Santa Monica

Steve - Before heading to Fiji we had to head back up to LA for a couple of nights before getting our connecting flight on. This meant a really long day of travel and we did not get into LA until late. We had decided to stay in Santa Monica as it was one place we hadn't really seen well the first time around and we also figured it would be nice to stay by the beach. We had booked a cheap motel online the day before as we didn't get in until 11pm but we had no idea what it would be really like. It was pretty horrible! Within a few momentsw of moving in some sort of animal sprang through a gap in the wall! We went to complain but he had no other rooms and it was midnight so we were stuck with it! We tried to put it out of minds but at about 3.30 in the morning i could hear at least 2 mice/rats in the room. That was it we were out of there! So we headed to a fast food place across the road and waited for daylight!

Come daylight we got a refund for the next night and money off that night and moved into a motel right on the beach which was much nicer. Santa Monica is really nice, it has a really nice pier like Weston but there are a lot less chavs! There is also a really nice shopping area which Kate loved and went a bit crazy buying beach stuff - shame its going to be winter in New Zealand! It was also nice to have some American food - a great change from rice! I particularly loved Bubba Gumps shrimp place on the pier. I also managed to eat a Chilli dog, a chilli burger and have chilli and eggs for lunch all in one day! It don't get any better than that!

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