bringingdilystotheworld
Dilys Joined: July 28th 2007
Logged in: October 18th 2007
Logged in: October 18th 2007
The plan:
Who: Yours truly
Where: Los Angeles - San Francisco - Vancouver - Ottawa - Washington DC - New York - London (so far...haha)
Why: To study at the University of Ottawa and see North America.
How long: 5 months.
How: By those things they call planes and using what they call money.
Travel Blog Posts
The Montreal Group
The ‘going away for the weekend’ bug started early for most of us with a trip to Montreal in week 2 of the semester. By this time i was a pro at packing my suitcase efficiently and thus did it in the early hours of the morning after our International Students Boat Cruise. The boat cruise for those of you who don’t know ran from 11pm - 2am so by the time the bus they hired got us back to rez and i was in my oh so cumfy pj’s it was nearly 4am. Sleep wasn’t really high on the priority list that night because we had to wake up to catch the 9am bus to Montreal and thus this explained most of our moods for the rest of the morning. The greyhound got us to ... read more
uOttawa
I arrived in Ottawa about a week before uni started so i could sort out my units and settle myself into residence life and the study that would necessarily follow. When i arrived the weather was absolutely beautiful - hot, sunny and a lot like the Perth summer that seemed so long ago. Considering our flight from Vancouver left at 11:30am, the duration being around 5hrs and Ottawa being a few hours ahead of time, I arrived in Ottawa airport at about 7:30pm. I was contemplating taking a taxi to residence but the sun was still out. Instead i dragged my luggage onto the bus and took the OC to campus (the transport system in Ottawa is called OC Transport hahah). Just a friendly side note, the bus system is nuts here - in some parts ... read more
Saks Fifth Avenue
With Stop 1 complete, Hayden & I set out to explore Stop 2 - Sanfrancisco. Thanks to Olivia i was prepared for the fact that Sanfran had good shopping (see Shoppers Guide magazine) but i knew little of the city apart from the fact that this was where Full House was filmed and cable cars belonged. Before i go on let me just say this city is nuts, its so hilly cars park with their wheels turned in. Sanfran is certainly not the city for anyone who is in a wheelchair, has foot problems, has leg problems, has hip problems or is just not generally fit because if your living or working in the downtown area walking is a sport in itself here. Golden Gate Good Fortune Cookie Factory For the life of me i cant ... read more
View of LA
Im finally updating my blog haha, about time you ask? well i agree....By this time Hayden & I are starting to feel like home in California - we were use to people asking us for money down the street, we actually know and are familiar with the train system (well hayden was anyway....), we watch shows like 'The Hills' (aka reality versions of the OC) on TV with a passion in our hotels, we no longer made fun of the way they pronounced words on the news anymore and most of all (prepare yourself) - we get asked for directions!! us!! hahahahaThus we thought it would be a fitting time to visit Hollywood - the place all tourists seem to visit first, we were doing towards the end of our trip (were so conventional haha). We ... read more
Shuttle Bus
Okay, its been a while since the last entry but i refuse to give up because then Jo will be right haha. The fact that mum resorted to reading Hayden's travel blog to update herself on my whereabouts caused me some slight concern and as a result here i am haha. I’m not sure if its normal for someone my age to feel like this but I was giddy with excitement on the day we visited Universal City, Hollywood. This was going to be funnn, it was a theme park day at the adult version of Disney Land. We took the train to the Universal City station and a little shuttle bus takes you up the hill (and rightly so, i wasnt going to walk). Dissapointingly this was the one time my height was working against ... read more
Phillipe the Original
Today we moved to the Comfort Inn in LA which was 5 seconds from the train station. Apart from the pawn shop and sprinkle of buskers around the corner, the place was great (highly recommended). They had a breakfast room with a waffle machine (yes waffle machine!), coffee machine, bagels, bread, donuts, fruit, cereal etc and more importantly it was all freeeeee (oh the student in me finally comes out). We decided to explore the cultural side of LA today visiting China Town and El Pueblo. I did not have too high an expectation for China Town (I saved that for Vancouver - and rightly so) and thus our walk through the stalls of Chinese merchandise, attire and whatever else they were selling was fairly quick. El Pueblo however was another story. It was nice to ... read more
Santa Monica
Today we decided to hit the beaches - Santa Monica and then Venice Beach. Santa Monica Los Angeles locals like to talk on the bus, not to themselves, but to people they dont know - other locals and tourists alike. I love just sitting on the bus and listening to people talk, im not actually evesdropping because its not the conversation that interests me but the way some Americans put so much energy into the way they speak. For example today Hayden & I were very much entertained by two African Americans as they discussed how one of them was hit by a car when walking down the road and how the other one has reformed his life from one of crime and jail. Anyway, Santa Monica is not just a beach - theres obviously the ... read more
UCLA Mascott
Its currently summer in LA atm and thus the weather is hot. Think a perth summer where the sun is hot and dry with the a cool breeze here and there. I love it! UCLA Hayden & I decided that on our trip we should scope out some of the university's in the US and our first stop was UCLA (University of California Los Angeles). This place is absolutely beautiful/stunning/breathtaking. The first thing that you notice when you get there is the scale of UCLA, its very very big (just like everything else in LA). The second thing you notice is the beauty - a lot of thought and effort was put into the architecture of the place and its surroundings. There are beautifully designed buildings surrounded by lots of trees and grass (you know how ... read more
Dilys with LA Cops Chuck & Larry
Armed with our map, lonely planet and sunnies Hayden & I set our sights on discovering LA, so here it goes! The Original Pantry Hayden finally woke up at around 7:30am. Considering i had been awake since 3am i was well and truly ready to find some good food for breakfast. While the hotel was fantastic (*thumbs up to the Doubletree*) there was only so much you could do in the early hours of the morning. I had the feeling that the concierge at the front desk thought i was weird as i asked him a gazillion questions, went on the internet, went to the gym and went for a walk all before 8am. Anyway, we finally took the train (whoops more precisely i mean 'tram' or 'trail') to Downtown to discover what was on offer. ... read more
Hayden & I on the plane
Flight Path: Perth - Singapore (stopover) - Taiwan (transit) - United States (LA) Flight Time: 7:45am Flight Duration: ~24 hrs Flight food: excessive amounts. Flight company: Hayden, myself and Jane (or at least i think that was her name, she went to bali for a week and was coming back.... personally i dont think bali deserved the sacrifice of a 24hr flight tho...) Im not sure how Hayden & I ended up with 7:45am flights, but we did and thus we had to get to the airport early in the morning, very early! Considering i was up till 2am doing last minute packing i wasnt exactly looking like posh spice in my high heels and designer gear for my international flight, my bad. We said our goodbyes at Perth International Airport and off we went! ... read more
