Hollywood Walk of Fame and Universal Studios

The post name tells what we did today.
On the journey to Hollywood we went through some extremely rough areas, showing the extent of the homeless. Not that you need to be out of the flash areas to see it, homeless are everywhere here. Although we have experienced them before, it has been quite an eye opener here in LA.
We found lots of stars on the sidewalk that we recognise. Even some
distant relatives.

Mouse sent me to find one star in particular and this is close.

I was going to visit the star of Jim Hansen but we had had enough of the midday heat by then. I did make sure that I found Grover's star just for Mouse.

One for Douglas

And some footsteps for Margaret.

The scenes at Universal were so cool that I filled my phone card up. Now I need to work out the best way to take photos and transfer to the tablet/blog.

The Hogwarts area was really cool with the amount of detail they put into everything.
We watched a few shows, did the Universal Tour and as the crowd thinned a little I went and had a few rides.  The Mummy was my favourite, totally soaked at Jurasic Park (although I dried off quickly in the heat). The Transformers ride shutdown mid-ride, not with me on luckily, and didn't reopen.
We had our evening meal at the Hogshead pub in Hogsmead just below the Hogwarts Castle.

This hogs head grunted and moved around periodicly

The heat of the day was made a lot more bearable with the help of cooling  cloths we soaked in water and draped around our necks. Thanks Graeme.
Vicki was looking at the stars on the way home till she realised they were all planes lining up to land at the airport. There wss heaps of them.
Another late to bed.

I will try to add photos as they come to the tablet.

Knotts Berry Farm

Today we went to Knotts Berry Farm.
End of story.

30 degrees for most of it, to hot to spend an hour in line for a 3 minute ride. We left early so we could have an early tea and a swim in the pool. We had another fishy meal, back at the Big Catch Seafood resraurant. When we got back to our room, we sat on the bed for a couple of minutes an woke a couple of hours later. The heat took It's toll.

Hang Time, the parks latest ride.

 A friend recommended a Funnel Cake.

The stage show on the bar of the saloon.

Gumbo and an Onion bomb

Ran out of day

Today's plan was to organise phones, bike gear and pick up the bike, however the time it took to use the public transport, doing the wallmart shopping thing and buying bike gear. By the time we finished the company that has the bike was due to close and I still have to Change the ownership and register the bike.
We had seafood again tonight. Guess where?
Stupid is as stupid does.

Added a few pics to yesterday's blog and do my homework for today then bed at 11.30

We're here

It's 5pm LA time and we have just arrived at our motel. It has been a long (very long) day. As we were at the Invercargill airport to check in, the attendant told me that my ESTAS (Visa) was not correct and that she could only give me boarding passes to get me as far as Auckland without it. It seems that I used the letter N instead of M when putting in my passport number.  I had to re-apply online then all should be good when I get to Auckland. No problem, I got that sorted using the tablet and the airports WiFi. When I checked in at Auckland they said it hadn't gone through! It turns out that ì had signed up on a scam site and had been ripped off to the tune of NZD 117.
They applied for me while I contacted the bank to cancel the credit card. All sorted. Yay.
After the 12 hour flight and a 3 hour queue for customs we were free to catch the shuttle. A quick freshen up then to downtown long Beach for a lovely seafood meal and a  free bus tour out to the Queen Mary Hotel/ship. It was then time for bed, 36 hours since we last got out of ours.

Met this cool dude in the Auckland airport.

 Grover pointed out this cool hotel.

 The  CHP OFFERED to take us for a ride around the block with the lights on, Vicki thought they may not let us out.

The Queen Mary

The Route

We have added a link to a map of a rough route of out trip. It is only a rough route as we have nothing planned in any detail, we will make decisions as we go.
Our planned trip takes in 14-15 states of the USA, even if we are just clipping the corner of some.
After picking up the bike in Los Angeles and taking some time to see Disneyland, Knotts Berry Farm and a few other things in L.A, we head north.
Our plan to travel up the Californian coast has been curtailed a bit due to the road being closed (due to reopen late July)
On the map things get a little confused after leaving Sacramento (if we go that far!), it has us going to Reno then down to Lee Vining and back. We are actually going south to a place called Grovetown then over the Sierra Navada mountains to Lee Vining and then to Reno. At the time of drawing the route to the map the route was closed for winter.
My plan was that each night I would put a pin on the map so that you could follow our progress, I could do this on the laptop but can't on the tablet. I will be able to put the pins on when I return to NZ.

click here to find the map

Remember that you can zoom in to find more detail.

The Bike

In March we bought our bike. A 2002 1800cc Honda Goldwing. 

It's been waiting patiently in L.A. for us to pick it up.

It will be our transport for the next 7 weeks.

Today we make our way to the airport.

Cheers All

Last NZ bike trip

Our tent at the rally site

The last bike trip we made in New Zealand was to the 38th annual Brass Monkey Rally held on June 1st to 3rd near Oturehua (argueably the coldest place in New Zealand. The rally is held at the Idaburn Dam, where, when the weather is cold enough and the ice freezes enough for people to walk on it safely, the locals hold a Bonspiel.

A bonspiel is a curling tournament, consisting of several games, often held on a weekend. Until the 20th century most bonspiels were held outdoors, on a frozen freshwater loch. Today almost all bonspiels are held indoors on specially prepared artificial ice.

 On the Friday night temperatures at the rally site were reportedly down to 14 degrees below zero celcius.
The hoar frosts made all the trees in the area very picturesque however it also made it very cold to ride the bike. Ice building up on the helmet's visor made it difficult to see the road ahead.

Even the fences were crystalised

The picturesque Idaburn Dam

The Idaburn dam

Note the icicles on Vicki's bike.

Frozen Grover.