Our next stop was San Francisco and after all the money we had blown in Vegas, we were quite relieved to be checking into a small hostel at $60 a night! With all the excitement, Gerard had come down with the sometimes deadly man flu, so we decided to take it a bit easy on our first night and cook up a hostel style microwave TV dinner for tea. Being the heavy handed lad that Gerard is, he tucked into his food as soon as it was hot enough, slopping all the components of the meal together. In his haste, he didn't realize that he was actually mixing his dessert in with his meal (it was hard to distinguish the two) and he ended up with lemon / apple crumble fish with vegetables!

The next morning we headed down to Fishermens Wharf, which we had heard so much about. Instantly we felt a familiarity about the place, firstly because Gez was so excited to catch a glimpse of the ocean, and secondly because it felt like we had just stepped back into somewhere like Hillaries or Fremantle. We visited the Aquarium of the bay, which I could have walked through in half the time that Gerard needed, since he stopped to photograph / comment to himself about each fish, but I must say I was very patient J. Afterwards, we stopped at a restaurant on the pier for a famous 'clam chowder' (another of travel agent, Beks suggestions!) before heading home for another early one.

The next day we were blessed with beautiful sunshine and we headed back to to Fishermens wharf again, which this time looked even prettier that the day before. We took a ferry to Alcatraz and spent most of the day wandering around the island and learning all the stories of previous inmates and how the prisons ran.

With all the beautiful weather, we decided to change our travel plans a little and leave San Fran earlier to allow us more time to enjoy the drive down the coast. We picked up our car from San Fran and spent 3 days driving down to San Diego. At this point of the trip, both of our energy levels were beginning to lag and just when we were beginning to miss home, our road trip gave us both a 'second wind'. We were met with the new challenge of driving on the different side of the road, which didn't start all too well when Gez tried to climb into the passengers seat and couldn't find the steering wheel! We hopped straight into the highway which is a scary place to start driving, but Gerard was very quick to pick up the different road rules (he'd been googling tips for driving all trip!) and once we hit two lanes of traffic instead of six, I'd managed to stop holding my breath and enjoy the trip. We opted for the coast road, which is windy and longer than the highway, but it was worth it to see the spectacular views of the Californian coast in the sparkling sunlight. During the drive, we both agreed to each other several times, that choosing to drive down the Californian coast was one of the best decisions we had made, firstly because it was a new challenge and experience for Gerard to drive on the opposite side of the road, which I will say, he pulled off really well! For me, it was such a picturesque experience to be sitting in the passengers seat with my sunnies on, feet on the dash, watching the stunning coast and cliff faces passing us by.

That night we checked into a gorgeous little hotel in Santa Maria for a rest.

The next morning we started driving early, which allowed us to fit a lot of sightseeing along the way to Anaheim. After briefly stopping in Santa Barbara for some wine tasting, we reached Santa Monica beach (Gez had been talking about it all trip) and I was wowed with how beautiful it was. Again, we were straight away reminded of home, it was pretty hot and the beaches were long and full of people, (most exercising….. argggh). We had lunch on the pier and a few gorgeous snapshots before finishing our days driving in Anaheim.

We'd booked a cheap motel in Anaheim last minute so we weren't expecting much for $70 a night, but I was grossed out when our room stank of cigarette smoke. We quickly realized that we'd been put into a 'smoking room' and we first considered 'dealing with it' but then agreed neither of us could handle sleeping in a bed that stank like an ash tray. Lucky we spoke up, because reception were super helpful and quickly upgraded us to a King apartment with separate kitchen, lounge and bathroom! Sometimes complaining can be worth it!

We had two nights in Anaheim which gave us a whole day in Disneyland! I was sooooo excited to get to "the happiest place on earth" and loved watching all the kids who were soooo excited to be there (loved watching the huge tantrums too!!). Gez took a little bit to get into the atmosphere of Disney, which is probably fair enough, since the lines for the 'rides' I chose to start with (Peter Pan's flight, Pinocchio's Journey) were filled with parents taking their kids, not young married couples such as us!! Truthfully, since I did Disneyland in Paris, I have been petrified of rollercoasters, so I'm happy to stick to the rides without height restrictions! By the arvo, Gez had convinced me to be a little more adventurous and we went on a few rollercoasters that I'm glad I didn't miss! The day was tiring and even though we loved seeing so many icons of our childhood wherever we looked, huge crowds meant most rides had 30 - 45 minutes to wait, and there were barely any characters in sight! So we came away happy but slightly disappointed.

Off to the last stop of our road trip was San Diego! The more south we went the more gorgeous and "Perth - like" the weather was. Our hotel was situated right in the middle of the bay which gave it a real "Mandurah-y" kind of feel. We arrived early so after checking in we decided to explore the famous San Diego Zoo (Gerard's choice!). Not being an animal lover myself, I was less than excited so I was quite surprised to find myself enjoying the day. The zoo was totally different to Perth Zoo, it was HUGE and you could get so close to the animals - we even paid money to hand feed some giraffes, which again is so unlike me to enjoy that kind of thing!! (I'm putting it down to missing Ruby!) It was definitely worth the visit and another tourist hotspot crossed off the list.

As if I hadn't already dealt with enough animals, the next day we headed to Seaworld (Guess whose choice?) which was amazing. The park presented all sorts of shows and presentations, Gez was super excited to see Shamu, the famous killer whale, and I was squealing excitedly at a very cute pet show (thinking of Rubo again!).

Tuesday was our last day in San Diego and we both used it wisely doing what we both loved more than anything. Gez packed up early and joined a fishing charter that took him down into Mexican waters, and of course, I went shopping. I was in heaven at Fashion Valley Mall, that was just full of shops and department stores. I would have stayed there longer, but I ran out of money and then there was no point me being there!! It was the perfect end to a perfect trip!

Tuesday night we went out for an early dinner then came home to sort out how we were going to transfer all my purchases home! Wednesday means the start of our 40 hr trek back to Perth, which I'm going to cover in one last blog!

Thanks to everyone who has been following us,

Love you lots, see you soon

Gez and Nae

xxxxx