San Diego - Mexico - Canada

After being in LA, the next stop was San Diego. A must-do attraction is definitely the zoo. Very nice enclosures and the best is, that you can see some Panda-bears there. Also interesting, when not sleeping, are the Koalas.
As I was at the border, I also decided to cross it for a short trip to Mexico, Tijuana and Ensenada. But it seemed like those places are more tourist spots, cause everything was more American in Spanish, than Mexican... If that's understandable.
So these have been the last stations on my vacations of my vacations... sounds a bit weird to say it, but well... what else should I call it? Coming back to Canada was quite fun, even if i had to wait 5 hours for my connecting flight in Calgary, but now I have two permits to stay here... don't know if that brings any advantage...

Back in Vancouver is quite cool, I attended a ice hockey match two does ago, in the end the Canucks won 4-1 over the Ducks and there have been 4 brawls, one including every player. What more do you can get from a hockey match?

Pismo Beach to LA

I can just recommend everybody to go to Pismo Beach once. That place is awesome, wonderful, small town at the sea, with a beautiful beach and sand dunes. It's also a super surfing spot. And you can get excellent Clam Chowder there.
After staying there for a night I headed for San Luis Obispo. This is a crazy town, I never saw so many weird people in one spot. Don't get me wrong, all are very nice, but just weird from the way they look, act or talk. To get to LA I chose to take the train with the wonderful name Pacific Surfliner. Again, an excellent idea, it's a very scenery route thru sand dunes with wonderful views of the ocean. I even saw a bigger animal in the sea, just couldn't make out what it was, probably a whale.
Once in LA I did the obvious things you have to do. A tour trough Hollywood, checking out the Hollywood Boulevard, including Chinese Theater and Kodak Theater. And my favorite on the first day, the tar pit. Where there even was some kind of dogfestival, I wasn't aware of. The next day I checked out downtown, including Chinatown, Little Tokyo, etc. I like those quarters, really nice. The afternoon was basically spent at the beach, in particular Santa Monica and Venice Beach, crazy, but very cool areas to hang out.

San Francisco - Santa Cruz

Those were the first to stops on my trip so far.

San Francisco is a very interesting place to be, loads of stuff to see or do. Definitely worth it is going to Alcatraz, really interesting. I have also done the obligatory ride in a cable car, checked out the Golden Gate Bridge and went to Chinatown. That is a really cool place with many weird things to see.

Thereafter I took the bus down to Santa Cruz to visit Jonathan and Pitt. This town is also really cool, would have been even better if the Boardwalk, an amusement park would have been open, but unfortunately it is already closed during the week. Same applies for the Surfing museum, too bad. We also took a dip into the pacific, pretty cold, but fun as there are huge waves here and a lot of animals around, like sea otters or seals. Still is is very cool and laid back place everybody should have a stop while driving by. I really enjoyed it.

Now I have to leave again for the next destination, San Luis Obispo!

Time to leave

At least for two weeks. My backpack is ready for a two week trip from San Francisco to San Diego. That means I have to get up at 4:30am to catch my flight, and then, hopefully, I will arrive in San Francisco, unless there is another pipeline blowing up. From SFO the plan is to go to Santa Cruz... more information once I hit the road ;-)

I spent yesterday downtown and checked out some museums, but the highlight was definitely the play I saw at the Fringe. Actually two plays, both held in the old Coroners office and Police Museum. Very cool spots and a unique location. Absolutely recommendable to watch that. The show itself was called 'After the End'.

So time to get some sleep to be ready for the US and A!!!

First days in Canada

So I made it to Canada. Quite a spontaneous decision to get here, but why not?

I'm in Vancouver for 5 days now and what have I done so far?

After arriving on Wednesday nothing much, just checked out what have change, since I've been here last time. Not much in Aldergrove, but unbelievable lot of construction work is going on, which makes trips quite long. And I thought is all done after the Olympics. Thanks to the Jetleg, Thursday started at 5am here and was more about finding my way around.. So I checked out the cows and had some fun with the cats, 6 of them are living in the house at the moment, which makes it quite lively.

That's where I'm living

The Cows

and the cats (Tortie, Panther & Mr. Cuddels [front to back])

On Friday night I went to the P'n'E, which is a fair and amusement park, with Nathan, a friend I met 4 years ago. Big fun night with games and rides. Quite cool was a 50+ year old wooden roller coaster. That one was much better then the modern steel ones.

Gorgeous view on Mt. Baker behind Blueberry fields

Saturday was the busiest day so far, I've been downtown and strolled through the city to check out what changed. Very cool is the new seawalk up to Stanley Park. I had a nice lunch at the English Beach and then went down to check out Gastown and the Chinese Night Market. Interesting, but the Richmond one is much better. Afterwards I checked out the nightlife with Lee and we went to some Irish Pub.

The next day was the sportsday, first I went to a pick up game with Nathan, to get some exercise, thereafter we went to watch a match of his brother and finally we went to the Whitecaps vs. Puerto Rico game... unfortunately slightly boring it ended up 0:0.

With pouring rain yesterday it was time to check out the Superstore, I just love those big groceries stores.

So that's what I've done in the last couple of days. Plans for the next are not settled, but I have to arrange some final things for my trip to California... but more on that later on.

PS: If someone wants to get a postcard, send me your address ;-)