Well we've been bad little bloggers and have got a little behind so this entry may be somewhat condensed. Please address complaints to the US Department of Useless Travellers, who can't find cheap internet anywhere. So we made our way from Yosemite, tired and full of mountains, back to Merced by train and then onto a bus. We should mention this entailed waking before 6 to catch the bus to the train station. Life is cruel. And I should say trains are infinitely preferable to coaches in the US if anyone is insane enough to consider travelling across the US by [View Full Entry]

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With tears gleaming in our eyes we packed our bags (why wouldn't everything fit! I swear our bags have shrunk!) and farewelled the Green Tortoise in San Francisco and its lovely bagels. We very strongly recommend it as a great place to meet people and doss down in San Francisco....always something going on and 3 free dinners a week can't be bad. However, our time had come, the road was calling, and we hopped on a bus for Emeryville. And a train to Merced. And a bus to Midpines. And you don't want to know about the hill we had to [View Full Entry]

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I can't believe how wonderful we are! Our mothers will be brimming with pride! We had a day of being healthy, organisey and some more healthy and then a little helpful, and failed to indulge in anything morally questionable, other than possibly Doritos...that orange dye can't be ethically sound. We started off by getting up only quarter of an hour or so after our alarm this morning, the constant and unwavering bagel was again our breakfast companion. Although Juliet had marmalade instead of jam on hers today in a bid for extra vitamin C, bravo! Jenny, after drinking lots of water [View Full Entry]

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Another crazy full day in San Francisco....I could get used to these bagels with cream cheese and jam for breakfast, yum! We rounded out our diet for the day with pizza for lunch, leftover chinese takeaways for dinner and irish coffee for dessert....wow tomorrow its salad and water for me! Having said that, I think we can be excused. We spent over 5 hours solidly walking and made further use of San Francisco's fantastic bus network, which we found gets a little more interesting on Sundays. Alright I'll give you some chronological order here, much as I enjoy recounting my life [View Full Entry]

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It's getting harder and harder to get up in the mornings - but then again, what's the point of being here and not experiencing the local life? That was the rationalle (after the group of us all saw Karine off on the bus headed for LA - our group is shrinking!) for Saturday night's trip to a funky wee bar in the Mission District, where all the trendy nightspots are. Thankfully there was a large couch covered with cushions, which the girls made full use of, laughing at the tired guys sitting across from us on a bench. Loved the 80's [View Full Entry]

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After a lazy start to the day on Friday 17th (yes, had a bit of a night out on the 16th) we jumped in a car with a group of other travellers from our hostel and took a trip to Muir Woods, an hour north of San Francisco. This is one of the last pockets of Redwoods (Sequioas) in the State, and the only one in the Bay Area. It was a beautiful sunny day, the air was very crisp and clear, and we were walking in a stand of trees over a thousand years old. We also took a side [View Full Entry]

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Ok so I was looking back over my photos and realised I had a bunch with no journal entry to post them by. It took a little work but I eventually worked out that neither of us had written anything for Thursday. So as not to generate unrealistic expectations I would like to ask you to disregard the fact that I was concerned about missing one day, it is most uncharacteristic behaviour for me, and I don't foresee many future concerns in similar situations. I can assume that for Thursday breakfast we got up and had bagels. I was in touch [View Full Entry]

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And thus has our first day in the U S of A progressed. Well, ok. Before that. Following fond farewells at the airport - from our families and from the toilet at our gate (seriously, it thanked us and asked us to come again, has the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation started shipping toilets to Earth now?) they announced that random bag checks would take place while boarding. Juliet tried for the triple, having already been stopped at two out of two check points, but this time was allowed through. Jenny seriously doesn't recommend sitting next to smelly people on the plane (and [View Full Entry]

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We had our farewell drinkies on Saturday night, at the lovely La Zeppa. A good many well wishing friends turned out to drink to us, and buy drinks for us- an unexpected but entirely welcome feature of the evening! (I lost count, but think I may have been close to some sort of record.) Jenny would like to add that the menu was exquisite, and I heartily recommend the figs with prosciutto and parmesan! And may I never have another gin martini as long as I live! Although the appletini was another matter altogether :) Juliet believes she made a lot [View Full Entry]

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We have our tickets! We have our packs! We have lost our minds! Who knew that travel involved so many last minute costs and items to be picked up and clearances and forms to be filled out? But that aside, we're at least as excited as we are terrified. We should explain the schizophrenic nature of our blog; we have 2 delightfully charming authors who will spontaneously change places at the keyboard, and take turns backseat writing....and you will NEVER know! Except when we tell you ;) So welcome to our online ramblings, we hope this will help us all stay [View Full Entry]

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