LA

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This one's being written a bit late seeing as we have now been in New Zealand for over a week but anyway here it is.

We stayed in West Hollywood in a really good hostel called Banana Bungalow and had a pretty busy week. On the day of our arrival we met two sisters from Kent who were in our room and spent the week with them. It was raining when we arrived so Rhi and I decided to go to Madame Tussauds to take silly photos with the wax works.

On our first whole day we walked up to Hollywood Boulevard to see the Walk of Fame and Graumann's Chinese Theatre. We then walked all the way down Sunset strip and saw The Viper Rooms and House of Blues. We walked right to Beverly Hills and down Rodeo Drive, where we did some celeb spotting and caught a glimpse of Andre Leon Talley, not that I knew who he was.

Day two we got up early to get to Universal Studios ready for when they opended to get our money's worth! We managed to do all the rides and see all the shows. On the studio tour we saw the sets for Jaws, Jurassic Park, Desperate Housewives and some of the King Kong set which included an awesome 360 4D simulator. We also did the House of Horror bit which was actually terrifying! It involved walking around a big, dark house with lots of dark corners with people dressed as horror characters jumping out at you and chasing you around in the dark! All in all a very good day!

Seeing as Universal was so expensive, the following day we had a nice cheap day. We caught the bus to Santa Monica and spent the day lying on the beach appreciating the lovely sun. We also explored the pier and found the original Muscle Beach.

Day four we hiked up to get a better view of the Hollywood sign, which was hard work in the heat! In the afternoon we did the very touristy thing getting one of the tour buses around the city and to see some of the celebs' homes. The tour itself was pretty poor as our driver didn't seem to know what he was talking about and you can't actually see the houses as they are all behind massive gates and hedges. That evening there was a party in the hostel which ended up being a pretty awesome night.

For our last proper day in LA we all went down to Venice Beach. Had a nice stroll along the boardwalk, seeing the street performers and artists. Before catching our shuttle to the airport Rhi and I went up to High Voltage, the tattoo shop from LA ink. No tattoos though as there is a $200 minimum so just a nice t-shirt each. Lunch in "The Grove" then shuttle to the airport to await our 13 hour flight into Auckland.

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