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As promised a fairly quick turnaround on the second blog for my road trip round California with Hector. So I got into San Diego airport and thanks to my s***ty phone was unable to call Hector (couldn't get any credit or something stupid like that, still don't really understand how they work) but he was luckily waiting out the from of the airport so it was pretty easy. We went for a couple of drinks and to catch up on old times. Much as the same with Jess it was really easy to catch up and it get along despite not seeing each other for 4 years. I was pretty shattered as I'd crossed a couple of time zones to get to San Diego (Eastern time to Pacific Coast Time) so we headed back about half 12 to Hector's grandparents beach house which even though it was dark looked pretty spectacular (have a peak at the videos section for the video tour) and crashed out. It was awesome to wake up at the beach and he had such a good view of northern San Diego and it was such a beautiful beach house it was just perfect. Hector thought we could hit a couple of beaches around San Diego today as we were off to the horse races the following day. We headed on down to Lajolla Beach and did a bit of snorkelling which as soon as I'd realised how to breathe properly and not panic like a little girl was really good fun. We headed a little further down the coast to this really cool bit of beach that was a sea break and therefore got ridiculously tall and powerful waves. It felt like you were in a washing machine getting thrown around in the water but was good fun. We moved on to Pacific Beach which is was a gorgeous beach and full of scantily clad gorgeous women which always makes a beach a bit more interesting., We spent a couple f hours chilling out there and desperately trying to sort out my touristy t-shirt tan! We had a quick beer before leaving for further down the coast to Hector's boat where, no we couldn't go sailing, but got changed to head into 'Old Town' in San Diego for some food. We ate at this 'traditional' Mexican restaurant, I'm not too sure how traditional this place was but the food was good and so was the margaritas….. We headed back as we had big day at the races the next day and we were pretty shattered, it was nice sleep in a really nice bed especially after being well fed.
The next day we were due to head to the races in the afternoon so had the morning free, hmm what to do when you have a few hours at a beach house…. Surprisingly we kicked back on the beach before the races. Hectors grandparents also have a box at the races but unfortunately they had donated it for that day so we had to go in as 'regular people'. Quality set up down at the races and full of San Diego's richest people as it was a weekday and everyone else was working. We started off pretty slow and full of expectation but we lost on the first few races, still a great atmosphere but obviously better if your winning. I hit a winner in the 6th race and bagged myself 85 bucks which was pretty good and then Hector managed to get a trifecta for the next race which paid out at about $280 we were both up with one race to go so rather than blowing it all we bet moderately - both lost but we ended up on the whole day which was good. We headed for a celebratory quick drink back at the beach house before heading to Hector's parents house to work out what we were going to do over the next week or so and get some campsites booked. We chose a route and got stuff booked - we would head up the coast for a bit then head inland to the Yosemite National Park and Sequoia National Park.
Our first stop, driving services courtesy of Hector as I still cannot drive yet, was in Santa Barbra a little party town for college kids during term time and pretty busy at other times - although we got there on a Thursday night. We managed t bag a cheap motel for the night which was in a good location for the bars and stuff - we got there late afternoon so we had a little walk around had a couple of beers then headed back to the motel to get changed and ready for a few beers. We grabbed some food in a little Italian place that claimed that we wouldn't leave hungry, they were right even if it was a tad expensive. We then did a little bit of a pub crawl or 'bar hopping' as they call it out here. Went into some apparently 'British pubs' not really that traditional apart from the appearance of a few British flags, I showed Hector how us Brits played pool and gave him a bit of a beat down (which is strange cause I'm usually pretty awful at pool - maybe it's the bigger pockets on American tables) we headed to a few other bars and got pretty drunk mainly mixing our drinks which wasn't a god idea from beer to whiskey to Guinness back to whiskey - it got pretty messy. We tried to get into a nightclub but wouldn't let us in as we had shorts on which was pretty s*** so we went back to a few of the late bars - it seemed that there was a lot of work do's going on and most people were almost a bit rude to us when we were asking where we could go - one snotty little woman said that I wouldn't get in anywhere wearing that 'deuchbag t-shirt' I thanked her for help - a win for British politeness. We were pretty steamed up by this point so we headed back to the motel to quickly change into some jeans so we could get into a club (not that we needed anymore to drink mind) and found one nearer where our motel was, had a bit of banter with some girls there about how Hector looks like Jack from Lost and I looked like Matt Damon and then headed home rather steamed up - it was good to have a good few beers again with Hector though.
The next day we were unsurprisingly really hung-over and headed to an American greasy spoon before hitting the road for Morro Bay which is a small little town on the coast between LA and San Francisco, it was a fair drive from Santa Barbra and we didn't get there till mid afternoon and really struggled to find a cheap motel of any sort, there was however a campsite there and we thought save a bit of cash and get camping early. We headed down to the coast to pick up some fish to cook on the campfire that night and found a little fish market that had some home made tartar sauce . We cooked it up back at the campsite and ate it all up it was just what we needed after the beers the night before, we managed a couple of beers that night but we were pretty beat and went to bed about half 10 - our tent was a little two man tent so was cosy but comfortable.
We headed off the next day pretty early (feeling a whole world better) to our next stop in Monterrey which is our last Coast stop before heading inland to Yosemite. We got there in good time and tried to get into the Hostel there but it was fully booked and the motels were really expensive - camping again was the much cheaper choice. We were really lucky as well to have found the campsite and get there when we did as we picked up the last available site - good times. We headed into downtown Monterey and went to the Aquarium there which is pretty famous, it was a really good Aquarium with all kinds of local and fish and deep sea fish - I hadn't been to an Aquarium in years so it was cool to go to a decent one. We stopped for some mid afternoon lunch/dinner of Clam Chowder in a huge sour dough bread roll which was really nice. The guy in the restaurant recommended a few places to go drinking that night (we were ready for a few beers now) and where we could go 'cougar hunting' which is an America term for chasing after older women something which is apparently quite popular in Monterey. We got a quick shower and headed back into downtown Monterey for some drinks and ended up in another British themed pub - this one wasn't as bad as the other one, we moved on to another bar and came across a band playing in a pub where there were loads of people - this was a Saturday night so there was bound to be a good crowd out. The band were pretty good it was a kind of rocky band randomly mixed in with Irish music very strange but pretty good. We met these two guys who had ridden down on motorcycles to spend the night and were looking to get drunk, they bought us a shed load of drinks and doing shots and all sorts in no time at all we were pretty smashed up. We got talking to these two Monterey local girls and went off to a club with them (do not fret they were my age) they were really cool although one of the girls had a real complex about some guy that was apparently stalking her - she was full of s***. We had a good giggle with them and then had to cut the party a bit short to get back to the campsite - we were both really drunk by this point and knew we had a big drive the next day quite a randomly good night though.
Woke up with another fun hangover and we had an even longer drive today to get to the Yosemite National Park, we'd booked a campsite for that night which was about 45mins from Yosemite Valley which is where all the main hikes, falls and cliffs are. The valley itself was gorgeous, tiny little rivers going through that you can go in and huge rock faces all around it was a very pretty place. We set up camp and boiled some water to go with out freeze dried food - needless to I was not to excited about eating freeze dried food but it was actually quite tasty and didn't just taste of salt. It helped that the big family next to us had cooked too much steak and offered us some which went down a treat. We collected a load of firewood and set up a decent campfire and sat around drinking beer - this was what camping was all about, and washing with wet wipes of course (there were no showers around) we tried to wash in the river when we could as well.
We were up early as we had to get to the first come first serve campsite early to guarantee a place, we were lucky (again) and managed to get a campsite early. We got our hiking gear together and headed for the valley floor - there are a number of hikes we could have done, the most famous up to half dome (going from about 4,000 feet up to 8,000 feet over 10-12 hours) was going to be unlikely as we started about 9.30, but we decided to get as far as we could. We ended up going on about a 10 mile hike which really took it out f us, the way up we took the 'mist trail' which is very steep steps and we were blowing out of our arses - obviously not in as good a shape as we thought. We got some great views as we went to the top of two waterfalls and was a really beautiful scenery, probably more special as we had struggled to hike up there so much! We headed back to the campsite after getting a bite to eat and dip in the river which was absolutely freezing as it was still quite high up the valley! We crashed out when we got back before setting up a campfire and chilling out for the evening with some beers - this was a really nice change from the beaches and cities that I had seen before. We decided to stay in the Yosemite for one more night rather than heading to Sequoia for two nights, there is so much to see here that we fancied one more day.
We slept like babies, probably shattered from all the hiking, but the best nights sleep I'd got in the tent. We decided to head to Cathedral lake which was a bit outside of the Yosemite Valley and away from the crowds (it was surprisingly busy with hikers, families and couples). The lakes were about a 10 mile round trip again but it should be an easier hike as it wasn't such a change in altitude but we still struggled a bit as we were trying to hike at an overall higher altitude. It was definitely worth it when we got the Cathedral Lake as it was absolutely gorgeous and only had about 20 - 30 people scattered around which was good. I went for a quick dip but it was so cold you couldn't stay in there for too long and then bullied hector into going in as well which was pretty funny. Hector did a bit of fishing trying to catch us some dinner (no joy) and I tried to work off my t-shirt tan sunbathing. We headed back about half 4/5 after spending a good few hours there and headed back to camp to have some dinner and the highlight of the trip: some freeze dried cheesecake (just add cold water!) it was ok but didn't really taste like cheesecake more like cake batter. It was a shame to be leaving the Yosemite's as it was a really beautiful place and very peaceful which made a nice change from everywhere else I had been.
Sequoia national park was a bit of a drive away so we got ourselves up early and got on the road. We stopped for a bite to eat at a little restaurant and took full advantage of the soap and hot water to wash our hands and face - after a few days of not showering you really do start feeling quite dirty, we didn't smell but you just don't feel clean. We got to the campsite in good time which left us some time to do a bit of hiking around the area, the campsite had a huge camp warning about bears as they had 3 breaks ins over the past 3 days. The last was a bear breaking into a brand new BMW over a straw! We bear proofed the car by taking out anything that had a scent and putting it the bear box, we were a little worried about having a run in with a bear after not seeing any all week. We did a little trek (3.5 miles) around the largest Sequoias (sorry for those who don't know because I didn't Sequoia's are a type of huge ass tree, absolutely massive in width and height) one was General Sherman and is the largest tree in the world by volume and area, they were really spectacular and you really felt like a dwarf next to them. We did try to grab a shower in the only public showers there but there was a huge wait, oh well washing is overrated and it would only be for one more night - besides we had bears to fight off! We had a bit of dinner and tried to setup a bear early warning device (fish line with some pots attached so they would make a noise if they were crossed) a load of firewood for a big fire and took a little walk around. We found a small little valley at the back of the campsite and we watched the sun set while having a couple of beers and trying to take some fancy arty photos. We got back to the camp just before dark and had a massive campfire going - it would scare away the bears. Every half hour or so you could hear people banging pot together and shouting to scare bears off of their campsites - bears were definitely in the area. Me and Hector both knew we wouldn't sleep too well tonight so we finished off most of the beer and kind of passed out. Hector woke me up about 3ish to show me a bear walking threw our campsite (completely avoiding the early warning system) the thing was absolutely huge but it just took a wander through and didn't bother with us or the car which was good. Neither of really slept that well that night.
Our final day, we got up early as we didn't sleep too well and headed into the park to see a few of the bits we didn't have time to see the day before. There was a huge roadwork's thing which meant we had a 1 hour delay so we thought we'd use the time wisely and get the stove going and cook ourselves some breakfast on the roadside - everyone looked at us a bit funny but soon followed suit. We made it down to Crescent meadow which was this pretty meadow in the middle of the generally dry forest. We then took a small hike up to see Morro Rock which was this massive great big rock sticking out of the cliff face it was pretty impressive. We had to get on the road before 12 as we had a very long drive back to San Diego and Hector had to be up early for work the next day. The journey home was very long we got stuck in traffic coming through LA which took us about 2 hours which was a joke. When we got back to Hectors parents house they had cooked us some dinner and we had a much needed shower and did some laundry - finally felt clean. It was awesome to see Hector again and get too see the two National Parks which otherwise I would have had no chance of seeing as they are really out of the way, I was pretty gutted to say goodbye but I had to move on as I was heading off to Fullerton ( a district of LA) for a couple of days before moving onto to San Francisco.
I know this a big old blog but there was a lot to tell and now I have the laptop I have time to write a bit more while I am travelling (I am currently midway through a nine hour journey to San Francisco so have time to kill). I hope your all doing well, I'll put up the photos and blog from Fullerton in a couple of days.
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