Author: ranginui

Home Again

We woke up round 8, with vinyl the dog licking my ear. Proceeded to pack up
all our stuff, or should I say, Laurel packed up our stuff. Im constantly
amazed by how she can fit so much stuff into the bags.
After Lunch at wendys (more vouchers :-)) we headed off to LAX to catch a
flight to San Francisco. Stupid US Airways didnt tell us we had to check in
at United, nor did they have any signs, so after waiting in line for a while
we got to the counter and got told we had to go to Terminal 7.
So we followed a US Marine who had to do the same thing and checked in.
After dealing with security which although tedious was less annoying than
MAF in nz (I hate those guys) we flew off to san francisco to repeat the
performance.
We boarded NZ007 in San Francisco and started the 12 hours and 20 minutes
flight to Auckland. It didnt start well when Ray (one of the flight
attendants) yanked the boarding pass out of my book, losing my place. He
then proceeded to annoy the crap out of Laurel and I for the remainder of
the flight. Poking Laurel with tongs to wake her to try and force a hot
towel on her went down like a lead balloon. If I could be bothered I’d make
an arsehat entry about him.
We landed in Dorkland where it was raining (it always seems to be raining
when we land there) and did the immigration and Customs and MAF dance.
Crackheads working at an international airport still can only manage to try
to communicate by yelling in english. Did I mention I hate those guys, with
their arbitrary random bunch of rules, jackasses. Anyway we headed out and
across to the domestic terminal and then home.
Now we are sitting in the lounge unpacking, the dogs have gone to bed but
snurrie still wont leave us alone. Its good to be home.

Day 11 Riverside to Palm Springs

We spent the morning talking with Laurels grandma and great aunt. Then after
lunch we headed off towards Joshua Tree, about halfway there we decided to
head into Palm springs to spend the last real night of the honeymoon
somewhere fancy. And fancy it is, I think us two are probably the only 2
guests in this fancy Hyatt hotel that havent had ‘work’. We are staying in
Indian Wells, right by where the play the tennis and just down the road from
Arnold Palmers private golf course.
We went to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner courtesy of Joe. YUM

Tomorrow we are off to Joshua Tree park and to the Meerkat farm, should be
tons of fun, then sunday we start on our way home. We wont arrive back till
tuesday sometime (nz time).

17256 steps since day 7.

Day 12 Palm Springs to Morengo Valley and back to Fullerton

After an earlyish start we headed off to Morengo valley to visit with the
Meerkats. We stopped at the Funky Monkey cafe for breakfast which was
suprisingly good. After that we had a little while to kill so decided to
take a little nap and then we drove out the unpaved road to where the
Meerkat sanctuary is.
Its a fantastic place well worth visiting. They only have meerkats that
other zoos have had problems with, they dont breed them just provide a home
for ones that have no where else to go. As well as the meerkats there were 2
super friendly dogs and a bantam rooster that thought it was a dog. Im
pretty sure there was a cat around too. The money we donated will be used to
buy some more galvanised steel mesh for cages.
After feeding meerkats and talking and generally having a fantastic time we
hit the road back towards Fullerton, CA. About halfway there Laurel yelled
out “holy shit” and I looked up just in time to see a car flip over 2 times
and stop. Laurel thinks it rolled at least 8 times in total. We slapped on
the hazard lights and pulled off to see if we could help. Laurel grabbed a
blanket and we tried to see if we could get across the freeway to help. But
it was 6 lanes with a lot of traffic, so as soon as I saw the driver crawl
out, we decided to stay on our side and wait for the police to arrive. Once
they did we figured we should drive off before someone tailended us. Scary
as hell but at least the guy walked away from it.

We got back to Fullerton and watched some baseball and an odd movie, then
hit the hay.

Day 8,9,10 Los Angeles

Well not really Los Angeles, Fullerton in fact, but close enough. We arrived
here at about 3pm on Tuesday and navigated our way around to Laurel’s
brothers house. No one was home so we wandered off to the local mall and
got some ice creams from Baskin Robins (Thanks again for the vouchers).
Later that evening Tom and Joe took us out to El Torito for dinner (99 cent
tacos, cant beat that). Then Tom, Laurel and I went to listen to Mike Barnet
and some others play at a local bar, very cool. Laurel headed off home but
Tom and I wandered over to another bar to have a few brews. After causing an
argument between the bartenders over where Bass ale comes from, and having
imbibed our fill we headed home.
The next day (Day 9) we just laxed out and did some shopping and watched
game seven of the Yankees vs Red Sox series which the Red Sox won .. YAY!!
Pizza for dinner, gotta have pizza with baseball.
Day 10, we had another slow start, got some lunch and then headed off to
Riverside to visit with Laurel’s Grandma. After battling our way through the
traffic (its insane) and stopping for hotdogs we arrived there around 6.30pm.
We stayed the night there and looked and wedding photos and tried to play
the wedding video with no success (stupid PAL/NTSC issues). Stayed the night
there.

Day 6 – Lodi CA to Fresno CA, via Yosemite National Park

After a particularly nasty hotel breakfast today we headed off towards
Yosemite along highway 99. Then onto 120 where we completely missed a turn
and ended up in Jamestown about 10 miles north of where we wanted to be. So
we had breakfast there and then headed back to the turnoff.
Driving towards Yosemite we noticed a
sign saying
kiwi tavern, and thought
thats weird, so we had to stop at Chinese Camp (population 150) to check out
the place. Once we noticed
the flag we had to go inside and have a chat.
It turns out that the the owner was a Kiwi expat from Gisborne who had been
living there for 12 years.
After a chat and an orange juice we continued on to Yosemite, which even
though it was pouring with rain was spectacular. We took lots of photos and
looked around the visitor centers.
After looking around there we got on highway 41 and headed south to Fresno
and got a room for the night. We went to TGIF courtesy of the some vouchers
we got as wedding presents (thanks Daschbach and Kreke).
3440 Steps today

Day 5 – Eureka CA to Lodi CA

After another hotel breakfast we headed south down 101 until we hit Fortuna
then we cut east on route 36. Stopping to eat in Wildwood (population 35)
where we were the only people not wearing knives. We then carried on until
we hit I5 at red bluff and turned south. Finally stopping in Lido to have
some food, do some laundry and get some sleep.

We did the laundry at Rancho San Miguel and went to get dinner from the
mexican supermarket there. Had fantastic burritos and I had about 50 litres
of Horchata. Debbie if you read this, as the only person of hispanic
ancestry I know I want to ask you, what the hell is the story with the big
plastic velour covered piggy banks?

3845 steps today.

Day 4 Coos Bay, OR to Eureka, CA

No internet day

After breakfast at our hotel in Coos Bay we headed south along highway 101.
We stopped at a zoo place and patted animals and looked at bear and elk.
Photos here.
We had lunch in a great diner in Port Orford where we managed to
get $2 off
our lunch bill by each answering a trivia question correctly. Next we drove
through a whole lot of redwoods and saw big trees and lots of elk.
Once we arrived at Eureka we checked into a hotel and then hit the mall for
dinner and bought some new cd’s to listen to in the car.
6871 steps today.

Day 3

After a fantastic free breakfast we headed off for our next destination,
Coos Bay Oregon. We drove south along I-5 until we hit Salem then took 22
west then 18 west to Lincoln city. After lunch and some shopping in the
outlets there we headed south along 101. Amazingly beautiful scenery, Oregon
is a really pretty state. We ended up in the best western hotel in Coos Bay,
nothing fancy but it does have broadband, so im uploading some photos now.

Photos are here
, more will be added as we go along.
Oh and according to pedometer 4923 steps today.