Just a quick note to let everyone know that we made it to New York after a HUGE day! We got up yesterday morning after sleeping through the alarm and then panicking. Had to rush down to reception in all of 20 minutes and get on the next shuttle - lucky we had packed. The shuttle arrived...and we made it to the airport, but our plane was delayed by 2 hours. JFK had bad weather so we had to sit in the departure lounge and wait for a window. We were supposed to leave at 11:26am but didn't get away until [View Full Entry]

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Today was a HUGE day. We were both VERY tired from the day before, and all the drama of gettting to NY. To make things worse, the clock in our room was over 2 hours ahead...we didn't notice as we were so zonked...so we set the alarm, and woke up thinking it was 9:45am. It wasn't until an hour later, that I realised our mistake...it wasn't even 7:00 yet! WHOOPS! We tried our best to get a few more zzzz's, but it wasn't very successful. At 10:45 the lobby rang to inform us that our Apple Greeter had arrived. This [View Full Entry]

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We certainly made the most of our last day in Vegas. Slept in till about 9am, then took a walk out to the pool...couldn't believe how hot it was already...and how many people were out sunbaking! That has to be lethal...we decided to skip the swim, and head downtown to the Stratosphere instead. Good move...the Duece took nearly an hour to get there...that bus is super slow. The hotel loomed above us as we walked through the Stratosphere doors, and into the maze. The owners are very cluey here in Vegas, and you ALWAYS have to walk through the casino [View Full Entry]

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By the time I woke up, I was already packing it...the thought of flying high into the air, in a tiny bubble is not very appealing to me...and as we waited for our limo to pick us up, the nerves got worse! Finally, our white stretch limo arrived, and in 5 mins we were out at the helicopter base...Sundance Helicopter Tours. We went inside and got all the housekeeping out of the way...weight, evacuation procedures, motion sickness possibilities - all things that put me toatlly at ease - NOT! I wanted to meet the pilot, and let him know that [View Full Entry]

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Today had its ups and downs excitement wise. It all kicked off with a tour of a new development on the strip - the one that Chelle mentioned in the previous blog. It was one of those standard scams where they give you a dinner, or in our case, cheap tickets to a show. All you have to do is struggle through a tour and a sales pitch to purchase part of an apartment (Time Share) - a sphincter says what? The start of the tour went all right, with a bit of a sales push, but the sales person [View Full Entry]

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If you haven't guessed from the heading...Vegas is BIG...and I mean Huuuuuggggggeeeee!! Everything here is done to the max...hotels, food, gardens, shows...it's nuts! But we are having a ball, as there is just so much to see and do. We touched down in the desert city yesterday at 2:00pm, 15 mins ahead of our flight...nothing wrong with that! As soon as we walked off the plane, the heat of the tunnel hit us...it was scorching! You'd think being Aussies, Iz and I wouldn't have noticed it much...but it was like a sauna in there! We quickly grabbed our bags, and [View Full Entry]

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The alarm went off rather early this morning for our last full day in San Fran. We had a tour booked with Extranomical Tours...a small company that only takes 12 people max on a variety of tours. We decided on the Muir Woods and Winery tour...it was only $25 more than the other tour, that just took in the woods...and Iz did drink a fair share of wine today! Our first stop on the tour was the Muir Woods, a forest full of 1000 year old, giant Redwoods. It was so serene walking around the sunlit paths, amongst these tall [View Full Entry]

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Today started out with a sleep in and a late breakfast at 10am. The plan for today was to check out some of the architecture in San Fran and walk around the Golden Gate Park. The first stop was a tram change at Castro, the homosexual capital of USA - note the rainbow flags! Our second stop was Alamo Square to check out the most photgraphed street in world... apparently. It's known as Postcard Row. The houses are pretty cool. There are dozens of these style houses around San Fran, which is quite amazing considering most of the city was [View Full Entry]

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This morning started like any other ordinary day...first of all I managed to block the sink when I poured my leftover cereal down the plug hole. Izzy then tried to unbock the sink, and pulled off one of the pipes (by accident). He kept saying, 'I'm an engineer, I know what I'm doing Chelle', and I kept saying, 'If you touch one more thing Iz, I'm calling reception!' Water was flowing onto the floor at this stage, and I was worried about the imminent plumbing bill. Izzy did touch one more thing, so I got on the phone, and we [View Full Entry]

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Today was spent cruising the bay at San Fran checking out Alcatraz and the Golden Gate bridge. The day started with the watch alarm buzzing at 6:45 in the morning - it's sad I know, but we have been sleeping in till 8ish lately! We grabbed a quick bite and caught a couple of trams to Pier 33 for our cruise to Alcatraz - leaving at 9:30. Turns out that the trip to the pier was a bit quicker than we thought. We rocked up at about 7:50 and had to gate crash a cafe that wasn't going to open [View Full Entry]

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