San Diego, which of course in German means a whales v ... never mind. After three large days & nights in Las Vegas we were all very happy to be chilling out for a week back in southern California, and even more excited at the chance of catching up with Spencer, Chelsea, Vanessa and Susie who we had met over our university careers through their exchange semesters at Macquarie. To date on this trip, we have experienced hostels, apartments, hotel rooms, B&B's, cabins and airport floors, but this was the first time we'd be couch sleeping, with the 5 of us boys splitting up to stay between Spencer's joint in La Jolla and Chelsea, and her roommate Caitlin, in Mission Beach. Both hosts were great in providing a place to sleep, driving us around looking for Halloween costumes, planning day activities for us to do outside of their work hours and even cooking us meals.

As San Diego is very much a college town for students of wealthy parents, the house parties and nights out at the bars were a ton of fun, however during the day when most were at work or school it was a rather sleepy old town. Our days basically just involved waking up at noon, eating Mexican food and riding down to Mission beach to play sports on the sand with Vanessa and Susie. The first day we played a fierce game of 3v3 beach volleyball which Vanessa, Alex & I triumphed in a close 3 set match, before playing a modified NFL game the following day at the beach. Whilst the water temperature was what seemed sub zero temperatures compared to what we were used to from Croatia, we still managed to brave through it and take the one-off ocean dip, it was almost ear-ache worthy it was that cold. The other sites included Louis taking us to what he claimed was one of the main tourist attractions of the city in 'the rock pier'. I'm not quite sure what all the fuss was about, as it was just your standard break wall. He'd lose the plot if he went up the east coast of Australia, you'd find tons of them. Chelsea and Caitlin, being the fitness fanatics they are, took us on a mountain hike around the cliffs of La Jolla one afternoon in which was a very scenic walk, capped off with Joe letting off multiple fireworks down on the beach. He is deadset like a kid on Christmas morning he gets that excited about them.

The nights were the main attraction of our 7 day stay in San Diego as there was always mid-week options for heading out seeing as though there was a heavy college student population in the area, who obviously didn't mind rocking up to class a tad under the weather. The first night was a Saturday, and thereby celebrated Halloween for those that worked full time and couldn't make it out later in the week. Dressed in lederhosens, sailors outfits, Frenchmen, sushi rolls, pirates and flight attendants, we begun the festivities with a big game of Kings Cup at Chelsea's house with all of her girlfriends. This quickly got a little out of hand in the form of Louis wrestling me onto her bed and snapping the slats, leaving the bed plonked on the ground. Not off to a good start but we headed out to the Ale House in Pacific Beach shortly after, and a few shouts of cheap tequila and sambucca shots helped in forgetting and forgiving for the incident and enjoy a good night ... the only downside was the fun gets cut short with all bars closing at 2am. With dinner and drinks to catch up with Spencer, and his girlfriend Jenayl, on Monday night, a $5 shot and beer combo turned the night into a slightly larger one that first imagined. Standard Fennessy was charging around the place like a man on a mission with his wingman Righton hanging of his shoulder. The night finished with an unknown, unnamed girl labelling us the 'worst Australians she's ever met', a bit harsh! Taco Tuesdays returned after our first taste of it a week earlier in San Francisco, however this time was much bigger and better. Starting with cheap tacos at Typhoons, the low key dinner all of sudden exploded out of what seemed like nothing, and in no time was packed full of people, with a cue stretching down the street to get in. Hanging with former Swans AFL player Shane Mumford, who now plays for GWS, we threw back plenty of drinks and terrorised the dance floor for many hours, making us wish there was a 'Taco Tuesday' type of event that existed in Australia ... maybe 'Meat Pie Monday'!?

Then there was Halloween, while it is more of a non-event in Australian culture, we were all super excited to finally experience an American Halloween, and what better place to have it than San Diego. Marking the fifth anniversary of his notorious village party, we kicked the night off at Spencer's place in La Jolla for beer pong in red cups to get in the American spirit. Flying through the drinks, we kitted up as Mr Incredible, Scooby Doo, an elf and an astronaut for the nights events. Relying heavily on the insight of Spencer and his roommates to find ourselves a house party to go to, he did so magnificently as we found a connection tin the form of a sorority party to attend ... at a waterfront property in Mission Beach. A multi storied house with what felt like 100 people all packed in to the level, so much that you could hardly move and no doubt spilt drinks everywhere. It was literally as if it had been taken straight from a scene of an American Pie movie. Not that the girls who stayed there would be too concerned if anything gets broken anyways, nothing that Daddy's trusty black AMEX can't fix. Perhaps we all got a little over-excited by the occasion and consumed an unnecessary Four Loko too many which tipped us over the edge as the rest of the night at the nearby 'Sandbar' became a blur. Joe got booted, Righton disappeared as he is making a common occurrence of and Louis got told aggressively in a verbal spray to 'go back to Australia already'. Needless to say, I don't think any of us moved off the couch the following day as we attempted to piece together the events of the night and all the silly stories i.e. broken fences and stolen flags.

After extending our stay by an extra night to be around for a Friday night with Spencer and Kevin, San Diego became the place we have spent the most time, alongside Cancun and Cabo San Lucas. It was great to catch up with so many of our close American friends after a year or two, and being able to party with them over the past 7 days. However, with many days lounging around over the week and eating more and more Mexican food, it's almost starting to feel we should get back home and start doing something productive again i.e. work and get fit. Spencer, Kevin, Susie and Vanessa dropped us off at the train station and bid us farewell as we depart up the coastline to Los Angeles to conclude the last 4 days of the trip. It's scary to think that this time next week we'll be back in Sydney!