aimo_sf_travels

one more entry before we leave for the airport....

today we spent most of the day at the library. i read the article about tom, kate and their baby, and a murder story in the same magazine. i read about the homeless people that have been everywhere here. and then i read a whoooole book.

 

goodbye america.

we're coming home today!!!!!!!!!!!!

in 13 or so hours we can get on the plane...and then we'll be up up and awaaaaaay to the best place on earth.

despite having next to no money in hand, i bought 2 more books. buuuut we were really good today and didn't spend much money. $3 for a day bus pass, a drink, some chips and a bagel. and then a ride on the roller coaster at the pier and some ice cream. it was a cheap day and i might want/need to read on the plane. i've almost finished the book i bought yesterday.

even though i have next to no money for the next 2 days, i still manage to spend it. bought a cool, rare present for krystle, which she totally deserves...and then i bought a book with an emo name to read on the plane. "heart on my sleeve". it actually looks interesting.

 

got some photos developed today. just odd ones from here and there so i have something to show at lunch on monday. got sad when i couldn't get photos from my usb because they were saved too small and looked really crap. all the usb photos were a selection of my favourite photos and moments from camp.

yesterday i bought a red dress. it's pretty and makes me happy.

we had to go on a long journey to find a wal mart. we got to stock up on chocolate we'd miss...then the silly wal mart worker told us about another section filled with halloween chocolate...so the chocolate pile grew a bit more.

i'm not as angry as i was before. the money issue sorted itself out.

i have a proper bandaid over the cut i got from getting my bags down the stairs on the train.

we had lunch...at 4ish. totally forgot about the eating aspect of the day.

and we saw a lot of what erin and i saw 4 months ago. it's familiar and feels good to be somewhere that i know...even though i hardly know the place.

for a while i hated america today, but i'm feeling a bit better now.

i almost died in vegas. a car decided to turn the corner into me while it was our turn to cross. tough aussie. wasn't actually hurt, just got a mark on my leg.

disneyland would have been better if 13 year old girls weren't allowed in.

today i actually said i would have rather caught a greyhound than the stupid amtrak with the stupid guy that made us take all of our bags upstairs - by ourselves! we've bother acquired an extra bag each as well...

santa monica is where it all began, and where it's all going to end.

can't wait for saturday.

in the last few days we've hiked in bryce, grand and zion canyons/national parks. it's hard work.

in salt lake city we did a mormon tour.

umm...that's all we've done. oh yellowstone. it snowed and was cold, but really cool. we saw old faithful blow twice, and saw things that unwritten law saw when they were there.

today we're going to vegas, the last stop on the tour. thank god. on monday we're going to disneyland. can't wait.

when we get back to australia we're going to a pub for lunch so we can have chicken shnitzels. with mushrooms sauce. yum.

we're on the contiki tour, and from hear on in wont have the internet or cell coverage for most of the tour.

on monday we found out our flight to chicago had been cancelled. we went to the airport and they said they'd put us on a later flight. so, we spent most of the day at the airport. i drew a picture/wrote on some scratch art paper for todd. once we got to chicago we caught the train downtown-ish, then caught another one out some other direction. we got off the train and no-one seemed to know where the street was that we wanted. luckily a guy in the cvs knew where we were going. the hostel was an old hospital, and a little bit scary. that night we went out for chicago style pizza. it was good, but i was really full. the next morning we woke up really early, took our stuff into the bathroom and got ready so we wouldn't wake everyone else up. we got a taxi at 6 to go to the hotel that the tour was supposed to start from. the taxi ride wasn't as long as we thought, only about 10 minutes, so it was a lot cheaper than we were expecting. we waited, and waited, then a couple from perth came down, waiting for the tour. then another couple came in, then a . kaya was talking to someone that worked there and found out the tour didn't stay there. we couldn't call contiki because the office wasn't open yet. eventually jen, the tour manager called and said they were coming to pick us up. we spent most of the day driving, with a stop at millers brewery. that night we went to the outback steakhouse (aussie steak chain) for dinner. wednesday was also a driving day, with only rest stops until we got to sioux falls. pretty disappointing, but the accommodation was good. instead of being social/going to get smashed with everyone else kaya and i went to the gym and worked out for an hour. we weren't used to sitting all day, as we'd been walking so far every day beforehand. thursday we drove to mount rushmore, through wall. we stopped at wall, got a bit excited by wall (tourist trap with lots of shops). today we went to moutn rushmore, saw the monument. then we went and saw the crazy horse. that was really good. tomorrow we're heading to cody...temperature 12 degrees c. down to 1 overnight. hopefully we can still go rafting on sunday. we're at cody for 2 nights, then we head off to yellowstone national park...temperature today, 6 degrees c. guess who doesn't have really warm clothes! and guess who doesn't have room for really warm clothes! apparently they've had snow at yellowstone, and are expecting more. fun fun. once we get to vegas the weather looks pretty good. hight 20's, low 30's. nice and sunny! tan up!

tomorrow it's 2 weeks until we fly out.

we're wasting time on the internet while our clothes dry. this morning we woke up early, 6am, got ready and did 2 loads of washing. then we put the 2 loads into one dryer, hoping they'd dry. but they didn't after an hour so we had to split it. there's nothing to do. we have to leave for the airport when the clothes are dry.

 

there's a man outside the window talking to himself. he's havin a good ole chat

best. haircut. ever.

 

or maybe it feels so cool because i haven't had it cut since i've been away.

 

today we did (to this point) nearly 25,000 steps. just over 18 kms. not sure if the distance is right, but we probably did more steps because it doesn't seem to count every step.

haircuts is pretty much all we did, apart from walk a really long way. sta told me it would only cost $25 to change my flight. i expected hundreds.

v festival tomorrow. it's raining and lightning/thundering now and tomorrow it's going to be lovely.

we're back in toronto, at our "home". been at this hostel for a week now so it's the closest thing i've had to home for a while. we're in a girls room this time...not even on the same bunk, at completely different ends of the room. we need a mega phone to speak to each other.
off to find hair cuts.

stop killing australians

today we got stuffed around by the espys at the hostel, but came to niagara at 11. it was pretty awesome during the day. lots of water and blue sky for once. the maid of the mist boat ride was cool. the trendy ponchos kept us dry. we did other things. we went to a winery. i tasted a mouthful of ice wine for $4. i would have liked a lot more for 4 bucks, but then i'm only 18 and shouldnt complain. we saw some statue thing that was really cool according to the tour man. he likes trees. and he said our quote of the day. something about liking trees.
after we were dropped off to check into the hostel we walked back into niagara. the main tourist street was like vegas. bright lights etc. then we went to see the falls with the lights on. it looked good, but the photos don't do it justice.

on the way back to the hostel one of my thongs broke so i walked back bare foot for well over a km. very sore feet now.

by the end of today i would have done over 20,000 steps/over 15 kms. if i didn't have to eat fast food all the time it'd be great.

tomorrow we go to niagara. i'm excited.
i have money again. this also makes me excited.

it appears steve urwin dies. i thought the sign up at the hostel was a joke, but then i read an email from mum and saw it was real.

today i went on 2 long walks around toronto. over 8 kms in total. i have no idea how far really because the pedometer isn't counting properly. if i had room i'd buy books.

on friday morning kaya and i almost had our door knocked down by drunk dickheads threatening to bash us for "throwing an egg at them". we'd been sleeping like normal people do at 3 am when they've got to be up at 5.
friday was a shitty day in general. 12 hours on a bus was way too long.
the hostel here is nice though. toronto in general isn't that special. we're bored already and we've only been here for 2 days. yesterday we went shopping and today we went to the cn tower. the cn tower was good, but really expensive. we got to stand on a glass floor 335 metres above ground. that was really scary. if the weather was clearer we would have had better views.
tonight i went out for dinner with the german guy from our room. kaya's gone to a rave that i was supposed to go to until we found out i wouldn't be able to use my id.
tomorrow's labour day so there's nothing open. on tuesday we're probably doing a brewery tour and going to a baseball game through the hostel. on thursday we're going to niagara falls on an overnight trip, also with the hostel. the hostel organise a lot of activities which is good, because there's not much else to do in toronto!

new york, new york. how i could stay here for weeks.

actually, probably not. but so far it's been good. on tuesday, our first full day here, we walked up broadway to an sta to organise flights from toronto to canada. then we walked up a couple more blocks to the coffee shop from seinfeld!! in real life it's called tom's restaurant. from there we braved the subway to times square. it wasn't that scary. when we surfaced at times square we were bombarded with bright flashing lights and too many people asking for money/if we'd go to their comedy club. we got talking to one guy and kaya told him it was the first time we'd seen rain (crappy rainy day in new york). he seemed to believe her, silly man. we walked around and around and went into many shops. i bought some cheap levi's because we were dressed for summer and it appears to not be summer any more. kinda sucks when you only have summer clothes! we bought some tacky souvenirs, like you do. the virgin superstore, oh my god. it was massive. 3 levels? too many things. i bought a piebald dvd because it was the 2nd time i'd seen it...must be fate! hopefully it will work back home. in the imports section we saw so many aussie cds! grinspoon, gyroscope...even the hot lies. the little hot lies from little adelaide, in a cd shop in times square!

 

today we set off on the subway again with the statue of liberty in our sights. we caught the free ferry to statern island, took photos, froze, etc. back to manhattan, a subway ride to the next station, a short walk, world trade centre site. it's a massive hole in the ground and in the sky. it was really sad, especially seeing all the names etc. next stop was the brooklyn bridge. we walked over it. it was long. and tiring. we've done too much walking. but yeah, we walked over it. brooklyn was what we expected the bronx to be like. don't think we'll be going back there. then we got on the subway, on a different train, that said it would take us to 96th street...only it didn't stop at 96th. it didn't stop until 125th street or something, which is pretty much the bronx/scary area we were told not to go. we braved it...and walked...and walked...allllllll that way back. plus we had to walk a few blocks over to broadway. we treated ourselves with ben and jerry's ice cream because we really earned it! the pedometer isn't counting properly, but it said we did 15,000 steps today. i think we did more! lots more!

then tonight we had a date with the laundry! the simple joys of life. we had to walk 15 or so blocks to get to an open laundry place. not really something we felt like doing, but we didn't really have a choice.

 

tomorrow we might go to coney island. there's nothing else that we really want to do. we're organised for the start of our canada leg. we've got bus tickets to toronto, train was sold out, and we've got 4 nights accommodation in toronto. then we'll head elsewhere for a few day before returning to toronto for the v festival

kaya and i have made it to new york! after dc we went to baltimore for a couple of nights. it wasn't really exciting, but we went to the national aquarium with the australian exhibition. they were selling little bottles of vegemite for 8 bucks. i also found a lot of cheap dickies stuff...a hoodie, skirt and shirt for under 40 bucks. from baltimore we went to philadelphia. our accommodation was quite good. we were in a hi hostel out of the city. it was in an old mansion. the only bad part was the uncomfortable beds/lack of sleep from being in a dorm. we didn't really see any famous sites in phili. our aim was to get organised. we didn't really get organised, but kaya got space bags so it was an achievement. oh! we saw the LOVE sign and took photos. when i can use a computer with a usb thing i'll upload them. in phili we did over 20,000 steps (trusty pedometre). a lot of people from the hostel had been working in camps. on the second night there were 2 aussies in the bunks next to us.

from phili we came to new york. so far we've walked down broadway, which is really close to the hostel. and we've walked through part of central park. the hostel is really nice. it's like a flash packer place, not dodgy like the first place we almost stayed at. there are heaps of people here. we've got our own room so hopefully we get more sleep tonight.

since camp ended and i left on saturday i've been to texas, back to baltimore, and then to dc.
texas was a lot of fun. nothing really went to plan but i loved the people that i was with, so that made up for it. wasn't really ready to say goodbye to everyone in texas, but you've got to learn to move on when travelling. i'll see them again, one day.
back to baltimore to meet kaya. only had to go to the next terminal to meet her. shuttle to hotel > hotel nicer than the 2 stars it has been given! had dinner from some american grill place, got it to go and ate it in the room. there was seinfeld on tv!! how i love cable! free breakfast from there this morning, then off to the train station to get the train to dc. once in dc we braced the metro system and got closer to the road our hostel was on. had to get a taxe up the street though because it was way too far to walk with all of our stuff. got to the hostel, which is currently in a different location due to a fire...it looked dodgy. o told kaya we should see what it was like before we went to find somewhere else to stay. inside it was just as dodgy. the guy looked like he wanted to rape us/murder us/make some kind on home movie with us. after we apid and took our stuff up to our room (4 flights of stairs, no help from scary man) we went out to search for alternative accommodation. every hotel we went into was really expensive. we walked so far!! then we came across a super expensive one that was also tied to holiday inn motel/hotels...so the lady hooked us up with some numbers and we booked a room. went back to the hostel, left the key with a note and got a taxi to the holiday inn. it's really nice here. we have free internet. ehee. tomorrow we're going to head back to baltimore. there aren't really any hostels in baltimore so we're going to stay in another hotel. soon we're going to go for a walk so kaya can see dc at night. either later tonight or tomorrow morning i'm going to put more photos in my album so keep checking. i'm going to start a new folder for post camp travels...it'll probably be called sf + kf in america

tomorrow i leave camp for 2006.
last night at our last dance i cried. i suck.
tonight at our dinner i got an award for best overall female counselor.
didn't expect it.
talent show in a few minutes.
this time tomorrow night i'll be meeting a lot of gia's friends.
scary.