We touched down in San Francisco, after an 11-hour flight with Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic, not a patch on Air New Zealand.
We flew over San Francisco bay in a cloudless sky and the harbour a millpond.
Our first problem was that we couldn't get all our baggage in the Chrysler 300, Id booked, but after a bit of negotiating we ended up with a huge 7 seater Chrysler, and headed off happily, trying to find the house that my cousins Will and Liam had very kindly let us use, in the town of Los Gatos, an hour south of San Francisco.
Our first impressions of America were very favourable, from the customs guy at the airport to the rental car guys, everyone was very friendly and helpful, and this would continue throughout our time in the USA.
The Freeway system here is awesome, so easy to use, and although you can have 6 lanes in each direction, it is easy driving. So without a map and only an address, we found our way to Los Gatos and Will and Lias lovely Duplex, and collapsed into bed.
California is an amazing place, it is the eighth largest economy in the world with a GDP of 1.3 Trillion USD, and is the third largest State after Alaska and Texas.
The Capital is not LA or San Fran, but Sacramento, and the 36 million people, who live here, range from the very poor Hispanic farm workers to some of the richest people in the world.
Infact the top 3% of taxpayers pay 60% of all the tax, but despite its wealth (average wage over $50000), unemployment is well over 10%, and the State is running a 40 billion-dollar deficit.
First thing you notice here is the size of the cars and trucks, the Dodge Ram is the vehicle of choice, and Hummers are common, I suppose with gas at under $3 per gallon, fuel consumption isn't an issue.
Our first day in the states was spent exploring the lovely town of Los Gatos, and the surrounding area. We travelled south to Gilroy to a massive outlet shopping area, and stocked up on new running shoes at a fraction of the NZ price.
The next day we were away early driving up to San Francisco, and parking the car in a suburb near the train station, and set off to explore the city.
SF is a very laid back city, the steep streets and lovely harbour give it a character all of its own.
After a visit to the Wells Fargo Museum and a wander through the huge Chinatown, we found ourselves at the waterfront for lunch.
From here we made our way through the very touristy Fisherman's wharf, took in the maritime museum, watched the mad harbour swimmers, and ended up at pier39 where a large colony of Sea Lions lay claim to a mooring area with hundreds of them crowded onto wooden rafts right in the city.
The afternoon was spent riding the historic trams, learning about the traumatic 1906 earthquake that devastated 70% of the city, and travelling on the historic street cars.
From Los Gatos we decided to travel north over the Golden Gate Bridge, to visit the massive coastal Californian Redwoods (tallest in the world at 369ft).
Unfortunately after leaving in lovely sunshine, by the time we got to SF it was pouring rain, and we had to explore the impressive Muir Woods reserve in coats and hats.
From here we travelled east through the Napa valley, which produces most of Americas wine to the small town of Lodi for the night.
The area around Lodi is a rich agricultural region, growing everything from grapes to fruit and veges.
We were now heading into the mountains to our next destination, Yosemite National Park!!
On the way we visited “Gold Country” , and the lovely little town of Angels Camp, whose claim to fame is that Mark Twain lived here for a while and wrote the story of the Jumping frog, which launched his career.
So now every year the town hosts the world frog jumping games, and the main street has the hop of fame, where all the winning frogs have a plaque in the footpath, including the world record of over 21ft.
From here we drove into Yosemite, arriving late in the day, and after booking into our hotel, we only had time for a short walk before darkness fell.
We awoke next morning to an awesome clear blue sky, and were instantly taken by the beauty of this special place, made even more memorable by the magnificent autumn colours.
We have timed it well, as all the high mountain passes that are normally well closed by now are still open, so on our first day we head up the incredible Tioga Pass road that winds its way up to an amazing 10000ft.
From the top we headed off on foot on a 15km round trip to Mono Pass, the very top of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, where you can look down onto Mono Lake on the other side.
Our tramp took about 4hrs, and because of the time of year, we only saw one other person.
The next day was spent doing a number of the great walks on the valley floor, as well as taking in the impressive visitor’s centre, before returning to our hotel and a well-earned soak in the Jacuzzi.
American hotel rooms are great value, most are huge, have two queen beds and include breakfast for $30-$70. They nearly all have pools and Spas, a pleasant change from Europe.
Eating out though is relatively expensive, and on our budget the food is fairly plain and predictable.
After a great three days in Yosemite, we headed out onto the plains again and travelled back to the coast intent on seeing the famous coastline below Monterey, and the renowned “Hearst Castle”
This central plains area seems to have dependable irrigation and good soils, and grows vast amounts of fruit, nuts and veges. To get to the coast you have to cross another range of hills, which housed some huge reservoirs.
Water is a real limiting factor in California, and seemingly they haven't had decent rains for five years so the water storage areas were very low.
We stopped at Carmel south of Monterey, which was very touristy, so we drove on down the spectacular coast, finally stopping at the seaside town of San Simeon, just south of Hearst castle.
The coast was very rugged and unspoilt, and we stopped to see a large colony of elephant seals on the way.
W.R Hearst spent 30 years building this magnificent, European inspired mansion using his vast wealth generated from his massive media empire.
He went broke during the great depression, and a lot of his magnificent art collection had to be sold to save the day, and eventually the castle was gifted to the state.
The next day we just made a short drive south down the coast to a small town called Oceano near Pismo Beach. We wanted to have a rest and catch up with washing. Oceano is the only beach in California where vehicles are allowed on the beach, hence it was packed with big V8 trucks and ATV’s and these petrol heads love to stay in RV parks in their massive 20 metre long triple axle RV’s . Despite this we enjoyed a beautiful sunset with the sun disappearing into the Pacific.
Nearby at Pismo Beach from November - February there is a wintering over site for Monarch butterflies. These are a special breed of Monarchs that live for 6 months and they migrate 1500 miles here from Canada for the winter and settle in a grove of eucalypts in their thousands. Some years over 100,000 of them. Not many had arrived yet so we only saw a few - but we found it fascinating.
We plan to leave the coast now and head inland to canyon country.