A BIG HELLO to everyone again!!

We have arrived USA, and are for the moment in Flagstaff Arizona. Our trip started in Los Angeles after a 10 and a half hour flight from Nadi, Fiji. Luckily for us we got to experience the 14th of April twice, as we almost travelled "back in time" :-) After arriving LAX airport we took a taxi with the german girls, we got dropt off at our hostel: USA hostels in the middle of Hollywood, only a few blocks from the famous Hollywood Boulevard and "Walk of Fame" ;-) (while the german girls got dropt off at another hostel in Beverly Hills.
Unfortunately the temperature dropt by 10-15 degrees travelling from Fiji to L.A., and suddenly we were FREEZING. This because we had trowned all our warm clothes and jacket away in Hong Kong - expecting ONLY warm weather all the way back to Norway. But no... :-/...
Anyway, we took a stroll down the street, took some pictures with the "stars" on the pavement before we went back to the hostel for a few hours of relaxing and internett time. When we were there SUDDENLY we realize that the two danish girls we met in Fiji were staying right across the hall from us. A pleasent surprice when we in fact thought we wouldn't meet them again on our trip :-) Later that evening we took another walk out on the street and did some shopping of new shoes(since we only had flip-flops to wear). We ate some dinner before we went back to the hostel for a good night sleep.
The next day we took the metro-train to Santa Monica/Vermont were we went to Advanced Rental Car to book a car for our roadtrip around California/Arizona/Nevada. And afterwards we took the metro a bus all the way to a shopping area called Fashion District, about 40mins from were we stayed. After a few hours we had managed to burn off a couple of hundred dollars on new clothes, and most important 2 pairs of jeans each(with we havn't worn the last 3 and a half months). A good day of work for us, which felt extremely good. ;-D After not doing any shopping on the first part of the trip we felt we had a lot of catching up to do in that area:-P
In the evening we met the danish and the german girls at the chinese theatre were we ate a nice dinner on a bit expensive italien restaurant.(well it was expensive for us pore backpackers, but it was our last night together, so we could go a little bit overboard;-)).
In the evening until 2am, we used our time to book all our accommodations for the rest of the trip, before we went to bed, exhausted after a looong day.
The day after we got picked up by the rentalcar agency and got our car. Line was the first one to try driving in the LA traffic. The first couple of minutes we got GOOD use of the "car belt" since it was an automatic gear, and Line got comfused - trying to clutch with the brake....heheheh... soon enough she got the hang of it, and left the left foot alone, only using the right one ;-)))
We got our luggage at the hostel and the directions to the Hollywood sign and Santa Monica beach on OFF we were. REALLY exited for our 10day long roadtrip;-))
The day before we went crazy in the Virgin store - buying a bunch of CD's for the trip, which we have gotten a LOT of use for - no road trip without MUSIC;-D
After the mandatory picture in front of the Hollywood sign, we hit the road towards our next stop - Santa Monica beach. We stayed there for an hour, had something to eat, and took some pictures on the beach in front of the lifeguard "house" and car(also mandatory!).
The next stop was San Diego, and after driving up and down the same road(it's not easy for us norwegians in this BIG forreign traffic) we got on the right direction on the High way. The drive was suppose to take about 2hours, but OF COURSE we got stuck in the Los Angeles traffic-rush, so the first half of the trip took infact 3hours. After a while it the sun went down, and we were driving in nightlight. We had the directions to the hostel in San Diego. So when we started to see the San Diego signs, we began to look for our exits. It was all very comfusing with up to 8 lanes and 7356234592 signs to read. But we were suppose to follow number 5 south, and so we did for a LONG time, before it suddenly went over to 805 south. But we didn't think any more of that, and just kept on going the same road. The time was going on to 10o'clock, and we couldn't find anything that looked as our exit...and then the some other signs turned up.... 3,5miles to border....hmm...
We are actually getting near the Mexico border...ah well...we were sure our exit was right around the corner.. and then 3 other signs followed: "IT'S ILLIGAL TO BRING ANY WEAPONS INTO THE COUNTRY".... whaaaaaaaaaat??.... "1 mile to the border"..... WHAAAAAAAAAT????? the panic starts to really rush over us.... MEXICO??? But we don't wanna go to Mexico!!!!!! OFF THE HIGHWAY!!!!!!! Oh-oh.....we MIGHT have gone too far.... We drove into a gas station, and talked to some very nice mexicans, that could tell us, yes girls, you have gone too far... but they explained how to get back to number 5 north and off we went. The time was now almost 10.30pm and we started to get exhausted. But we found an exit that matched our description - J street, and went on to that... The exit came a little faster than we expected and what was told from the mexicans, but we didn't think any more of that, finally we were there. hmm....J-street, on to 5th avenue....hmm...a LOT of houses here. no other cars.....and no tall buildings....this was wierd...we went up and down 5th avenue in search for our hostel...after a while we figured out that we should call the hostel. "yeah....hi... we're suppose to check in on your hostel tonight, but we don't seem to find it... yeah we're on fifth ave. hmm...no....no tall buildings...." "yeah, you're not downtown in San Diego, you're somewhere else were they have all the same street system...a lot of different towns use the same system..." aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah..........DjEEEEEEz...... After about 17 u-turns, an attempt to get back on the highway we managed to find it. Back on the phone with the hostel, they explained our way into downtown san diego. Around 11o'clock we were FINALLY outside the right place. First we had to park the car. The guy from the hostel said that we had to turn right in the next light-cross, but what he forgot, was to tell us that it was a one way street, and which way was the traffic going??? the OPPOSITE way of us of course... OH OOOOH.......This we figured out in the middle of the street, with no other option than to keep going to the next cross a few meters ahead. A LOT of hunking were one car had to stear out of our way we luckily got on the right track, and in to the parking house....phuuuuh..... About 5mins later we arrived with all our luggase in the hostel lobby about 3 or 4 hours behind the original time.....aaaaaah..... SOOOOOO exhaused... finally our first day of driving was over...only 9 left.... The next couple of days we left the car in the parking house, using only our feet to get around in San Diego:-)
After a GOOOOOOD night of sleep, we woke up to a sunny, but still cold day in San Diego, we were up and about around 5o'clock :-P... We went around the city to have a look around the area, bought some food and went back to the hostel. In the evening we had made plans to meet up with Turid's cousin - Erik who live in San Diego. We went out on an indian restaurant before we met some friends of his in a bar afterwards, and had a really good time;-)

The day after was used for a little bit more of shopping which we have comed to like very much over here;-)
Also had a walk down at the harbour with all the boats and stuff. It was a really beautiful scenerie with the sun setting:-)

After three nights in San Diego we started our way to Flagstaff, Arizona. We were told it was going to be a looong drive, so we got up early and were on the road around 9o'clock. When we were filling up some gas on the car, we met some lovely ladies that could tell us to take a little detour and visit a town called Sedona, it was suppose to be beautiful. So we did, and it WAS!! With the sun setting down, all of the mountains and their surroundings was red and gorgeous!!! we stopped there for some food before we hit the road again towards Flagstaff. on our way up the mountains, we stopped at a look-out point, were we met a couple on a motorcycle with a flat tire. They had no cellphone reseption, so they asked if they could join us to towards Flagstaff, so they could find reseption and some help.