chicken in a bucket, chicken in the beans

160 days ago we left for Thailand.

We now have 11 days until we leave for home.

I think it's fair to say that we have all started to miss

home now, it might be the fact that we know it's less than

two weeks away until we see our friends and family or it might

just be that we're homesick, either way we're missing

rainy, boring, cold England!

Since our last post we've been travelling down the 

West Coast of America, we've stopped off at both San Jose and Monterey.

Monterey is a seaside town where Americans go on holiday similar to Brighton but full of clam chowder and national parks. After travelling for 

6 months you soon pick up 'tricks of the trade' and so when someone

offers you free food, don't even think of the answer you say yes.

Monterey is famous for it's clam chowder and so outside

every restaurant there are free tasters, Megan and Robyn took it

as a personal mission to try every free clam chowder bowl

there was throughout the whole pier and so once we were at the end

we felt like there was no type of chowder we hadn't tried.

 We spent 2 days in Big Sur - walking through the ancient forests with the biggest trees we've ever seen. (HALLELUAH the three explorers finally
did some exercise (it did however highlight how unfit we were)) We definitely fitted in with the hikers with our trainers and decent clothing haha. The bus journey there was just as enjoyable with stunning ocean views and winding roads through the forest.

Happiest when with food

 San Jose didn't have a lot going for it so we mainly spent our 4 days by the pool, walking round town or 'flicking each others boobs' inside our motel room. Like Inglewood in L.A it was a bit rough here so we were glad to move onto Monterey were its a bit safer. 

Tomorrow we move down the coast to Venice Beach for the final leg of what has been the best experience of our lives. 

Sorry this is only a short update, 

we look forward to seeing everyone soon.

lots of love

Megan, Robyn and Erin

xx

P.S our next post will be our last of the travelling series
however we'll pre warn you it's going to be a big one

San Fransisco, AAAHH HELP **Francisco

It's been a while since we've written a blog post,

we spent 2 weeks at Erin's Aunt Sheree's house

 where we sunbathed, relaxed and made it our own

personal mission to watch all 4 series of Prison Break.

81 episodes, 4 series, 3 girls, 1 programme.

My Aunt and Uncle picked us up from the station (big shout out to them for looking after us for 2 weeks)

and took us to Alcatraz- a prison island in the bay where criminals like Al Capone where sent. It was really eerie and was the main reason for our dedication to Prison Break. We learnt about the prison break attempts and in the 29 years of being open only 3 made it out through the pipes in their cell, however, whether they made it through a mile of shark infested water 

will forever be an unanswered question.

(The rumours were they were heading to South America).

We're now on the homestretch as we're heading to San Jose and 

Monterey for the next two weeks and then we finish our whole 

trip in LA. We've spent the last week in San Francisco

city and although it's no Melbourne it has definitely

become one of our favourite cities. Similar to Melbourne

it's quirky, full of life and filled with wonderful people.

Whilst in San Fran we met a lovely woman called Erika,

orignally from the city she decided to show us all the best places in San Francisco. She started by taking us to one of the longest

running festivals in the city the hippie Haight/Ashbury festival,

(que megan's input) 'it had garlic fries' (food forever on the brain).

A tourist's dream we visited Pier 39 and Fisherman's Wharf where we had a famous In-N-Out burger which we burned off climbing 1000 steps up to Coit Tower wgiving us a 360 degree view of the city. Erin was desperate to see the TransAmerica Pyramid which geographers will know, is built to withstand the effects of an earthquake (seeing San Andreas with my aunt made us paranoid to an earthquake along the fault). While in San Fran it was compulsory we visit the Golden Gate Bridge which although foggy and SO cold was breathtaking to look at. Americans know how to do it right. 

(However were clearly colourblind when they named the bridge) .

We also sampled a bit more American culture with a trip to watch the NBA finals (Golden State Warriors v Cleveland Cavaliers). Because the Warriors are from San Fran, the atmosphere was electric and the crowd where hilarious "put a dagger in him Curry!!!", everyone went mental when they won for the first time in 40 years (comiserations to Lebron James though).

The streets were alive all night, with buses honking and the drunken

chanting went on until the early hours of the morning.

 "Warriors, Warriors, Warriors"

Whilst in San Fran we thought it would be fun to
go to a over 18 club which was a good way to
experience the city natives. It was an experience to say the least,
in Megan's words "we turned ghetto for the night" being
part of the only few white girls in the club our dancing
skills could not live up to the twerking, pole dancing
and the moves that the San fran girls could pull off.

We thought we'd finished but Megan was upset we didn't

talk about Costco, so here is Megan talking about food. Being big food lovers we were amazed when we walked in to the shop as we were surrounded by extra large food, no joke the pizzas were the biggest things i've ever seen. After wondering round the shop taking pictures with all the food and trying all the free samples multiple times we got a famous costco hot dog and drink combo for only $1.50 which was truly delicous. Basically Costco is a wonderful place. The end.

lots of love

Megan, Robyn and Erin

xx

hopped off the plane at LAX...

If you've ever heard the stories of Inglewood

(which you probably haven't because you're English)

they are all true.

We lived to tell the tale.

We survived.

Unlike Australia, America isn't known for it's backpackers

and therefore, is not backpacker friendly.

We searched the internet for hours trying to find a cheap hostel

to stay at (turns out they don't exist) and we ended up booking

a hostel in the centre of LA in a place called Inglewood.

First thoughts, we hadn't booked a place too bad,

we got free cookies, cake, and a blueberry muffin every morning

so we couldn't complain. However, come next morning when we decided

to venture out of the hostel and jumped on the bus we soon realised

we were staying in a dodgy area of LA.

3 white English girls in the middle of LA attracted the wrong

sort of attention, we later learned just a month before we arrived

someone was shot outside the reception of the hostel.

Anyway, apart from that we were in the fast food country of the world

and couldn't be happier. Our first week in LA we were typical

tourists getting the compulsory photo under the Hollywood sign and walking along the walk of fame. Memorial day fell on the week in which we 

were in LA and so we went to a beach carnival and dscovered the

wonders of pitta pit, which is a subway for pitta bread,

but this pitta bread is like no other, it is honestly one

of the tastiest things ever to enter our mouths.

The highlight was definitely Disneyland where we fulfilled our childhood dreams of meeting Mickey Mouse, Cinderella and Winnie the Pooh. Being the 60^th anniversary we saw a Frozen show, went in a “Finding Nemo” themed submarine ride and sailed through a “Pirates of the Caribbean” set. I 

think from this day we learned you are NEVER to young to go to Disneyland

and meet your idols. The evening began with a night-time parade and as usual we made friends with the right people so got front row seats,

some people had been queing 4 hours, we rock up 20 minutes

before the parade starts and with our English accents and natural

charm we won over the security guards (mwahah).

 Next came the firework display over the castle which was incredible,

 Robyn was probably one of the oldest there

and she definitley attracted some funny looks as the 19

year old English girl stood alone singing as loud as she could

to every Disney song they played.

 Snow fell during “let it go” Tinkerbell flew over the castle and

even Nemo made an appearance. BEST DAY EVER!!

 

Pitta Pit is what we live for.

 

Next stop was Las Vegas, Nevada and the Grand Canyon, Arizona.

We don't like to get up early so a 5.30am start meant we missed our collection point, spent 1 hour driving round LA chasing the tour bus in a taxi before arriving at a new location- Chinese old people's home, this was a bad omen from the beginning. Little did we know we had booked a tour for Asian tourists, so imagine this, 3 English girls sitting on a tour bus surrounded by

Asians with a tour guide (named Mr Wu) talking in Mandarin to us through the speaker. Trust us to book a tour for Asian tourists, however, it had it's perks, when we arrived in Vegas we were assigned our room and after staying in hostels for the past 4 months being given a room

to ourselves with FAST WIFI, and comfy beds, we were on top of world.

This good news led to the traditional jump on the bed to test the springs.

That evening we explored Vegas to watch a few street shows,

one being the volcano show the Mirage puts on every night, each show

costs $20,000! Vegas is EXACTLY how you imagine it to be,

bright lights, crazy people, everything over the top

and exaggerated, it was a lot of fun, Robyn even had

a go at gambling, (even if it was only $1, but being a traveller

you don't really have that much money to spare)!

We spent the next day at the Grand Canyon, bright and early

we hopped on the Asian bus at 4:45am and were on our way.

When we first arrived at the Grand Canyon we were all shocked at the sheer

scale of it, it's so big, it doesn't look real and it is one of those places

which no photo does it justice and so you don't get a real feel for what it looks like unless you see it in real life. 

The rest of our time in Vegas we spent eating cheescake,

Chinese food and shopping.

We are now at Erin's Aunt's for a week, just 2 hours outside San

Fransisco, here we plan to

spend the week doing absolutely nothing

(because the last 5 months of travelling has been just too tough).

Just before we end this post, we should

proabably pre warn you, we will most likely be returning

to England triple the size we left, food here is to die for.

lots of love,

Megan, Robyn and Erin

xx