December 23rd, 2003

Posted on 22 December @ 10:50pm @ Melanies house.

Just back from LA. Heres what went on.
Friday we flew out of Seattle to LAX. Got there in the afternoon – the flight was around 2 hours. Melanies friend holly was there to pick us up and went went back to her place. The drive was fairly long – it was in the arvo so it was busy. Drove past Malibu and the beaches and stuff.
Got back to Hollys place and met Luke – her husband. We ate and slept an that was friday done with.
Saturday we got up and went or a drive around with Luke. Holyl had to work in the morning. So Luke took us back down to the Malibu area – gave us a tour of the Uni he is going to – its really expensive looking. Picked Holly up on the way back to their place. From there, Luke headed off to do some other stuff so Mel, Me and Holly went down to the water. IM not sure what the name of it was but it had a lot of boats and stuff. There where a few shops and stuff around there so we had a look at those. After looking round there we headed back to their place via the fish and chips shop.
Ate tea and watched a dvd and slept.
Sunday we got up and all headed into LA – or more precisely – Hollywood. didnt take long to drive there in Lukes car. Found a parking lot to put the car in and started walking. Went to the corner of Hollywood and Vine streets where the ‘stars in the footpath’ start and followed it down form there. It was a great sunny day and we spent the whole day in downtown hollywood. Saw a few landmarks and visited the touristy shops and stuff.

Yup – thats me with the hollywood sign behind me – it is.. really… it is behind me… its just a little small Ive got a bigger picture that shows it better.

We ate lunch at a food place – i had mongolian grill which was really good. After lunch we headed down to street level to where a lot of busker type people where doing stuff. One of them was this big ol african american dude with a huge hat on that was rapping to peoples names as they walked past. It was really funny. Anyway he made up a rap for Luke and Holly which i got on video – also made on up fopr me to which also got taped. Ill try to put some of it up for download – the dude was funny.

We continued to walk up and down the main street. Saw the Chinese theatre and the ‘footprint / hand prints in the cement’ section. There where people dressed up in that area as batman and superman and stuff for pictures.

By the time we walked up and down the street it was getting dark and we all kinda wanted to find the car before it got too dark. Hollywood apparently gets pretty seedy after dark – who wouldnt have guessed huh?

So yeah we walked back and found the car then drove back to Luke and Hollys place. All in all it was a good day. 1 day doesnt do the place justice though. Youd need at least a week in the area to get around everything and see all the stuff, but the time we had there was good.

Monday we spent the day organising our stuff and packing up. Somthing interesting that happened was that there was an earthquake during the morning!. Yup! and earthquake!. I was sitting on Luke and Hollys lounge, holly was in her room having a shower and mel was in the other toilet. Anyway the lounge started wobbling! I didnt know what was happening and though i was giddy or somthing until the cupboard on the side with glasses in it started shacking too and the glasses touched each other. It was kinda strange. It wasnt until after it was done that i thought “wow that must of been an earthquake!”. Lukily it was that bad in the area we where. The news showed that some other places had building doen but it wasnt that serious or bad.

So yeah, Left luke and hollys and headed to LAX and flew out at around 5:18pm. Got back to Seattle at around 8pm.

So the weekend was good . Got a quick but decent look at LA. Its definately somthing to see at least once. But yeah id like to go back again someday and do the other touristy stuff.

Its kinda ‘dreamy’ being over here and seeing places / buildings / stuff that ive seen in movies and on tv. Its like its not all real or somthing – kinda hard to explain. I guess being in Australia makes everything on tv and the movies seem so far away – yep coming over here its like they are in your back yard. *shrugs*

Anyway – im about done for now. Christmas is in the next few days – wont be long and we will be on the plane back to Australia. Time has flown. Ive had a blast being over here and seen so much cool stuff.