My morning was a bit rushed. I was taking a fairly early bus out of Los Angeles, using some small independent Vietnamese bus company that was going to pick me up in China Town. The main issue was that I had to have a printed copy of my ticket, which I had forgotten to do in advance, and I had to wait for the staff at the hostel to get up (they tend to party pretty hard, and normal office hours weren't until 11am), and then we had problems getting the printer to work. Once we finally got things working it was a pretty quick ride to China Town since it was on the same subway line as where my hostel was, so I managed to get there in time. The ride wasn't very good. The bus was cramped and completely filled, with only 5 people that weren't Asian.
We got into San Francisco in the late evening, and by the time I got to my hostel the sun was down. The hostel I stayed in was huge, and one of the few real organized hostels I've encountered in the US. It must have had a few hundred beds, and had other perks like a fully-equipped industrial kitchen, pool tables and even a small movie theater. It was right on the border of the nicer part of downtown and the much less nice Tenderloin district (you can't expect much from a district named Tenderloin) which was full of beggars and homeless. Since it was already evening by the time I settled in I only went out to get a pizza, and then spent the rest of the evening trying to plan out what to do in San Francisco.
Monday, March 25, 2013
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Day 350: LA - The Hidden Places
With much of the big touristy stuff out of the way I decided to spend my last day in LA doing the sort of thing I enjoy most, which is exploring interesting neighborhoods, wandering down back alleys and generally just looking for cool places tucked out of the way. I had gotten a few suggestions from people in the hostel, and had looked some things up online to make a list of plays to see. I ended up not getting to half of it, mostly due to one of the stops, Culver City, taking longer than I expected to get to, and then getting a bit lost there. I can't share the highlights of the day until I do my street art post, but the Culver City trip was worth the effort. I hopped around to a few other places after that, but in general I was pretty ready to move on in my trip.
Day 349: LA - Being a Tourist
After a good night's sleep I was ready to go again. Like most cities, and especially cities in the USA, I wasn't really sure what to do. Big American cities have all these things they are famous for, but I kind of feel that they are only famous because they put them in movies and talk about them a lot - and they don't really have much inherent interest for me. For Los Angeles, I started my explorations by looking around downtown some (it turns out downtown LA isn't really all that interesting).
I took the metro up to Hollywood, which was a bit more interesting. It has all the tacky iconic stuff, but also had some nice street art. I have somewhat mixed feelings about the touristy stuff. I found the entire Hollywood sign and Walk of Fame pretty underwhelming, but I did enjoy the Chinese Theater and going through all the handprints out front.
I spent the evening back at the hostel spending time with the people living there, partly because it had been drizzling off and on all day and I didn't feel like staying outdoors. Most of them were semi-permanent, having been staying in the hostel for at least a couple weeks, and while a lot of them were pretty strange, they were a good group.
I took the metro up to Hollywood, which was a bit more interesting. It has all the tacky iconic stuff, but also had some nice street art. I have somewhat mixed feelings about the touristy stuff. I found the entire Hollywood sign and Walk of Fame pretty underwhelming, but I did enjoy the Chinese Theater and going through all the handprints out front.
I spent the evening back at the hostel spending time with the people living there, partly because it had been drizzling off and on all day and I didn't feel like staying outdoors. Most of them were semi-permanent, having been staying in the hostel for at least a couple weeks, and while a lot of them were pretty strange, they were a good group.
Friday, March 22, 2013
Day 348: The Longest Day
I was sitting out in this little park/plaza on my tablet with my backpack and bags piled around me in the middle of the night. It's sort of in the middle of the bar area, and it was a Friday night (or very early Saturday morning) so there were lots of really drunk people stumbling around shouting a lot. A few came over to talk with me, but it's New Zealand, so nobody really gave me much of a hassle. Finally around 3am I walked to the corner and caught my shuttle bus to the airport. There were only 2 other people on board, and the ride was a lot faster than it had been when I flew into Auckland due to there being nobody getting on or off and no traffic. I checked in and lounged around the airport and read some more. My flight path was a bit strange. It was cheaper to go to LA through Melbourne than direct, even though going through Melbourne meant flying for hours in the wrong direction first. I'm more concerned with money than time, and spending long hours sitting in a vehicle is routine by now.
The issue in Melbourne was that I was transferring between two airlines (JetStar and Qantas), and they weren't going to transfer my backpack to the second flight automatically. This meant that I had to get my bag, queue up to go through border control, go through another queue at customs (which is very thorough in Australia), go to the Qantas desk to get my boarding pass and check my bag for the new flight, then go through more queues back through security and border control again. There was only about 1:15 between when the first flight landed and I was supposed to board the second flight, and with all the long lines that time disappeared quickly and I was feeling a little nervous (and rather tired since I still hadn't slept). Ultimately I did get there in just under the time I needed, but it turned out to be moot since there was some sort of equipment trouble and boarding was delayed 40 minutes anyway. Finally we got on the plane and it was time to head back the way I'd just come, flying east over the Pacific.
The person sitting next to me on the flight was a blind Australian who was eventually heading to Venezuela to visit hospitals and orphanages as a clown with Patch Adams. That, combined with me having been travelling the world for a year made for lots to talk about. I also watched a few movies, and got a couple hours of much needed sleep. American border control is known for being pretty thorough, so the lines were slow. When it was finally my turn, I got grilled. My passport is by now rather colourful, which seemed to make him suspcious (in Australia, people going to backpack around the world is almost part of growing up, in America, not so much). This led to him asking for additional identification, which hasn't happened anywhere else in the world. I gave him additional identification, but of course since it's me the names didn't match exactly since all my IDs are slightly different. This led to more questioning about all my aliases (no, I've never gone by the name Rico Martinez Miller) before eventually letting me continue on. I finally got into the main terminal about 7:30am on March 7, the same time and date as I'd left Auckland like 20+ hours ago (gotta love the date-line time travel flights). I took my time getting a shuttle to Union Station, and since I was still really early decided to walk to Mariachi Plaza instead of taking the subway. My hostel was across the Los Angeles River, and in a rather poor and run down Mexican/Latino area. The hostel itself was a small independent one, but the staff was friendly and it was right next to the subway. I was pretty exhausted still from all the travel and not getting much sleep on the plane, so I napped a little and just spent the day in the local area, talking with other guests in the hostel and finding some nice little restaurants in the local area. After months of craving Mexican food, bein in the Mexican part of LA certainly gave me a lot of options. I managed to put off going to bed until late, partially since it was Saturday night and there were a lot of people coming and going. Finally I got some well deserved sleep.
The issue in Melbourne was that I was transferring between two airlines (JetStar and Qantas), and they weren't going to transfer my backpack to the second flight automatically. This meant that I had to get my bag, queue up to go through border control, go through another queue at customs (which is very thorough in Australia), go to the Qantas desk to get my boarding pass and check my bag for the new flight, then go through more queues back through security and border control again. There was only about 1:15 between when the first flight landed and I was supposed to board the second flight, and with all the long lines that time disappeared quickly and I was feeling a little nervous (and rather tired since I still hadn't slept). Ultimately I did get there in just under the time I needed, but it turned out to be moot since there was some sort of equipment trouble and boarding was delayed 40 minutes anyway. Finally we got on the plane and it was time to head back the way I'd just come, flying east over the Pacific.
The person sitting next to me on the flight was a blind Australian who was eventually heading to Venezuela to visit hospitals and orphanages as a clown with Patch Adams. That, combined with me having been travelling the world for a year made for lots to talk about. I also watched a few movies, and got a couple hours of much needed sleep. American border control is known for being pretty thorough, so the lines were slow. When it was finally my turn, I got grilled. My passport is by now rather colourful, which seemed to make him suspcious (in Australia, people going to backpack around the world is almost part of growing up, in America, not so much). This led to him asking for additional identification, which hasn't happened anywhere else in the world. I gave him additional identification, but of course since it's me the names didn't match exactly since all my IDs are slightly different. This led to more questioning about all my aliases (no, I've never gone by the name Rico Martinez Miller) before eventually letting me continue on. I finally got into the main terminal about 7:30am on March 7, the same time and date as I'd left Auckland like 20+ hours ago (gotta love the date-line time travel flights). I took my time getting a shuttle to Union Station, and since I was still really early decided to walk to Mariachi Plaza instead of taking the subway. My hostel was across the Los Angeles River, and in a rather poor and run down Mexican/Latino area. The hostel itself was a small independent one, but the staff was friendly and it was right next to the subway. I was pretty exhausted still from all the travel and not getting much sleep on the plane, so I napped a little and just spent the day in the local area, talking with other guests in the hostel and finding some nice little restaurants in the local area. After months of craving Mexican food, bein in the Mexican part of LA certainly gave me a lot of options. I managed to put off going to bed until late, partially since it was Saturday night and there were a lot of people coming and going. Finally I got some well deserved sleep.
Days 346-347: Waiting to Leave
I took my last bus ride of New Zealand from Taupo, back up through Rotorua and finally to Auckland. During our hike across Tongariro our group had a lengthy discussion on New Zealand meat pies, which seem to be something of a national dish. One of the places that came up was a little bakery in Rotorua that had delicious pies, so when I happened to have an hour between transferring buses around lunch in Rotorua I managed to hunt the place down and get a few award-winning pies.
I had purposely booked a hostel a bit closer to where the buses come and go, mostly so that I wouldn't have so far to work at the dreadfully early hour I had to go at to catch my plane when I finally left the city. I didn't really have much I wanted to do in Auckland, but I did hang out in the city for much of the second day, just browsing through comic and book shops and sitting around in parks or by the water. Although I booked 2 nights in my hostel, I ultimately only slept there once. My flight from Auckland to Los Angeles left around 7am, and between the few hours early I'd have to get to the airport, the bus to get there, and the walk from my hostel to the bus stop I'd have had to get up around 3am to do everything comfortably. Instead I just walked to a nearby park where I could use wifi (my hostel was charging $10 a day to use wifi - one of the things I really hate about New Zealand) and just spent the night reading a book on my tablet and planning out the next few weeks a little.
I had purposely booked a hostel a bit closer to where the buses come and go, mostly so that I wouldn't have so far to work at the dreadfully early hour I had to go at to catch my plane when I finally left the city. I didn't really have much I wanted to do in Auckland, but I did hang out in the city for much of the second day, just browsing through comic and book shops and sitting around in parks or by the water. Although I booked 2 nights in my hostel, I ultimately only slept there once. My flight from Auckland to Los Angeles left around 7am, and between the few hours early I'd have to get to the airport, the bus to get there, and the walk from my hostel to the bus stop I'd have had to get up around 3am to do everything comfortably. Instead I just walked to a nearby park where I could use wifi (my hostel was charging $10 a day to use wifi - one of the things I really hate about New Zealand) and just spent the night reading a book on my tablet and planning out the next few weeks a little.
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Days 344-345: Resting in Taupo
Originally I'd planned to squeeze one more place in before returning to Auckland to fly out, but after all the bus rides and hiking I decided I'd rather just take things slow and just rest in Taupo for a few days then head to Auckland. The day after the hike I had breakfast with the others before they drove on back to Hamilton and I switched to a new hostel. The two days in Taupo was pretty uneventful. I went for a few walks around town and along the lake, but there isn't really much to talk about!
Day 343: Feats of Endurance
We got up around 4:30am to get read for an early morning shuttle from Taupo out to the start of the climb in Tongariro National Park. We shared the shuttle with two other people staying in Taupo, bringing our little group to 7. Tongariro is recently famous for being used for filming of Mordor and Mt. Doom in The Lord of the Rings movies, and it's something of a wasteland of dust and volcanic rock. The walk began pretty easily with winding paths through rocky fields with lots groundcovers and lichens. The mountains themselves began pretty obscured by cloud, but things cleared up quite a bit as we approached.
Once we got to the edge of the mountains things got steeper and quite a bit harder. The steepness wasn't really the problem, but in many places the ground was loose volcanic sand and gravel that slipped with every step, and through the hike we all slipped and fell down more than once. After the first climb up there's a long flat section that goes by the red crater, and a nice view down at the rocky plain on the other side of the mountains.
There was another steep climb up the next ridge before the path carried on down the other side to the emerald lakes. This steep descent wasn't too bad to go down, and normally going down is all you have to do since it's a one-way path. Unfortunately the end section of the crossing has been closed for some time do to dangerous volcanic activity, so we had to slowly climb back up the steep, shifting slope of sand.
Once climbing back up to the highest part of the walk we stopped for lunch, then retraced our path back over and out of the mountains. Once we got back to our starting point we got the shuttle back to Taupo and after returning to our hostel for showers we went down to the main area to get some dinner and drinks. As I mentioned before, this was the day of the Taupo Iron Man race, so we got a table along the course to watch and cheer people on. For those that don't know, Iron Man competitions are insane. It's like a triathalon, but they lengthen all the sections since apparently triathalons aren't hardcore enough already. The Iron Man consists of a 4km swim followed by a 180km bicycle ride. If you're not exhausted after all that, then you only have to run a full marathon of 42km afterwards to finish. I'm a little in awe of anybody that can finish one of these, even if I question their sanity a little for wanting to put themselves through it. Deserving special mention is a guy staying in our hostel that we had a bit of a chat with who was probably about 50, and only had one arm. I don't know what time he got, but we saw him well into the marathon run.
Once we got to the edge of the mountains things got steeper and quite a bit harder. The steepness wasn't really the problem, but in many places the ground was loose volcanic sand and gravel that slipped with every step, and through the hike we all slipped and fell down more than once. After the first climb up there's a long flat section that goes by the red crater, and a nice view down at the rocky plain on the other side of the mountains.
There was another steep climb up the next ridge before the path carried on down the other side to the emerald lakes. This steep descent wasn't too bad to go down, and normally going down is all you have to do since it's a one-way path. Unfortunately the end section of the crossing has been closed for some time do to dangerous volcanic activity, so we had to slowly climb back up the steep, shifting slope of sand.
Once climbing back up to the highest part of the walk we stopped for lunch, then retraced our path back over and out of the mountains. Once we got back to our starting point we got the shuttle back to Taupo and after returning to our hostel for showers we went down to the main area to get some dinner and drinks. As I mentioned before, this was the day of the Taupo Iron Man race, so we got a table along the course to watch and cheer people on. For those that don't know, Iron Man competitions are insane. It's like a triathalon, but they lengthen all the sections since apparently triathalons aren't hardcore enough already. The Iron Man consists of a 4km swim followed by a 180km bicycle ride. If you're not exhausted after all that, then you only have to run a full marathon of 42km afterwards to finish. I'm a little in awe of anybody that can finish one of these, even if I question their sanity a little for wanting to put themselves through it. Deserving special mention is a guy staying in our hostel that we had a bit of a chat with who was probably about 50, and only had one arm. I don't know what time he got, but we saw him well into the marathon run.
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