Gap Year 2013 Jan-Mar: Southwest and south USA: Tue 8 Jan

The big day has finally arrived...

After an early wake up and a final morning stroll along Manly Beach to Queenscliff Surf Club and back, we finished our packing and left on the 10.10 ferry. Far too early for a 3pm flight, of course, but the kids were excited :-)

We arrived at Sydney Airport before noon, and checked in in no time at all. Good seats too, with an empty seat next to Di, in an Airbus A380. In fact, the trip went very smooth, good service and surprisingly good food (after all, we have pretty low expectations when it comes to Qantas, sorry). Lots and lots of movies to choose from. Despite a great plane we did not sleep more than a few hours.

A 13 and 1/2 hour flight to Los Angeles later, we queued up for that immigration and expected a looooong wait. They expect papers galore (3 more from us) + finger printing + photo to be taken once again, but despite the long queue, it wasn't too bad. We queued for a bit more than 45 minutes before it was our turn.

The US Migration guy turned out to be a real character. After asking us his mandatory questions about funding and where we would go, when we answered New Orleans down the track, he gave us a small "synopsis" of how things are very different only one block away from the French Quarter. We ended up chatting and laughing with the guy.

Then, after we picked up our bags and were going through Customs, Di was declaring her personal prescription medicine, and asked the bloke whether he would like to see them. He seemed almost offended and said "m'am how could i possibly stop you bringing them in?" And he also started to laugh.

All a bit unexpected and lighthearted to say the least. Good start. Welcome to Los Angeles.

We then took the Flyaway shuttle bus from just outside the terminal to Union Station at $7 each, before changing to Metro and the red line after each buying a 7 day pass valid for most LA public transport (at $20 a pop +$2 each for the card).

We arrived at Hollywood / Western metro station, crossed Hollywood Boulevard, walked 50 metres and there on North Western Avenue is Coral Sands Motel. Very central and convienient location.

Here is Di outside the motel...

And the inner courtyard of the motel, which has both a pool and a jacuzzi. Don't think that we will try the pool, after all, it is winter in California.

After checking in and dropping off the bags, we went to the little shopping centre next door and had Chinese for lunch. Massive amount of food. Nowhere near as good as in Australia but lots of it. 2 chosen dishes, fried rice and fried noodles for $5.50. Next time, we will share.

We then took a walk around the neighbourhood to get our bearings. Its about 20 degrees and warmer than we expected. A couple of photos from the hood...

This is a block of apartments, almost as nice as Strathspey :-)

A real mix of housing in Hollywood, but as soon as you get up the hill a bit, it is starting to get very posh. Not this guy though...

Before we got back home again, we went shopping at Ralphs for breakfast items and the basics, and, yes there it was, cheese in a can. As you can see prices at the supermarket are not cheap.