of many drums beating away. We found a congregation of people either drumming, dancing, or enjoying the spectacle. We didn't stay too long as we feared the weather would start to hassle us again. For the same reason, we didn't stick around at the Jazz Festival, where we watched a short snippet of a couple of acts.

After dinner, it was time for one final deeply intellectual conversation with some of the fellow guests (oddly enough, ending with the mention of Snakes on a Plane), as well as one final jam session, before a few of us headed over to watch Infected Mushroom play a gig downtown. The show was great, but the timing sucked. Doors opened at 10, but Infected Mushroom didn't get on stage until about 1, finishing at around 3 (with no encore). This meant that we'd get less sleep than we would have liked before heading over to Burlington the next day.

Montréal overview

Days spent: 8
Bedbug outbreaks: 1
Money spent: More than anticipated
Theme song/s: Infusion - What Lies Ahead

Odd traffic patterns

It wasn't too bad getting out of Montréal late in the morning of the day after Canada Day, but after being a couple of hours into Ontario, we encountered a bit of congestion. The first sign of the business was actually inside a Wendy's at a highway rest stop, where the queue to get food cascaded back like a line in Disneyland. It was a similar sight in the next rest stop where we stopped (since the Wendy's line was far too long for us to bother), except that this time it was for Tim Horton's and the female washrooms.

After escaping the human queues, we progressed a bit before running into more queues, of the vehicular kind. What struck me as quite odd about these traffic tailbacks were that they didn't seem to accompany any particular roadwork or accident on the road. I guess it was just congestion due to the sheer volume of cars heading in the same direction. The jams eventually relaxed as the number of lanes increased, and traffic was flowing smoothly once we reached Toronto. We eventually made it back to Shelley's place at around 7:30 in the evening.

Sadly, I haven't uploaded any new photos, since I can only get a faint wireless connection at the moment.

Canada Day

Previously on Adrian's adventure, he was very irritated at disruptions to the hostel he was staying at. He was in the process of changing his plan amidst this development. And now, the conclusion...

Fumigation

A couple of staff members at the hostel seemed to be as set on kicking out a certain guest as they were on getting rid of these bedbugs. Now, I don't want to get into specifics about this conflict, but all I'll say is that I could see both sides of the story, so neither party was "in the wrong". However, one certain staff member seemed adamant on this guest leaving, and was a bit rude about handling the situation, which just made things worse. There was a huge argument about it, the police were called (though they didn't do anything), and in the end made for quite a spectacle.

The next day, they were fumigating once again, so I didn't end up doing a whole lot until the end of the day, when a few of us went to check out the first evening of the Jazz Festival. It was nice and relaxed until the first major outdoor act of the festival, when crowds filled up the main area to critical mass. I wasn't really a big fan of the type of music the band was playing, so I avoided the crowd and went to an outlying stage, where I watched a blues guitarist play a set that was much more to my liking. We were all separated by the end of the night, and met up again back at the hostel well before the night's festivities were over, as we were all fairly tired.

Circuit Gilles Villeneuve

I finally ended up inline skating around Canada's world championship F1 track, Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, which was on a little island, accessible via bike paths. I found somebody in the hostel to venture out to the island with me, and it took just over 2 hours to get to the track, go around once, and get back. Alas, the rental company charge by full hours, so we ended up just cruising along the pier before returning the skates. By this point our legs and feet were burning up, so we retired back to the hostel for some relaxation.

The relaxation turned into quiet beer drinking, which turned into "let's all go out to a club tonight". At this point, Shelley had finally made it through the traffic-congested highway from Toronto and arrived in the city. After drinking several more beers, we headed out to a nearby pub, and then wherever the night took us. I actually don't know where the night took us, I just went with people, and we all eventually got split up into really tiny little groups.

It wasn't so bad yesterday - we managed to stick together in the most part. I didn't do a lot yesterday. I got up with a huge hangover from the night before, got some greasy food from the Vietnamese restaurant I've been frequenting, and went back to bed until about 5 in the afternoon. After that, there was a nice little jam session outside in the courtyard, at which point we started drinking again, then headed out to celebrate the birthday of Laurel, one of the guests at the hostel. We hung out at the busy Crescent St. for the whole night, and didn't get back home until about 3 or 4.

Consequently, I'm now too hungover to start celebrating Canada Day until much later. I need some more greasy food before doing anything productive. I'll probably get some tickets to see Infected Mushroom tonight, and check out some other stuff... but apart from that, there's not a lot planned until late in the day.

Oh, and no photos uploaded yet. Too lazy.

Don't let the bedbugs bite

It's amazing what difference a day can make. Today, I woke up and found that several people had been bitten by bedbugs. Couple with that the fact that I was told by a few other guests that they had been paying less than what I (and other online bookers) had been paying per night, and I'm beginning to think twice about my assessment of this hostel. Certainly, it's got great character, but the (seemingly) semi-regular outbreak of bedbugs and the high price seem to have tainted my original view.

The best thing to do when there's a bedbug infestation is to wash all clothing at high heat, which is a problem for two reasons. Firstly, there's only one set of washers and dryers. Secondly, I have a lot of shirts that would probably explode (exaggeration) under high heat due to their permanent press designs. I will end up washing my stuff, but one cannot exactly wash their entire luggage (including backpacks and such), so in the end I can only hope that my stuff has not been negatively affected by this recent development.

As it is quite clear, I'm not in an incredibly happy mood about either of these issues. My hope is that I can cancel at least part of my booking on the basis of one or both of these problems, and that Shelley, who is also booked in for this hostel for the weekend, can do the same.

Almost as a footnote, I did end up going in-line skating yesterday. Alas, the skates they gave me were too large, so it felt a bit weird. I didn't crash though, which was good. And damn, it was hot.

Heatwave

It's damn hot today. Perhaps not as hot as it was when I was in the desert, but hotter than the past couple of days, reaching above 30 degrees. It's meant to stay like that for the next couple of days. According to the weather report, the whole northeast is meant to be experiencing high heat and thunderstorms in the coming days.

Since I'm here in Montréal for two weeks, I've decided to take it easy today, mostly hanging out in the hostel, and possibly doing a bit of grocery shopping or something. The hostel is a pretty cool place. Possibly not the best accommodation I've ever seen, but it does have a lot going for it. First and foremost (and definitely the first thing you notice after you check in) is the character of the place. Your first impression is that of pure class. The place is literally a shed, and that's not a bad thing. The wooden structure, and within it the wooden bunk beds, immediately makes Le Sous-bois a hostel that stands out from the rest. The free Internet, laundry, breakfast, and coffee are only positive afterthoughts. Even the bathroom area sticks to the theme. You can't help but love the sinks, which are basically plant pots with drainage installed into them.

The only downfall the hostel may have is the apparent lack of privacy. The majority of beds are all in one huge common area, covered only by their own personal curtains. Even the 'private' rooms are little shacks (which are really quite cool) outside, in the shared patio. However, this just adds to the whole character aspect. If you don't mind a bit of a sacrifice in terms of your privacy, you'll soon find out that it is to create a relaxed, old-school vibe. I'd almost state that it's like the Big Brother house, but that would imply boisterousness and bad behaviour. Not so. In fact, the open-community-style atmosphere is anything but. It's generally quiet and friendly, and disturbances are fairly rare. In short, I quite like this place. Definitely not a bad place in which to spend a bit of down time.

Experiencing Old Town

I started off my first full day in Montréal doing not much at all. I woke up close to midday due to my lack of sleep the previous day. My first order of business was to figure out what exactly there was to do, particularly in my part of town. As I soon found out, Vieux-Montréal (Old Montréal) is a great place to see some old architecture (which I always enjoy seeing). I had a long walk around, mostly taking pictures (a few of which are here) and walking along the Old Port along the St. Lawrence River. Despite the sights, I got tired a bit too easily, and I soon retired back to the hostel for a bit of rest, and also a bit of reading. I wanted to finish reading Xenocide, book three of the Ender quartet, before I left the city, so that I could leave it behind at the hostel and decrease the weight of my somewhat cumbersome bag.

I perhaps succeeded a bit too quickly in that task. After taking some night shots (which I have not uploaded yet), I came back to the hostel and read another (very long) chapter of the book before heading to bed (bedtime ended up being about 1 in the morning). I finished the book this morning, after having breakfast and determining that it was far too hot to do any strenuous activities, especially in the middle of the day. A good book, I have to say, but it left me wanting more (i.e. I really want to buy the fourth book now). I'll try to hold off until Toronto so that my efforts to finish reading the book in Montréal would not prove to be counterproductive.

Incidentally, the weather is meant to cool down on Thursday, the day when the Jazz Festival begins. I'm hoping to get at least a bit of in-line skating done on the F1 circuit (Circuit Gilles Villeneuve) before heading over to check out the festival's... erm... festivities. I'm actually expecting to get a fair bit of in-line skating done while I'm here since, apart from the Jazz Festival, I don't think there's two week's worth of sights left for me to see, so enjoying the lifestyle seems to be the best plan.

Montréal

Well, I made it. I'm finally back in Canada. The train was stinky because of the restrooms, but I survived.

The East Village

I did end up buying that camera from J&R, a retail store near City Hall. I had a $10 discount coupon from my free map of the city, so the camera ended up being around $350 after tax, included a 2GB Sandisk Ultra II Memory Card, which I decided to get since it was on sale. It was likely a lot better than I would have gotten had I bought it from a camera salesman.

I immediately set out to waste the rest of the near-empty stock battery on a final stint of sightseeing in New York. My first stop was the West 4th Street Courts, colloquially known as "The Cage". This is one of New York City's most well-known locations for the clichéd street basketball games you see on TV and in the movies.

After watching the game for a short period, I headed over to the East Village. This is the real New York. Forget the busy tourist meccas of Times Square and Broadway, the East Village is one of the places to be to experience the true Manhattan lifestyle. The buildings are old and yet retain their character from years past as trees sprawl all along the sidewalks. A plethora of small cafes pack with people sitting outside, enjoying the sun instead of the city lights. People in general seem a lot more laid back in this part of town. It was a great vibe that I wish I had discovered earlier in my stay.

One of the main stops I aimed to find in the East Village was "Physical Graffiti Corner". This was the name given for a small section of St. Mark's Place where the cover for Led Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti was shot. It was also supposedly where Jagger was hanging out in the music video for a Rolling Stones song. I really would have loved to have stayed longer, but I didn't want to stay out taking photos for too long, as the battery was still new, and I needed to sleep early for my train anyway. Thus, I made my way back to the hostel, had a bit of dinner at the corner pub and enjoyed a beer for the last time in New York, then went to sleep.

To the 5 boroughs

I technically did visit all five boroughs of New York City. The first borough I saw was Queens, when I landed in La Guardia airport on Tuesday, followed shortly by Manhattan, where I spent most of my time. I was on Staten Island for a couple of minutes when I caught the free ferry there and back for the view of the Statue of Liberty. I went to Coney Island on Thursday, which is in Brooklyn. Today, as I left Manhattan, the Amtrak train I was taking to Montréal traveled north, passing through The Bronx, completing my makeshift tour of the five boroughs.

Naturally, the Amtrak train was delayed. I was quite confused as to where to go for the train, and was directed to the ticket office by the person baggage check-in desk, who also informed me that there would be no checked baggage for the train. After lining up for about 10 minutes at the ticket office, they informed me that I didn't need to be there, and that there was a separate area for people already ticketed. They looked at me like I was an idiot, so they obviously didn't know how it worked in other places where you need to first show your ticket to get a boarding pass before heading to the waiting area. But anyway, I went to the right area (finally), and got my ticket stamped with a stamp saying "Canada" and waited patiently for the train, which ended up arriving about 15 minutes late. I got on the train, chucked my luggage in the luggage area, and sat down, knowing that by the end of the day I will be in Canada.

Despite the difficult time I had dealing with rogue traders, I did love my short week in New York. Things I regrettably missed out on were Flushing Meadows (home of the US Tennis Open) Yankee Stadium, the 59th Street Bridge, the UN Building (which would have been cool since it is technically on international territory), the Empire State Building... oh, and I guess a few hundred more stuff. However, that just gives me more reason to come back to this great city, and when I do, I will claim my "I (Heart) NY" shirt because I do love the place (side note: the only reason I didn't buy that $3 t-shirt was because I was lacking space in my bulging backpack).

New York City overview

Days spent: 5
Population: 18.5 million
Ripoff merchants: Unlimited
Theme song/s: Simon and Garfunkel - The 59th Street Bridge Song

Mock postcard: New York City

Pictures from New York and Chicago

Le Sous-bois

The train trip wasn't anything of note, except for the stinky toilets. For some reason they wouldn't flush, and so the smell carried on into the cabin. I ended up spending most of my time couped up in the snack car where the smell didn't reach.

When the train finally arrived in Montréal, I was far too brain dead to attempt to speak my limited French to the people, so thankfully all reports were correct in saying that most people spoke English here. I caught a short cab ride to my hostel, Le Sous-bois, an odd little place (I'll try to elaborate on that in my next post), then grabbed something to eat.

I didn't realize that today was St-Jean-Baptiste Day, a national holiday for Quebecois. Consequently, all shops were closed, barring some food joints (not that I got here early enough to shop anyway). Apparently it's gonna be a big party tonight. I'm considering going out despite my near vegetative state.

The runaround

Ok, I admit to it... I fell for a cheap sales tactic.

Tip for travelers: When a camera salesman tells you he can get in a certain camera if you come back in so and so, don't bother coming back. They won't have the camera you're looking for, and they'll just try to rip you off some other way.

My guess is that they won't bother going below certain prices for the camera I want because it's in such high demand. Needless to say, I'm still without camera at the moment. I've found a retail chain that is selling it for $300, and I'm on the verge of just buying that for the sole reason that retail chains are more respectable than these rogue traders.

In any case, that's not the only thing that's been happening lately.

Midnight in Chelsea

...and Liza'a shuttle bus hadn't arrived to pick her up to go to the airport yet. She had booked it on Wednesday afternoon as the hostel said to book it at least 24 hours in advance. It was meant to arrive between 11 and 11:15 at night, but we waited until midnight (since her flight wasn't until 7 anyway) before calling up the service. Apparently they canceled her pick up without notifying her, which was rather inconvenient. Lucky she decided to get there really early.

We ended up having to catch the subway to the AirTrain connection for JFK International. I escorted her as far as the connection, since I had a 7-day unlimited ride pass, and she needed help carrying her bags around. Otherwise, it was actually quite safe to travel alone in the subway late at night. There's always other people doing the same thing (especially to the airport), so there's really nothing to worry about.

The train took about a two and a half hour round trip, meaning I got back home at around 2:30 in the morning. I crashed in my bed as soon as I got home.

At the drive-in

Apart from being annoyed by camera salesmen, I also partook in viewing a film at an outdoor film festival, the Tribeca Film Festival Drive-In series. It wasn't actually a drive in, because that would just be silly in the middle of Manhattan, but there were Dodge cars lined up in the middle of the aisles for VIP guests (Dodge being one of the sponsors). It was a nice outdoor set-up right in front of the Rockefeller Center, and the sound was very clear. Unfortunately, the brightness was a bit low on the projection, but I guess the city lights didn't really help.

The movie itself, Netherbeast Incorporated, was mildly enjoyable. The idea behind the story was clever, but the movie itself wasn't very well executed. It probably could have done with about 30 minutes to an hour more to set up the premise a little better. Still, it was a good experience overall, and I didn't feel ripped off because it was completely free.

Back on course

After a (really long) detour into the United States, I'm finally ready to head back into Canada tomorrow morning. My train for Montréal leaves early, so the rest of today will most likely consist of packing and resting, with the option of camera buying.

As for photos, you can imagine there's not a lot of new ones. I haven't uploaded any yet, but I did PhotoShop a mock postcard of Grant Park in Chicago. It's nothing special, I just wanted to try out a new style. It can be found here. I used two photos of the same thing from slightly different angles, and used one of the photos for each box (not necessarily alternating). I saw the style used in a photography exhibit inside the New York Public Library, and just had to copy it.

Coney Island

Still no luck with the camera. I went back to that store that had the sale, but they were sold out of the TZ3. The guy there said that after the discount, it would work out to be around $200, which is a really good price. He said to come and see him again on Saturday and he'd see if he can get one in from elsewhere. I'm hoping he'll be able to.

Since I didn't end up buying anything (and thus had nothing to carry around), we headed straight to Coney Island. Coney Island is home of the Cyclone, an old 1927 roller coaster that has the honour of being the most copied roller coaster in the world. It was quite a ride, with the drops being at steep angles, making the otherwise tame looking coaster a blast to ride on. It was definitely worth the $6 admission to go on an old rickety roller coaster that had some punch.

Another thing that had to be done at Coney Island was to get a hot dog from the original Nathan's Famous. I hadn't tried Nathan's Famous before, as I'm not really a fan of hot dogs, and being a big company, I was doubtful of its quality. After the first bite, all that was behind me. The hot dog (with the optional sauteed onions) tasted great, and their crinkle cut chips weren't too shabby either.

Overall it was a very satisfying (albeit short) day at Coney Island, an area with an old school oceanside amusement park feel to it. Definitely worth the visit if you're in the area and you have a bit of spare time.

Random Toys"R"Us queue... of doom!

When we walked past the Toys"R"Us in Times Square this morning, there were people queuing up outside the store, waiting for it to open. There was no new toy or game device that was coming out today, so I found this phenomenon particularly odd. Apparently this happens every day. I guess it's just another one of those crazy things that Times Square brings out in people. It's kinda like those lights that dazed me last night - I think the effect carried onto today, because I was getting very lost in terms of navigation, which is something I'm usually good at. Thankfully, Liza was there to set me straight. By the end of the day, the positions were reversed, and Liza started getting lost.

The day began with a storm, which in turn had began the night before. We got up early to try to get cheap tickets to a Broadway show and were greeted by light precipitation, and a excessively long line for the ticket office at Times Square, which had not yet opened (this happened at around about the time we saw that pointless queue for Toys"R"Us). We decided that we got there too late, and waiting in line would waste our time, so instead we went to hunt for a reasonably priced digital camera to replace my now defunct Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-T3.

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ3 was what I had set out to find. It had appealed to me for two reasons - Panasonic's image stabilization system, since I have shaky hands, and the 10x optical zoom, which is pretty amazing for a compact digital camera. The first shop we went to didn't have any, and the second one didn't let us test out the camera (which I wanted to do to see if it was any good). Before searching for any more stores, we decided we'd check out the Statue of Liberty.

We didn't actually go to the statue. Instead of paying to go there, we were cheap and just caught the free ferry to Staten Island, which gave a pretty clear and close (enough) view of the copper lady also known as Liberty Enlightening the World. It was still cloudy when we caught the ferry, but the statue could still be seen clearly. We didn't spend any time on Staten Island, immediately making our way back to the return ferry once we got off the first one.

Our next stop was Ground Zero, the former site of the World Trade Center buildings. I won't lie... my eyes were welling up with tears as I walked along the edges of the site. I barely contained them, and probably would have cried if I had read any of the memorials. It was a pretty long time ago but I still remember that night (in Australia) when it happened, and I was in utter disbelief of what was going on in that emergency news telecast.

After leaving Ground Zero, we headed to City Hall for some views of the Brooklyn Bridge, then headed back uptown to Grand Central Terminal, which was pretty cool, and had a statue of Jay Garrick, the original Flash. Ok, so it wasn't the Flash, it was the Roman God, Mercury... but to be fair, the original Flash's look was based on Mercury. Speaking of comics, we also ventured into Midtown Comics, where I finally found a copy of the black and white edition of Wolverine #32. I had some sushi at Grand Central Terminal before we headed back to the hotel/hostel for a rest break.

When we recommenced our search for the camera, we finally found a shop which let us play around with the camera in question. Unfortunately, the price they were asking for was still quite high, so we moved on. We found a shop that we had missed at Times Square, but that was no better. In fact, it was much worse. The TZ3 retails at around $350... this shop was asking for $500! It was obvious that the shop was there to sucker the tourists into buying gear that was clearly overpriced to the well-educated. Once I said that the price they had the camera at was $150 above retail price, they put it away, probably knowing that they won't be able to trick somebody who knows at least a small bit about cameras.

At this point, we were about to head back to the hostel via subway, but for some reason Liza's metro day pass wasn't scanning properly, and there was no station agent around, so we decided to walk a few blocks, maybe check out another camera store (if we found one) and then catch the closest subway station to that. As luck would have it, there was another store that we had missed (due to construction blocking our view earlier in the day). In fact, it was a store that Liza's mum had recommended. The store was just about to close, but the man in the store told us to come back tomorrow as they were having a sale. Normally I would feel dubious about claims such as that, but the store did have cheap prices in the display window, so I'll give them a chance.

The plan was to head home, eat something, then head back out to watch some baseball at a pub, but Liza's been too mesmerized by her new DS Lite and several games, so it's looking like we'll be staying in for the rest of the night.

New York City

The Big Apple is a lot like every other typical city, and yet unlike any other city in the world. You get all the things you expect in cities - bad traffic, crowds, and city lights - but in a much grander scale. The roads seem to run on the chaos principle, the amount of people wandering the streets is incredible, and the lights daze you more than any other city, with huge neon signs. I'm sure other cities in the world would have these things too, but perhaps not all these things at once at such an extreme. It's what makes New York unique.

We got into town at about 10:30 after catching an airport shuttle from La Guardia airport. On that shuttle ride we got to experience first-hand the chaotic nature of the roads. It was like the crazy traffic around the Arc de Triomphe in Paris - seemingly no road rules, and yet amazingly no accidents. When we got to our hotel (which is really a hostel), we waited a while before being able to check in due to the phones ringing off the hook with people trying to find a place to stay... apparently it was a good thing that we booked in advance.

After sorting out our things inside our room, we headed out in search of some of the many sights of New York City. The first stop was Strawberry Fields at Central Park, where there stood a small memorial to John Lennon, near the place street crossing where he was shot. The subway going to and from Central Park was quite packed, emphasizing the crowdedness of the whole city. Apparently the city holds about 18 million people - almost as much as the population of Australia!

Rockefeller Center was next, where we had a quick stopover at Nintendo World (had to be done) before heading up to the top for some views of the city. It was nice, and a lot more worth it than the Sears Tower disappointment in Chicago. Alas, my camera was getting to the point of no return in terms of operation. When we were done there, we checked out some shops, then crashed back at the hotel for a quick nap before heading out at night.

Times Square was an awesome sight. You've seen it on TV and in the movies, but it's something you really have to experience for yourself. You notice the lights even at daytime, but when it's night time, and you stand in the middle of that square, you know you're in New York. The lights dazed me momentarily, and I was in another state of mind (I would say 'New York state of mind' but that would just be too cheesy, so I won't).

We ate at a nice Forrest Gump-themed restaurant then had a look around various shops at this famous (insert any colour here) light district - something that many of the people that night had done. You just don't stop being amazed by the sheer volume of bodies walking around at all times of the day. One particular place we took note of was the ticket office where they sold cheap tickets to Broadway shows, which is on the cards for tomorrow night.

Chicago

Sitting at the airport McDonald's right now, waiting for our flight to start boarding, which is about an hour away. The AA desk here didn't seem nearly as complicated as the United one in San Francisco. Today, we're headed to New York City.

Please form ten lines in any direction you please

We got to the airport in the morning and split up to our individual flights - mine being United, and Liza's being American Airlines. Liza seemed to get through really quickly, while United seemed to have a confusion set of mazes to get through to get your bag checked in. Apparently my ticket was a paper ticket (despite it having an e-ticket number on the actual ticket), so I needed to go see an agent, of which there was about 3 servicing 10 lines. When I got to the front of the queue, I waited about 10 minutes only to be told that my ticket was a paper ticket I needed to be in another queue. Thankfully, the agent took care of it anyway. I couldn't have been the only one feeling that the system was a bit disorganized, because even the people who had tickets were getting a bit annoyed.

Having gotten through the first set of obstacles set by United, I checked my bag and proceeded through the security check. When I got to my gate, I found another set of fun and exciting challenges, United style. It wasn't so much a challenge for me as it was a challenge that they seemed to set for themselves, as they still had to assign seats to confirmed passengers. Why this couldn't have been done prior to boarding, I do not know. The flight was actually overbooked, and they were offering confirmed passengers a later flight plus a return ticket on any United flight anywhere in the United States just to free up room. I considered the offer, but without conferring with Liza and the people we were staying with in Chicago, I decided to just sit there and wait for them to call my name out and give me a boarding pass.

The flight itself was fine. I watched a movie and caught a bit of a nap before landing at O'Hare airport, reputed as the world's busiest airport. It wasn't really made to seem that way when I arrived, since the airport was really well laid out, and seemed to operate quite efficiently. In any case, I got to my baggage carousel and met with my aunt Jean and uncle Ernie. We then went to the AA terminal to meet up with Liza before heading back to their place in a northern suburb of Chicago.

The not-too-windy-but-quite-hot city

Our first day in the windy city was a mixture of expensive disappointment and cheap thrills. The Holography Museum was our first stop. The museum was pretty interesting, but the five dollar cover was a bit steep for such a small display. The Sears Tower was our next stop. I'll have to warn future travelers that this tall office building would only be worth the $12.95 to get to the observation deck if the weather is very clear (and I mean unlimited visibility), and if you plan to stay until night time, when I imagine you would be able to get some really nice night shots of the city. We got up to the deck after a short introductory movie to find haze as far as the eye can see. It was perhaps one the biggest ripoffs of the entire trip so far, but I guess we only have ourselves to blame for not considering the conditions (not that it looked too bad from down below).

We got out of the building soon after entering and looked for some excitement. We found it in Millennium Park. After a quick look of Buckingham Fountain, we headed to the north end of the long stretch of parks to find the highlight of the day - a giant reflective kidney bean. Oh, sure, it doesn't sound all that interesting, but trust me, it was damn good, especially after the huge disappointment of the Sears Tower. The shape of the artwork (a giant kidney bean, which gave its nickname) and the reflective surface made it a fun house of mirrors in one big structure. It was really cool. This proved to be our last stop of the day, and we soon headed back home.

Our second (and last) day in Chicago was a lot better than the first. We went to the Lincoln Park Zoo, which was free, the conservatory, which was free, checked out the shopping district, which was free (except for the Levi's jeans I bought, which were half off - a lot cheaper than I was expecting to pay for a substitute for my ragged old jeans), checked out a skate shop, which was free, and got to see a crazy man, which was free. The story with the crazy guy was that we were sitting on the train, heading back to the house, and there was this random dude in the train car just laughing his ass off at nothing, speaking to random people and himself, and making absolutely no sense at all. A big dude walked into the car at one of the stations, and the crazy guy just started talking to him, as if he knew him. It was pretty entertaining. The only bad thing that came out of the day was that we missed the night's episode of Hell's Kitchen due to the show being shown an hour earlier in Central Time regions. We went to sleep relatively early to catch our early flight (6am) to New York City.

Farewell to the city by the bay

I always love it when I go to San Francisco. It's a great city, and the fact that I have lots of relatives here often makes it relatively cheap to visit. Tomorrow we leave for Chicago and further adventures.

The amazing expanding backpack

It's not a pleasant surprise when you are packing your backpack and all of a sudden its a lot fatter than you remember it being. I know I bought shirts, new shoes, and some books during my stay here, but I didn't expect it to make my backpack so heavy. I suspect that I may have to jettison a book or two and some unnecessary accessories before long.

It was a good thing that we returned our scooters today, as they would have added way more weight and space than our bags could have handled. The main reason we returned them was that while I was scootering around one day, some screw-on pieces fell off. I don't think it was too dangerous riding without those pieces, but the fact that it happened gave us a good reason to get our money back for them. Liza had also bought a skateboard yesterday, and had some problems trying to figure out how to fit it in her somewhat heavy bag. I suggested using it as a wheel-frame for her duffel bag, killing two birds with one stone.

After an hour or two of packing, it is finally safe to go to sleep and look forward to tomorrow's trip.

San Francisco Bay Area overview

Dates of residence: May 04, 2007 - Jun 16, 2007
Weather: Windy and foggy
Episodes of 'Lost' viewed: 32
Theme song/s: Arcade Fire - Cold Wind

Images from the west

Photos from San Francisco can be found here, and the photos from the road trip can be found here.

My camera's started to stuff up in the middle of the trip, so I haven't really taken a whole lot of photos, and the amount of photos in the coming months will probably be the same or less. However, Liza has a digital SLR and took loads of photos, so I'll try to poach them off her before she heads back to the UK and post them up.

Road trip USA: Conclusion

And we're back.

Last legs
(Bears gone wild)

Viva Las Vegas. I've been to Sin City before, but while I was underage. That's not to say that I even gambled this time, but it was still fun to go around the casinos. I actually wanted to play some poker, but the buy-ins seemed too high. That, or I just wasn't looking hard enough. There were also poker games where you played against the house, which were blatant ripoffs that should be well avoided.

The World Series of Poker was going on at the time, but I didn't bother going because the two-block walk to the Rio in the excruciatingly humid Nevada desert heat was just too much, especially since it wasn't the main event yet. Instead, we spent most of our time indoors, checking out casinos and shops, staying where the air was artificially cooled. We had a great lunch at the Harley Davidson restaurant, where Harleys both new and old were displayed on platforms mechanically dragged around through the ceiling of the shop and around the walls. It was quite cool.

I had a cheap prime rib for dinner at Circus Circus, where we were staying, and Liza managed to earn a cool $1.95 afterwards from the slot machines after careful strategies involving one dollar notes. She had $3.60 at one point but got too greedy. After Liza's gamblathon, we were both pretty tired from the day's travels (mainly the walking), so we finally called it a day and crashed in our hotel room.

The next day started later than planned, and the entire day turned out to be a mission. Still tired from the day before, we checked out of Circus Circus at around 8:30 and began to make our way for Sequoia National Park. The journey was marred by various stops (mainly for gas or food), and it took just over 7 hours to reach the national park. The roadwork within the park didn't make moving any quicker, so we slowly made our way to the first major attraction, the General Sherman Tree, the largest living tree in the world (in terms of trunk volume).

We had a side-quest of trying to spot either a bear or a cougar within the park, and had no such luck for the first couple of hours. At about 6 hunger had struck us hard, and we were forced to stop at the first place that served food, Wuksachi Lodge. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise for two reasons. First of all, the food was magnificent. I had the Trout Paccata, and it was worth every penny (though it literally cost me all that I had left in my wallet). Second, because of the delay in travel, we managed to be in the right place at the right time when Liza spotted bears above a stretch of straight road.

I quickly pulled over, slowly reversed a little, and there they were... bears... in what seemed to be some sort of mating ritual (so to speak). It was quite funny. The first time we ever see a bear in the wild and they're going at it right in the open. We couldn't stop laughing about it until we reached King's Canyon National Park (Sequoia National Park's twin park) where Liza promptly told the clerks at the Grant Grove Lodge about the bears. The clerks also found it highly amusing.

Now knowing that bears were around, we were kind of half-scared that a bear would come and destroy our car in search for food if we were to camp in the campgrounds or something like that. We also didn't have exact change for the campground self-registration, so we decided to move on towards Yosemite and hopefully pull over at a highway rest stop to catch some sleep. Unfortunately the highway wasn't a very big one, and didn't have any places to rest like a huge interstate would have, so we ended up at a motel in Fresno, which was en route to Yosemite. We figured that although we were paying a bit more than what we would have for camping, we would still have the benefit of being much closer to Yosemite the next day.

Today was the final day of the trip. It was actually supposed to be the second-last day, but we decided to drive back a day earlier to save on a night's accommodation. This also gave us more time to get our stuff out of the car and give it a bit of a clean before handing it back to the rental company. The day started off like most others on this road trip - with a drive to the next location. The final stop before heading back happened to be Yosemite National Park on a particularly warm day.

I guess it's not really unseasonal for it to be hot during the summer, but I class any day over 30 degrees Celsius to be uncomfortable. Today it peaked at 36, and I sure felt it, especially with my last clean shirt being black in colour. Still, I persevered and enjoyed the sights the park had to give me. It was a beautiful forest in a valley overlooked by massive granite monoliths, the most outstanding of which were El Capitan, the largest granite monolith in the world, and the Half Dome, which is a huge piece of rock that looks much like its name suggests.

Bridalveil Falls and Yosemite Falls were also nice, but the lack of water took away from their attractiveness. It was a similar story for Mirror Lake. It would have been nice to make the short trek over to the small lake, but we figured that it wouldn't really have too much water due to the drought that the area had been having this year, and the heat didn't really encourage a 2-mile round trip. We only spent a few hours looking around, and decided to try to make it back to the bay area by sundown.

The last hour or so of the drive provided much excitement. The on-board computer signaled that we had low fuel coming into the city, and we were trying to guesstimate how much we would need to put into the tank to make it back to the house, then back to the rental car company tomorrow. It felt really close in the end because the computer had changed its mileage range prediction from a number to simply saying "low", which could have meant anything from 40 miles or below. We did happen to make it back to the house, but refilled a dollar's worth of gas at the nearby station just to make sure it didn't run out on the way to the airport.

It feels good to be back in familiar territory. Being on the road for a long time was fun, but it sure had its limitations. Many a time did we run out of battery for iPods and thus ran out of music for the long drives. Many a time did we go without showers or flushing toilets for hours, even days. Many a time did we run into random logs on the road. Ok, maybe that was only once, but yeah. It was definitely an enriching experience, and has added a lot to my general knowledge base, not to mention some great memories. The one highlight for me that really stands out was seeing Bryce Canyon for the first time. When I saw the Grand Canyon as we drove into the park, my reaction was, "wow, that's cool." For Bryce Canyon I almost had to do a double-take. It was just so incredible. The stampede at Space Mountain and the bear sighting were also great.

Road trip USA overview

Days on the road: 12
National parks visited: 6
Car breakdowns: 1
Theme song/s: U2 - Where the Streets Have No Name, Steppenwolf - Born to Be Wild

Well, I guess that's it for now. We're headed to the east coast on Saturday (by plane this time), with Chicago being our first stop. Updates shall come as often as my laziness and net connection decides.

Oh, and a big congratulations to the Anaheim Ducks for being the first western conference team to win the Stanley Cup. They played well throughout the entire season, including the playoffs, and beat a very good opponent in the Ottawa Senators (whom I was backing by default since they were the last Canadian team left) and thoroughly deserved to win this year.

Road trip USA: Part 3

Ok, it seems that I posted parts 1 and 2 three times, which is a bit odd. I think I pressed back instead of editing or something. Oh well, it's fixed now. The trip's almost done, but before the stunning conclusion in part 4, you'll need to read...

Desert detour
(Where the streets have no name)

Driving to Joshua Tree National Park took us away from the coast and into the desert regions of the California, erm, desert. We drove through the Coachella Valley, where I had spent a few days about a month ago, to arrive at the national park's southern entrance. Unfortunately, the ranger station had already closed. We got in without paying the parks fee, but we also had no idea what to do at the park apart from what our Lonely Planet guides told us. We soldiered on, however, and stopped at places that looked interesting, including a rather treacherous bit of road (due to road work) to a vista point that overlooked the Coachella Valley.

At that point, the sun was beginning to set, so we decided it was probably a good idea to head to our campsite and set up camp before it got too dark. When we got there, the campsite registration office had also been closed, leaving us rather confused on the procedure for pre-booked campsites. We headed over to the area where we were meant to camp and found it completely desolate. There were barely any facilities, which was to be expected, and there were also no other campers there. This made the landscape under the setting sun behind clouds look very alien, which was neat, but it also made things rather spooky. We were afraid we'd get eaten by coyotes or something. The registration office was closed when we left early in the morning, so we left Joshua Tree National Park as clueless as we were when we entered.

The next leg of the trip was the Grand Canyon, which we were hoping would have more people and give us more information upon entry. The drive to Arizona's most famous national park was quite uneventful with the exception of the car trouble that left us stranded for 4 hours. Almost right after we passed the California-Arizona border crossing the Colorado River, we hit an unavoidable (and quite random) piece of wood on the road, completely messing up a wheel, a tire, and our plans.

We called the insurance company that we took out the car insurance with and they said the earliest they could get a replacement car to us was four hours, since they would have to send it out from Las Vegas. Fortunately, a kind tow-truck driver named Carl saw us pulling over to the side of the road, and towed us to the nearest city, Lake Havasu City, where we would then sit and wait for our new car. We spent our four or so hours there buying more stuff for our trip (mainly really cheap air mattresses - floating swimming pool beds for $1.50) and rethinking the next few days of our trip.

By the time the new car arrived, we had decided to spend an extra night at the Grand Canyon so we would have more time to take in the sights, thus scrapping our venture to a couple of eastern Utah national parks.

The Grand Canyon itself was huge. To our relief, we saw that the campgrounds there were much more populated, meaning no more coyote scares. It immediately showed that this national park was much more popular and thus more organized than Joshua Tree. We didn't get to do much the first night, but we did visit a fair few viewpoints on the second day, and on the day we left.

The consensus we reached was that we would go on to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon for the Friday night instead of going all the way to Moab to see Arches National Park, saving us a lot of time and gas money. We set up camp at around midday at Jacob's Lake, which was really just a tiny little pond in somebody's yard. In contrast to this anticlimax, the highly recommended cookies at the Jacob's Lake Inn were very good.

The North Rim of the canyon was better than the south rim for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the higher elevation meant cooler temperatures, allowing for lush vegetation in and around that region of the park. Secondly, since the northern part of the national park was less accessible from the south (about four or five hours drive from the South Rim), there were generally less visitors, which is always a good thing (except in the case of completely empty campgrounds).

We drove around, again seeing the view of the Grand Canyon from several points, then headed back to our campsite, where we had more cookies from the inn. Bryce Canyon was the next stop, this time being a very forgiving two and a half hour trip across the Arizona-Utah border.

Breathtaking is the perfect word to describe Bryce Canyon. The Grand Canyon may have been amazing in its scope, but Bryce Canyon's beauty was incomparable. The red rocks that got their colour from iron oxide blended with the white/gray sandstone in just the right way to make the rock formations in the Bryce Canyon Amphitheater truly a sight to behold. I wish I could have been here for longer to venture into the bottom of the canyon and see the rocks from there, or been here for the winter when, I would imagine, the cross-country skiing views would be unlike any other place on earth.

The last few nights of sleep had been in very cold conditions, I suppose due to the high altitude. Temperatures reached below freezing on some nights, and I found it hard to sleep with my nose and ears stinging from the cold. In stark contrast, it was very hot when we reached Zion National Park. We were pleased to learn that the overnight temperatures don't often reach under 60 degrees Fahrenheit (around 15 Celsius). The park itself was also different to the two previous ones in that it was situated within the canyon instead of above it like Grand Canyon and Bryce Canyon were (well, you could go into the canyon in those parks, but they involved rather hefty multi-day hikes). Zion would be our final desert national park stop before heading to Las Vegas.

Road trip USA: Parts 1 & 2

Okay, I'm in the middle of that road trip right now, stealing wireless from some random campsite. I've been blogging every now and then about our adventures, and I'll be posting them in parts. This first one is called...

San Fran frenzy
(Scooter quest)

The road trip really began a few days before we got the car. Liza flew in on Memorial Day Monday, and after an early night, we commenced being tourists when we hit downtown San Francisco, doing a tour of the city's sights. We did the outer landmarks, including the Embarcadero, Fisherman's Wharf, Alcatraz, the Palace of Fine Arts, and the Golden Gate Bridge.

Liza also got persuaded into buying some lenses for her camera since they were being sold for a really low price at Fisherman's Wharf (in some cases more than half off of what she would have paid in England). Unfortunately, the weather was quite cloudy when we went, which is rather typical of San Francisco, so the photos that were taken weren't incredible. After a short photo shoot at the bridge, we decided to head home. We ended up taking a bus that ran for about an hour before it reached the train station, and by the time we got home, it was about 9 at night.

The next day was a bit of a mission to find some mini scooters. We hadn't originally planned to get them, but as we were walking to the bus stop in the morning, we saw a kid riding along on one, and agreed that it would save us a lot of walking, as well as provide a lot of entertainment. We reached the city a couple of hours before noon, and had a bit of a feed after checking out Union Square. The shopping mall where we ate (a Westfield, oddly enough) did not seem to have any of the scooters and, according to one of the clerks in the Volcom shop, there weren't any places nearby that sold them. Fortunately, she gave us an address of a shop that she thought might sell them, and it close to where we were headed, so we soon set off.

The next stop was Chinatown. Hiking was not something that we were very happy to do, as we were both tired from the previous day, but we braved the hills to reach our goal - the fortune cookie factory. It was just a little hole-in-the-wall in a small alley, and at first we couldn't really locate it, but a nice old man called us over and ushered us in, giving us a free hot sample to eat and urging us to buy a bag. I'm not really a big fortune cookie fan, but Liza loves them, so she bought a huge packet of them. The store that supposedly sold the scooters was nowhere to be found and, the two of us not wanting to climb any more hills, decided to finally head downhill towards downtown again.

We stopped off for a smoothie at Carl's Jr. then headed off back to the Golden Gate Bridge in the hopes of getting shots in better weather. However, that was not so easy. After looking for the proper bus stop for 10 minutes, we waited about another hour for a bus that never came. We decided that catching a different route would be the best idea, but that didn't quite work out as planned either. The next bus ended up getting delayed 10-20 minutes, and when we finally got to the bridge, we find out that the weather had not greatly improved over the past day. We took a few more photos both off and on the bridge, and finally headed home, a lot earlier than the day before, with no scooters in hand.

A ray of hope finally shone upon us when my aunt informed me that the nearby Target possibly stocked the elusive devices. Like little children on Christmas morning, the two of us got impossibly excited, topped only by our childish giggling when we finally bought the things that we had struggled to find all day. At last, success!

We didn't do much at all the following day. A bit of scootering around was about the extent of the excitement for that day, which mostly involved watching some TV and getting food.

We finally picked up the car on the first of June, the Friday, and we promptly loaded it up with food and water supplies as well as some of our bags. Liza got the hang of driving on the wrong side of the road pretty quickly, and we once again watched TV for the rest of the day. That was, of course, until I went to watch Arcade Fire at Berkeley.

It was a rather stressful drive over to the UC Berkeley Greek Theatre. I was driving alone as Liza didn't really know who Arcade Fire were, and couldn't afford buying a ticket to the show anyway. It was all well and good until the start of the Oakland Bay Bridge, which had the most horrible merge ever imaginable. Combine that with a car with really bad blind spots, and it was a recipe for a bad drive. Still, I did make it to the gig fine, after about an hour of driving and 10 minutes of looking for somewhere to park. It was a really great set at a nice outdoor venue. I got home just past midnight to fall asleep for about four hours.

Part 2

Bad weather
(A cruise down the California coast)

The road trip proper began at around 6am on Saturday morning. Liza took the first shift of the driving, which ended up being a marathon 10-hour shift (stops included) as she didn't really feel like switching around. The trip itself wasn't too remarkable. We only did a few stops at some scenic points or points of interest, and stops for food and fuel. Fuel was quite ridiculously priced on the road, even more so than in San Francisco. We filled only as much as we needed at expensive stops, and as much as we could at the cheaper ones.

At the end of the scenic stretch of beaches in the south part of highway 1, we finally reached Santa Monica, quite earlier than we had actually expected. Despite Liza being stressed out by the city driving, and thus getting me to find parking once we reached the city, we still had enough time to check out the beach at Santa Monica. I went for a bit of a swim, which was quite pleasant. We went to bed kind of early to try to get up early for the next day of tourism.

The agenda for Tuesday was going to Hollywood in the morning, and then back to the beach in the afternoon, and to some extend that did go to plan. We made it to Hollywood at about 9:30 after a good hour of public transport. The main attractions were Grauman's Chinese Theatre, the walk of fame, and the Hollywood sign, which was barely visible through the LA smog. I gotta say that while the charm of Santa Monica has changed my view of LA, I still think that most areas are quite unlivable.

When we got back to Santa Monica in the afternoon, it was still rather cloudy, so instead of going back to have a swim at the beach, we instead decided to check out the Santa Monica pier, home of a carnival type atmosphere, and have a scooter around Venice Beach. It was an experience that was both relaxing and tiring at the same time. Due to this, we soon went to bed after having an early dinner.

Disneyland was the next stop. The cloud soon subsided once we reached the park and the heat wasn't very welcoming. We tried to stay in the shade as much as possible, sometimes even going on a long indoor queue for a ride just to avoid the sun. The theme of the day was breakdown. For some odd reason, 3 of the rides that we wanted to go on were at one point temporarily out of order. Space Mountain was the most notable because of the fact that we were walking around for about 3 hours doing random stuff while we waited for it to be reopened, which was a bit annoying, because Space Mountain is probably the best ride Disneyland has to offer. Rumour has it that somebody had gotten stuck on it. When it did manage to reopen, there was a stampede after somebody shouted "Space Mountain is open!" and the queue was cascading within minutes of operations commencing. We were lucky to have a 'FastPass' that got us to the front of the queue right away, which was handy.

We soon left as the sun started to go down, and went back to our hotel room across the street. It was very conveniently located, but rather expensive. After short tourist moments at Laguna Beach, which was plagued once again by the bad weather (it had actually started to rain when we got there) and San Diego the day after, we were headed into the desert, where the bulk of our journey would take place.

Random notes about stuff

Golf: Had my first ever swing at a golf ball today. 60 balls in fact. Had like 3 or 4 good hits, that was about it. Used a 7 iron. I'm a bit sore from it.

Awesome: I'm staying at The Canadian in Vancouver for a week in September. Looks frickin' spectacular.

Canada: Plans for my return to Canada are solidifying. Huzzah!

Public transport: In San Francisco seems excessively pricey.


That is all.

Road trip update

I guess I should do a quick update on what I've been doing in the past week... not a whole lot! The most exciting thing that's happened has been experiencing the tail end of the ING Bay to Breakers, a race similar to the Sydney City to Surf marathon, in that it's a race from the San Francisco bay to the beach at the end of Golden Gate Park via the streets of San Francisco, and involving some pretty damn wacky costumes.

On the most part, though, I've been planning the finer details of my upcoming road trip around the southwestern states of the USA. Since my previous post, the direction for the trip has been reversed to save a bit of money (cheaper accommodation at certain places on weekdays) and some stops (Yellowstone National Park being the main one) have been removed to make room for other stops that are not too out of the way. Most things (hotel/hostel accommodation, camping reservations, and car rental) have been booked with some things, such as first-come first-serve camping, being left to chance, just to make things a little more interesting.

The Internet connection where I am currently staying is a bit iffy at the moment, so don't be surprised if you don't hear from me until mid-June, because the road trip starts in about a week and a half, and I don't know how often I'll be able to update, if at all, in that period of time.

San Francisco

Well, I've finally gotten around to uploading some photos, which can be seen here. Still no videos though (sorry)... I haven't really gotten a chance to convert any videos to any decent quality due to lack of hard drive space, but I'll see what I can do before the end of the month. In the meantime, enjoy the photos, and this short summary of what's been going on in the past couple of weeks.

Escape from LA

Los Angeles was pretty uneventful. The most I really did there was check out the public transport system and buy a book. I wasn't too interested in doing a lot of things in LA due to the pollution. Even on a sunny day, it still seems overcast due to the smog. I'm probably a bit biased due to the fact that I've gotten sick every time I've been to LA in the past (presumably because of the pollution) but I just was not motivated at all. I'll probably go back there to visit Santa Monica though (which I'll touch upon later in this post).

After the farcical experiences of the Amtrak delay and the Greyhound queue, I decided it would probably be best to pay a little extra and just fly to San Francisco. Getting to the airport was convenient enough. There was a nearby station that ran an airport shuttle for $3 one-way, which was quite a bargain. Peak-hour traffic meant that it took a little more than an hour to get to the airport, while a delayed incoming flight meant that the departure time for my flight was about half an hour late, but after dealing with a 10-hour lineup for a bus, I had definitely become a lot more tolerant for shorter delays.

The Bay Area

I was picked up from the airport by one of my many aunts that live in the San Francisco Bay Area and wasn't really given a lot of time to rest, as another one of my aunts was taking me to Monterey the next day. Monterey was pretty cool. A seaside community in an area full of quaint little towns and lots of golf courses. I visited the aquarium, which was cool albeit quite small, then went to visit a couple of the famous golf courses in the area, namely Spanish Bay and Pebble Beach. After that, we took a slight detour and visited Carmel, which was full of really old-school looking country homes, some of which looked like the stuff from fantasy books.

After a family dinner at a Chinese restaurant for my grandma's birthday, I went over to my cousin's place in the city, where I've been staying for the past week and a bit. I haven't really done too much so far. I've had a few short strolls in the city, but mainly I've been watching DVDs and reading stuff at the bookstore across the street.

It's a kind of exciting time to be in the Bay Area right now, because the local NBA team, the Golden State Warriors, are currently in the second round of the playoffs. Sadly, they're 3-1 down against the Utah Jazz after 3 mediocre performances in several departments, so they could go out as soon as tomorrow night. I'm hoping they win 3 straight to make it to the conference finals.

Road trip

While I've been relaxing a lot as of late, it should only last until the end of the month. At the start of June, Liza is visiting from England for her summer break, so we're going to hire a car and do a loop around the southwest. The current plan is to visit some national parks, such as Yosemite, Yellowstone, and the Grand Canyon, and also some cities such as Las Vegas and Salt Lake City. We'll probably loop back around through Los Angeles too, and have a look at Hollywood and Santa Monica, before heading up Highway 1, taking the scenic route back to San Francisco. It'd be harder to do than taking a bus tour, but it gives us more time to visit what we want to visit, instead of having to stick to a tight schedule and a fixed itinerary. I'm really hoping that the parking and camping isn't too rough.

Anyway, I guess that's it from me for now. If anything exciting comes up, I'll be sure to post something about it. Ciao.

Lack of postage

Due to computer issues of late (in particular, the laptop kept crashing due to a faulty driver), I have not had a chance to sit down and write anything of noteworthy length, nor have I been able to upload any recent photos. The problem has since been rectified, and things should be getting back on track soon. I'm hoping this weekend, if I don't party too hard.

Indio

Well, I'm back from Coachella, and had an absolute blast. The following is my full write-up on the event. It's not exactly a review of any of the artists that played (although I will have some opinions on that) but rather a recollection of my time there, just like most of my entries on this blog. Be warned, it's quite a long entry.

Day 0 (Prelude to a festival)

I woke up early on Thursday morning to try to co-ordinate where I would meet up with John, Kelly, and Cam. We decided to meet up at the LA Greyhound station at 2. That proceeded to fall to pieces the moment I got to the Greyhound station in Hollywood, where there were several bus loads of people waiting in line just to get to the LA station. Thankfully, there was a direct bus to Indio, which I only slightly hesitated to catch. I later found out that the LA Greyhound station was packed with people going to Coachella.

I got to the Empire Polo Fields at about 3 in the afternoon. The line to get into the campgrounds was pretty short at the time, and I got my bags inspected by security but had to stand there waiting for the others, as Kelly still had my ticket, including my camping ticket. I got a call from John at about 4 saying that they had just gotten on the bus at LA, which meant I needed to wait another 3 or so hours. The wait was both boring and interesting. It showed me just how badly organized certain aspects of the event was.

The Coachella campground queue

First of all, there were 3 lines to get into the campgrounds, nowhere near as much as there should have been for the amount of camping tickets they sold. At one point, the queue, which was mostly outdoors, in temperatures well above 30 degrees, was over a hundred meters long, and was moving very slowly. The flow problems came from the fact that the will call line was right past the security check, and a lot of people had will call tickets, so there wasn't a lot of wiggle room, which brings up another funny thing.

At the start, when it wasn't too busy, I was sitting down right past the bag check. A security guard came up to me and told me to move. He said that I was creating a fire hazard by blocking the way there. I can guarantee that if there was a fire, the huge amount of people packed together in a queue with two fences surrounding them would be more of a worry than a single person with 3 small pieces of luggage in an open space. It turned out that getting to the festival early wasn't really that much of an advantage, as I had to line up again once John and co. arrived. They got there at about 8 o'clock, and were also lucky enough to get dropped off at the campground like myself. It should have occurred to them that so many people were coming to the festival and arranged more chartered buses that would stop directly at the polo fields.

Once we got in, we set up camp and got some food from the overpriced food stalls and some beer from the overpriced beer garden. It's not much of a complaint, I guess, because it's to be expected that food and beverages at any musical event would cost a fortune. Our camp consisted of myself, John, Kelly, Cam, Natalie (who found us at the beer garden), and Jesse and Nick, two Aussies John and co. met at the LA station. We had a few drinks and went to sleep, looking forward to the first day of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival 2007.

Day 1 (Burn, baby, burn)

I was promptly woken up by the warm morning sun just before 7 and, although I was very groggy from the lack of sleep, I got up and prepared myself for the day ahead. When everybody was up, we decided that some shopping was in order. We walked over to the local grocery store and bought a few things for the next few days, then caught a cab back to the fields. It was still only 11 at the time, so we sat in the sun doing not much at all until we had the wisdom to head over to the beer garden for some shade. We went in at about 3, walking past the will call queue, which snaked around for what seemed like forever, and had a scout of the field where the festival was held. I felt sorry for the people in the will call line, waiting for their tickets for several hours, and potentially missing bands that they want to see. Yet another mistake on the part of Goldenvoice, the organizers of the festival.

The first gig I watched was Satellite Party. I was very amused by Perry Farrell's antics in between songs, and took note that the bassline in one of the songs was the same bassline from Hybrid's Dreamstalker, suggesting that Hybrid helped out on the album on more than one song (Wish Upon a Dog Star took its lyrics from Hybrid's Dogstar - a track that Perry Farrel did vocals for). The crowd went wild when they played Stop!, a Jane's Addiction song, and some people who had just gotten into the fields had thought that it was actually Jane's Addiction playing.

Perry Farrell and the gang

After Satellite Party finished playing, I wandered around for a couple of hours and eventually caught the end of the Arctic Monkeys. They were okay, but I was never a big fan, and the frontman didn't really have good skills in interacting with the crowd. I had dinner while listening to The Jesus and Mary Chain from afar, not knowing that Scarlett Johansson had supposedly gotten up on stage and sang with the band for a song. After JAMC finished, I went over to the tent where Peeping Tom was scheduled to play. Another celebrity popped up, when Danny deVito, dressed incognito, introduced Peeping Tom. Mike Patton entertained the crowd for the entire set, but was topped by the beatboxer in his band, who was unbelievable.

We all met up back at our designated meeting spot (in front of a couple of bins in one of the beer gardens) and listened to Interpol from a distance. Once Interpol finished, we went to try to get a good view of the main stage, and waited for Björk to make her grand entrance. Björk certainly did not disappoint and performed 16 songs, including many classics, some new songs, and an encore. The DJ was particularly impressive due to a device he was using, called a ReacTable.

Day 2 (Camping out)

I didn't see others for most of the afternoon on day 2. In the morning, a couple of the boys bought a gazebo for the campsite so that we wouldn't have to endure too much of the sun during the day. We chilled there for a while then headed into the fields at about 3 once again. I went to the front of the main stage, and found a good viewpoint, where I would stay for most of the day. I camped out at the front because I wanted to see Arcade Fire close up, and knew that it wouldn't be possible had I gone there later in the day. Regina Spektor was the first artist I saw from that position, and was really great. She seems like a really nice young woman, and played her uncompromising anti-folk music.

Regina Spektor sings a tune

Travis and Kings of Leon were next up, and were not too bad, but I've never been too fond of their music, so I just sat there relaxing, and observing the antics of the crowd, who were crowd surfing more and more as the day went on. By the end of the Kings of Leon set, there was a steady stream of crowd surfers getting yanked out by the security staff. Watching them kept me amused until Arcade Fire went on. Arcade Fire were, to put it simply, explosive. Their energy on the stage was electric, and the band brought the crowd along for the ride. Win Butler even got off the stage and started walking alongside the barriers where the people were. The only bad thing about the act wasn't the band itself, but the damn staff that were spraying the crowd with water. It was a good idea, but they neglected to pay attention to the people holding cameras, trying to take photos or, in my case at the time, videos of the stage. I was in the middle of recording a song they started spraying some water. Idiots.

Arcade Fire

The Red Hot Chili Peppers were on next, and the only complaint I have about them was that they weren't on last, which meant they couldn't go for longer or do any encores. Flea and John Frusciante jammed for a while before Anthony Kiedis and busted out Can't Stop. The crowd, as the cliché goes, went wild. The set was full of hits, with the notable exception of Californication. They did play Dani California, so they probably didn't want to overdo the whole California thing. Flea and John Frusciante did some wicked solos, and even sang a couple of songs by themselves. It has to be said that John Frusciante is one of the best, if not the best, guitarists today, maybe ever. Flea told a joke but stuffed it up. The joke was meant to be "What do you call a sheep with no legs?" ("A cloud.") Instead, he said "what do you call a dead lamb?" The crowd had a big laugh at it. I finally left my position at the front after the Chilis finished, and had a bit of a peek at The Black Keys and The Good, The Bad, and the Queen before heading back to the campgrounds early. All in all, another excellent day of music.

John Frusciante is an absolute legend

Day 3 (Rage against the Rage Against The Machine fans)

The third day of the festival was a bit strange. It was kind of a amplification of everything that was great about the festival as well as everything that was bad about it. It was the first day that we all got into the concert grounds before the first act. We saw Mika and Lupe Fiasco before going to the AT&T tent to use the net for a while. After checking my e-mail as well as the NBA and NHL scores, I headed back to the main stage to see Explosions in the Sky, an experimental rock band who were kinda cool. I didn't stay for the whole thing, though. After a while, I went back to the meeting spot, and met up with Nat.

Creed does indeed suck

We went and saw Rodrigo Y Gabriela, an acoustic rock duo, who were very good, and kind of set a theme for the day in terms of music - seeing a wide variety of music. After a couple of songs, we went to watch the Roots, who put on a great set. The notable highlights were a medley of various songs by other artists, and a phenomenal cover of Dylan's Masters of War. It was probably the best cover of that song that I have ever heard. The first part was sung to the tune of the Star-Spangled Banner, which was pure genius.

I stuck around to watch Willie Nelson, which I was very surprised by. I hadn't really listened to a lot of his music before, but once he started he proved why he's been around for so long. There were a few solos from members of his family, including a blues number by his son. I was almost tempted to crowd surf just so I could say that I crowd surfed to Willie Nelson. I wandered around a bit after he finished, catching some of Placebo and José González, then went to see Crowded House.

Neil Finn and the gang played several hits and a few songs from their upcoming album, and was very well-received by all the Aussies and Kiwis. During Don't Dream It's Over, some idiot at the front decided it was a good idea to throw a water bottle at Neil Finn. It hit him and dislodged his microphone, so he needed the help of the crowd to sing the chorus while the mic was replaced. I assume that whoever threw it was a stupid Rage Against The Machine fan who had no sense or respect for other people's musical tastes. I hope that he got beat down by security. Neil Finn had a bit of a laugh about it after the song ended, saying "it was a good shot".

Neil Finn shown on the big screen

Natalie, Kelly, and I were all very pumped up after Crowded House finished their (unfortunately short) set, and all agreed that going to the dance tent to see Paul van Dyk was the best course of action. We stayed there for a few minutes, dancing our asses off, then did the same at the Do Lab, where the music was a bit slower, followed shortly by the Dome, where the DJ from Pendulum was playing some mad drum and bass. After the dance fest that lasted longer than expected, we sat down and watched Manu Chao from afar. There was a huge buzz in the air of the humongous crowd after Manu Chao finished in anticipation of Rage Against The Machine.

Rage came on and put on a great show, but I have to be unbiased and say that it was also a bit disappointing. The crowd was way too large to enjoy the performance completely, and there were a few sound problems throughout the set. When it started, the bass was barely coming through, and once they fixed that, the sound levels for Zack's vocals kept changing, and were sometimes inaudible above the music. It also kind of sucked that I had to skip Adam Freeland and Infected Mushroom so I could see Rage. Still, it was pretty good, and it was pandemonium when they played Wake Up to finish the first part of the set, then finished off the encore with Killing In The Name Of, ad-libbing the words "some of those that burn crosses are the same that hold office" into the lyrics.

We were all feeling pretty dead at the end of the day, but apparently others weren't feeling the same way, because people were partying hard until the very early hours of the morning. It was a good thing that I had earplugs, which helped out in getting me to sleep.

Day 4 (A long epilogue)

We packed up the campsite shortly after waking up and started heading to the bus station before hitching a ride from a local. There was a very long line at the Greyhound station, and only a few buses throughout the day headed to LA, so the others decided to get a taxi to Palm Springs and head to where they were going by rental car. I already had a return ticket, so I decided to wait around. It turned out to be a wait of almost 10 hours, with precious little shade during the middle of the day, and nothing to keep me entertained except for a deck of cards that I purchased after a few hours. I finally got back to LA almost 12 hours after I left the Empire Polo Fields, making for a very boring day of unnecessary nothingness.

After 3 very hot days (in more ways than one) of musical goodness, I ended up seeing around 25 acts (some I stayed for the whole way through and others I didn't), and the ones that stood out definitely made the festival worth the price of admission (which, due to bad timing in terms of exchange rates, was quite expensive) despite all the problems that could have easily been remedied by a bit of common sense. I guess, as was the mantra way back at the health and safety talk at Panorama, common sense is not that common.

I just realized that I've forgotten to mention the various art installations and demonstrations throughout the festival, all of which were very cool. I suck at describing stuff like that, so I won't attempt to try. The pictures should show off a few of them.

Indio overview

Days spent: 5 (although it should only have been 4)
Time spent waiting for something: About half a day (mostly in a queue)
Danny deVito spottings: 1
Theme song/s: Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication

The seedy streets of downtown Los Angeles

I was picked up by my cousin at the LA Greyhound station, which was located in a very shady area of downtown LA. On the day before Coachella, Jesse had mentioned that they saw a car chase in that area. Now it all made sense why. I stayed at my cousin's house for the night, and he showed me around the area in the morning before I headed back to my aunt's place, where I was almost bitten by the guard dog (random, I know). I later heard that there was a bit of a small riot during an immigrant worker demonstration in downtown.

Photos from the last few weeks of Panorama, the Whistler trip, and the day in Vancouver can be found here, while photos from Coachella, as well as other photos from the USA taken in April can be found here.