Sat 7 June We arrived in Amsterdam at 11:00 am having taken the night train from Berlin. The train was a sleeper train with two bunks in our cabin. It was a really comfortable sleep, I would have been happy if the train had kept going for a couple more hours. We stored our bags in the train station locker and took just a small day pack with our clothes for the night. We then went and hopped on a canal boat and travelled round the canals. It was quite a good trip and enabled us to see the architecture of [View Full Entry]

---

---

Tuesday 3rd June - Friday 6th June We arrived in Frankfurt around midday and headed to our hotel. The plane had been delayed by six hours so it meant we were arriving at a more civilised time as opposed to 6am that we were meant too. After negotiating public transport again (tricky when its in German and your tired from the flight) we found our hotel. It also had a shared bathroom (a pain) and our room was right at the top of a three story stair climb. We then had a look around Frankfurt. There didn’t seem that much to [View Full Entry]

---

---

29th May - 2nd June We arrived at LaGuardia Airport in New York at 8pm and took the Bus to get to the hostel, this was okay although it did get quite crowded and travel through some interesting neighbourhoods. A $2 fare made it really good value. The hostel (Candy Hostel) we were staying at was quite basic with nothing in the room apart from the bed and shared bathroom / toilet. Luckily it was quiet this weekend and the people did a good job of keeping it clean. The location was very good though on the upper west side (96th [View Full Entry]

---

---

Wednesday 28th May - Thursday 29th May We took the 9:05am flight to Washington DC which required an early start and another trip on Chicago’s Public Transport system. The flight to Washington was pretty easy with the exception of the two brats who were seated behind us. We took public transport to our motel which was pretty easy. The only issue was how far it was from the Metro Station (we were to find when we were leaving DC that there was a free shuttle ). The place was nice been a suite and having a separate kitchen. It also had [View Full Entry]

---

---

Sunday 25th May - Tuesday 27th May We arrived in Chicago about Midnight and took the train into town. It was quite late but were able to find a station near our motel and take our cab. This was good as it only cost $10 to get from the Airport to the motel. We were staying in the Ohio House Motel it’s a dated building but is close to town (the wireless is crap though.) The coffee shop is good value and on the premises. We explored the City on Monday. It was the Memorial day so there was lots of [View Full Entry]

---

---

Thursday 22nd May - Sunday 25th May We arrived in Vegas at about 2pm via Las Vegas Boulevard which is more popularly known as the Strip. Las Vegas looks amazing, massive themed hotels, replicas of the Statue of Liberty, a Sphinx, Roman Colosseum, neon lights everywhere. After been in the wilderness for a few days this was quite a contrast. We checked into our hotel (the Paris Las Vegas complete with replica Eiffel tower.) The room was very nice and was good to get some luxury, in fact it was so compelling we decided to stay another night. We then walked [View Full Entry]

---

---

Tuesday 22nd May - Thursday 24th May After SF it was time to head to the back country of California. We were going to two of the most well known National parks Yosemite and Death Valley. To get to Yosemite we drove east along the I-580 to route 120. This got us off the freeway and on to some of the rural roads. It took about 5 hours to get to Yosemite and the views coming down the hill into the valley was spectacular. The Yosemite valley is full of sheer rock wall that shoot up from the forest below. There [View Full Entry]

---

---

Saturday 17th May to Tuesday 20th May Once we arrived, parked (see previous entry) and checked in it was about 9pm so we thought some dinner would be a good idea. We found a 50’ style diner and eat there. At this point we had already discovered a couple of things about SF: 1. There are lots of crazy homeless people 2. It’s a lot colder then the rest of California we had seen (and there is lot of cloud.) 3. There are a lot of hills We were staying at the Downtown International Hostel. Its right in Downtown (one block [View Full Entry]

---

---

Friday 17th May - Saturday 18th May We left LAX in our rental car. it’s a Pontiac G6 Convertible and it’s very nice to drive. We headed up Highway 1 past Santa Monica and Venice and then on to the Pacific Coast Highway to Malibu. At Malibu we cut across to Interstate 101. Driving on the right has been a challenge but I’m getting the hang of it, no mishaps so that’s good . There has been quite a bit of traffic on some of the roads (especially on the I-101 just out of LA) but the roads are well maintained. [View Full Entry]

---

---

We arrived off the plane about 2:00pm on Tuesday 12th May. Immigration was the usual officious, surly experience but there was no lines. After studying the transport options we decided to take a taxi to our motel. We are staying at the Hollywood Downtowner Motel in Hollywood. it’s a nice location and the hotel is good value, (its cheap, small but clean). Shayla at the desk gave us the low down on where to go in the area. First stop was to go down to Hollywood, there was a couple of things we noticed: 1. There was a whole lot of [View Full Entry]

---

---