September 6th, 2009 (05:26 pm)
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current mood: good
current song: Shinedown - Call Me
Ok, so, three weeks driving across the US, 15 states in all, travelling about in a van named Flora! Sounds pretty awesome, right? :D
Everything started off in New Jersey (House squee!), but we weren’t there long, just stayed in a hotel overnight until we moved on to Washington D.C (Bones squee!). Washington was really nice, the first day we got there late in the afternoon then settled in for a Chinese (in the little white, awesome boxes!) and then took the Metro down to Nationals Park to see the baseball, but we got there too late to actually go in so we watched on the big screens outside and did a load of shopping :D The next day was sightseeing, the Washington monument, World War Two memorial and the Lincoln memorial with the Reflecting pool, the Smithsonian museums. Oh, and we saw the Capitol building and the White House of course! The white house had snipers on top of it and everything. We also saw the presidential cars drive through the streets while we were sheltering from the torrential rain.
After that we headed off to North Carolina, a little place called Maggie Valley in the Great Smokey Mountains, which was so pretty and proper back-country American. They even had rocking chairs outside the motel rooms, on the porch!
Then we moved on into Nashville,Tennessee, which was one of my favourite places on the whole trip, even though we were only there for a night. It’;s the home of country music so we all headed out to the bars, ended up at the Wildhorse Saloon which had live country music and line dancing lessons throughout the night. And they were serious about it! No irony involved at all!
After that was Memphis. We spent a lot of time on Beale street, walking around the bars and shops. Lots of jazz music there, and great southern food (if you ignore the cockroaches!). Second day there we went to Elvis’ Graceland which was great. It’s huge, they even have three of his jet planes. He had so many awards and gold/platinum records, and they displayed a lot of his costumes there too.
New Orleans after that, which was lovely by day, very French, but not so nice at night. There were cockroaches EVERYWHERE! But the French Quarter had some gorgeous shopping and we had some nice traditional creole food. Also visited the Voodoo Museum cause thats big there (I was pretty excited cause a lot of the voodoo creatures have been in Supernatural! I was walking round remembering all the eps, and thinking about ‘Playthings’) We also did a Swamp Tour o n the drive out of there, saw two alligators! The Bayous are really pretty but I don’t think I’d like to live on them like the Cajun people do.
That night we stayed in a cabin in a national park and I witnessed the most horrific thunder storm I’ve ever heard! It was awful! I was awake most of the night, afraid some serial killer was gonna bust in one of the THREE doors and chop us into pieces. My other thought was “Oh no! Bears!” Thankfully, I survived and we left the next day for Texas! Austin is kinda weird, rougher than I imagined but it was also a lot of fun. Went kinda mad with the shopping there but it was Texas! I had to! We stayed in Texas another night, but moved on to a town called Lubbock. Nice place, had a really good meal there (Chicken Fried steak is awesome!)
Next was Carlsbad, New Mexico. Carlsbad Caverns was really impressive, you have to walk down into them, the equivalent of walking down an 80 storey building! The rock formations were incredible and it was nice and cool down there compared to outside where it was friggin’ boiling! Stayed in another cabin which was in a great location, we sunned ourselves on the porch with some alcohol and then went to a Drive-in movie! Although its an awesome experience, they really aren’t thought out well. The sound comes from the car radios, but seeing as we had a great big van we had to get out and sit outside so you have to keep all the doors open and turn the radio up to hear it. Had a blast though!
On the way out of New Mexico we stopped in Roswell! I had another major geek moment (tell me you remember how awesome that show was!) and did some alien-inspired shopping :D People from the other tour group were walking around wearing their own tin-foil hats! It was awesome.
Monument Valley was incredible, just red dirt and rocks for miles. The rocks are all different shapes, one looked just like the dragon from never-ending stories! We had a Navajo jeep tour in an open back 4x4, and our Indian guide took us into this semi-circle cave and played traditional music on the flute.
Next day was the Helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon which is still one of the best things I’ve ever done. The view was incredible and I loved the feeling you got as the pilot took you out over the edge of the canyon. Got some great shots of the Colorado river and the rainbow that we managed to catch as we flew out over. Absolutely beyond words, I loved it. Next morning we got up at 4:30 (omg! Not easy at all) and went down for the sunrise over the canyon. There’s no way to describe it, I got some awesome pics though. Then we hiked down a mile and a half into the canyon. It took an hour to go down and then the sun came out properly and it took two and a half hours to come back up! I almost died but I am so glad I did it! Collapsed after that and tried to recover! :)
Vegas. I thought I wouldn’t like it but OMG! It was one of my favourite places, I had so much fun. I went to a shooting range and fired a Beretta handgun at a zombie target! And I was a pretty good shot! Then we went out on the Party Bus in the evening. It had leather bench seats, holes for ice and drinks and a pole in the middle! Lol. We drank too much and danced around like idiots while the driver took us down to Freemont (the old Vegas, from before the Strip was built). We stood in the massive covered street and danced and sang along to The Summer of ’69 celebration. The whole ceiling is made up of a giant television screen and they were doing a show, using old music like ‘American Pie’. We also got taken to the Vegas sign to have our photos done there, then we explored hte Strip and watched the Bellagio's water show (incredible how they do that). The next day was shopping and checking out the casinos. The casinos are incredible, they’re huge! One has real lions inside it, another has a rollercoaster! It’s crazy but so much fun. Last night there two of us went to see the Cirque de soleil show, ‘KA’. That was amazing, the acrobatics were incredible, I don’t know how they do it!
We spent the next two days in San Diego shopping and visiting Sea World! We saw Shamu the whale (from Free Willy!) and dolphins, Beluga whales, all sorts and we went on the water rides and got absolutely soaked. Haha. It was a nice relaxed place, unlike Vegas, so a nice break.
The last day we were in L.A but didn’t see as much as I would have liked. We drove down Sunset Boulevard (and I was totally singing the song in my head!) and then got dropped off on Hollywood Boulevard to see the Walk of Fame. There are so many stars, it was funny, even Bugs Bunny and Big Bird have one! Also saw Mann’s Chinese Theatre and the Kodak Theatre where they hold the Oscars. But then we got taken to the last hotel and totally collapsed, ordered room service for dinner and watched crap on the TV! It was nice to end on. The next day we got up kinda late and then went to the airport to fly home!
Tada! So much happened that I couldn’t possibly write everything down but those are the basics. I’m so glad I did it, I had the best time and there’s no way I would have seen all of that stuff any other way. Totally recommend it. And with such nice people, it wasn’t even as scary as I’d expected! :D
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catnap_69!
