Birthdays and final days

Monday 27th July

Today I am a little excited and a little sad all at the same time.  Excited because we are heading back to LA staying in Huntington Beach in a hotel and going to visit some more great places.  Sad because our trip has come to an end again.

It's a fairly long drive today made longer because I looked at the map incorrectly and instead of heading left off the 125 we headed right and took the 101 instead of the I5 whoopsies!!  no big drama really and saw some stuff that we wouldn't have otherwise seen wineries etc.

We arrived in Huntington Beach well Sunset Beach really.  We found our hotel easily Ocean View.....mmmm where is the ocean oh there it is!!!!  LOL

 We settled in well and then another hotel with no laundry!!
For dinner we ate the last our microwavable stuff and drank the beers we got.

Tuesday 28th July
Happy Australian birthday to me another 48hr celebration begins!!!  woohoo and to kick it off an 11km run along Huntington Beach to Sunset Beach then Balsa Chica Beach and back again what a way to start the day!!!!.  I was pretty wrecked after that so David went out to do the laundry while I stayed back to blog.

When David got back we drove to a mall to do some shopping, have lunch and wash the car.
We both got trail runners for around $70AUD New Balance for me and Asics for him pretty happy with that!  There were so many cool baby things I could have got but I held back yes yes I know I have no one expecting as yet but a Nana can dream.
Yummy Teriyake chicken for lunch and then off to the car wash.  We have this down pat now and it cost $4 to rinse/soap/no spot rinse....ha ha such fun and the car looks great I know we didn't have to but it was so filthy!
On our run this morning we saw a place called Don's Beachcomber within walking distance of our hotel and Tuesday is all-you-can-eat Fish Fry sooo it's fish for my birthday dinner woohoo.  It's a lovely restaurant and the cocktails were yummy two birthday Mai Tai's for moi!

we finish with delicious desserts.  Hawaiian rum cake is my birthday cake apparently! and it's yum Dave goes for the bread pudding.
What a great day looking forward to my actual birthday tomorrow. :)

Wednesday 29th July 51 today!!!!!

We pack up our bags and by we I mean David (he's the best packer in the house and I leave him to it).  It's a tight squeeze and we may have to repack a little at the airport (which always makes me laugh) we have a 23kg bag limit but if we go over let's just move it to our hand luggage BUT it still goes on the plane LOL I know it's so the handlers don't have to lift a too heavy bag!

Our flight is not until 10:40pm so we have planned a day looking around some of the sites in LA that we have never been to before.  Firstly we head up a little north to a place called 'The Great Wall of LA' it's amazing!!!! it's a mural in a concrete drain that depicts the history of LA from prehistoric times to today.  The paintings are wonderful and colourful.  We spend a little time wandering along the mile long mural.

Next we head back downtown to find Batman's cave.  We end up on Hollywood Boulevarde aarrggghhh!!! then we find Canyon Drive BUT we never do find Batman's Cave oh well it was a nice drive and then our GPS takes us through the Hollywood Hills to the LA Zoo.  I so love Zoos and this one is a great Zoo.  We have lunch as soon as we enter at the Grill and whaddya know they serve beer I LOVE this country!  The enclosures are large and the animals are out and about even though it is a very hot day. hence beer at lunch and hey it's my birthday!  We wander around for ages checking out the animals (the elephant enclosure is one of the largest I have ever seen).
Then we head towards the airport and stop at Chick-fil-A for some food.  We order and on the way to the loo I see these cute cows wearing sandwich boards saying"'eat mor chikin!" so I ask our server if I can buy one and she comes back with one and gives it to me I think it's like a Happy Meal toy at Maccas LOL

Then it's off to the airport dropped off our car and jumped in the shuttle.  When we got to the airport we are half a kilo over weight so yes of course we have to repack so David takes one pair of socks and a shoe out of the suitcase and puts it in his pocket LOL  We get up to our departure gate and find out we are 40 minutes delayed.  It's very cold up here but we have organised warm clothes for the flight ....so glad!!!  Then I spy some teenagers eating Yoghurtland and I say to David "oooh hat could be my last birthday treat!"  so off he goes to get some while I look after our backpacks.

I am disappointed when we finally board because I am positive that I had booked seats where we had nothing in front of us, so when we board and we are in the row behind my heart sinks!!!  oh well make the most of it.  I go from being really hot to freezing cold the whole flight but the 14 hours goes surprisingly quickly and we are sitting on a train to Newcastle before we know it!  Glad to be home yipeeeeeeeee

Until next time...............

Pinnacles NP

Sunday 26th July
Leaving Walnut Creek today the drive down the highway is very smoky.  There are several fires around California and we are thinking of all the firefighters especially our friend Bill Moody.

The drive to The Pinnacles NP is very narrow and windy and I have to slow down quite a bit as the edge of the road is very close to the car.

We arrive at the visitor centre and are surprised to find they have 83 campsites so we find one and go back to the visitor centre to pay.  The next surprise is that there are showers at this campground (very rare for US campgrounds) Happy Days!!!!  Once we set up the tent we drive out to explore the park it's quite small compared to the other parks we have visited (our Annual pass has got a massive workout well worth the $80) and it does not have a road running all the way through so we drive out as far as we can and then hike up to check out the caves which have been formed by falling boulders.  Just a short hike today.

At the visitors centre they warned us about the local raccoon population and reiterated keeping our tent closed storing our food either in the bearproof lockers (no bears though) or the car and keep all windows completely closed.  I was quite worried about the raccoons and thought we would be overrun by them.  We watched as the condors soared in and settled in nearby trees for the night we counted over 30 of them.  As it got dark we were very vigilant and put all our food away.  We decided to go for a walk with our torches and check things out....still no raccoons.....it was a very bright, moonlit night and perfect for a walk.  As we got back to our tent we heard some rustling in a nearby tree and A raccoon climbed down and wandered off in the opposite direction ....so much for being overrun I had to laugh!!!

Another great camping experience and a little sad that it is our last for this trip.  So looking forward to our next camping adventure whenever that may be.

Crissy Field parkrun!!!!!

Saturday 25th July
David went across the road early this morning to Taco Bell for some breakfast.  Yeah not good but the only thing close by and nothing in the room to prepare a better breaky so TB it is.
When we left Walnut Creek to head to Crissy Field for parkrun it is sunny and warm, I am sooo glad we took jackets with us 'just in case'!!
We arrive at Crissy Field and the bridge is fogged in and it is blowing a gale and FREEZING!!!
Even though we arrived at 8:45am there is no sign of any parkrun paraphenalia so it takes us a while to find them.  Finally we see a small group of people standing around a box with a sign.  No parkrun flags or cones set out??  It becomes pretty obvious that there are a LOT of people there who have never been to this parkrun before and in fact, find out that of the 45 runners that day only 6 were locals.  There were people there who were competing in the San Francisco marathon the next day.  Lots of people from the UK, another couple from Australia (it turns out that one of my work colleagues studied at Uni with the husband!! small world eh?)  The RD explains the route, which runs through a car park LOL, and we start the run.  There is a fair headwind heading towards the Golden Gate Bridge and as I'm running I'm thinking this will be great on the way back, so I round the turn cone and start running back down the gravel pathway and all I can think is "This is so not helping!!" ha ha.  David has been running a fair way behind me snapping photos and then about a kilometre from the finish he runs up beside me!!! oh my! that made my day NOT! and then he beat me to the finish!  After parkrun we go to the nearby cafe for a coffee and chat to the organisers.

We took clothes with us to change into as we have planned a bit of sightseeing.  Changing into dry clothes helps but it is still very cold!  David has planned some things to look at and then after talking to Mike last night we have decided to go to the Giants v Oakland A's baseball game this afternoon.  He says there are $16 bleacher seats so that sounds good.  We decide to park up near the Marina and brave the public transport to get to the ball game but end up walking a LONG way instead.  We arrive at the ground just after the game has started and when we buy our tickets of course the bleacher seats are all sold out and we pay a bit more for seats up the back of the stadium but we have a great time and the game is very entertaining.  Burgers and beer and we are all set!  To get back to the car we manage to negotiate the transport system a 'little' better and end up walking only a little way.

Getting back to Walnut Creek proves VERY difficult as we get caught up in a massive traffic jam!  It takes us 2 and half hours to travel the same distance that it took us 40 minutes to travel this morning.  Half an hour at one particular intersection because two buses decided to use the green light even though the traffic was banked up into the intersection!!!  too funny  David joked that I should jump out and order food and bring it to the car, in hindsight, I should have!!!!  It didn't ruin what was a lovely day out though.

Walnut Creek

Friday 24th July
From Lassen we drive to Walnut Creek.  Our plan is to meet our friend Mike Blumencrantz for dinner after we do our washing.
On the way we stop in Sacramento to visit the PCT Association office and have a great time talking to Jack.  He gives us some stickers, maps and a magazine.  We ask lots of questions that we have about different aspects of hiking the PCT.  We talk for so long Jack nearly misses his lunch break what a trooper!  We buy some books and a pair of earrings (PCT logo LOL) and leave very excited about planning this amazing adventure.
We arrive around 4pm after stopping at REI to look at stuff.  We end up buying two more books (ones we couldn't get from the PCT assoc), a pair of long hiking pants and a swiss army knife (my birthday presie :) happy girl).
Not happy that the hotel doesn't have a laundry so we drive over to one only to discover that the laundromat has better wifi than the hotel!!! huzzah! so while I blogged Dave washed!  He got talking to a guy there and he said "she has you well trained!" David's reply "No she's doing the important stuff!" and "I'm self trained" I so love that man!!
We contacted Mike and organised to meet at the Pyramid Alehouse in town.  We have a lovely time chatting and eating and drinking the local brew is yummy and the food was great.