Going Back In Time

The flight to LA was strange because of the time zones - I left at 23.15 on the 2nd of December and I arrived at 13.30 on the 2nd December, almost 10 hours before I left! It was freaky and I thought I would have been quite jetlagged but I wasn't affected that badly.

Customs weren't necessarily strict, as you would expect from US customs these days, but they were extremely inneficient - they only had 7 or so counters open for over 500 passengers trying to pass through - they did take fingerprints and a photo of you at the counter though which was time consuming too. Once I got my bags I was out on the street and looking for somewhere to hire a car from. I opted for Budget as the name seems to suit my requirements - they got me a Chevrolet Cavalier and, even though it was described as a small car, it was still pretty big.

My introduction to driving in the US was more like a baptism of fire as I was straight into a 5 lane motorway North towards Nevada - I wanted to go to Santa Barbara first but I was misdirected to the wrong highway! Driving in America is an experience - there are fast food outlets aplenty every 5 miles and every once in a while some place would say "Martys Diner - still serving Pea Soup" whatever that meant - it was always pea soup!? Also, all the streets are famous in some way - Mulholland Drive, 8 Mile Road, Madison Avenue, and my favourite one was rather festive - Santa Claus Lane!

As I only had one CD, I had to make do with the radio for most of my travelling too - the stations are varied and weird - occassionally I'd get the odd hip-hop or Rock station but the general concensus is hispanic radio (like Little Spanish Flea on a continuous loop) and evangalists and Country and Western.

The traffic was immense and I know now why my car was described as small, because compared to the huge SUVs they have here, I was small-fry! I stopped in Fresno and then Bakersfield on my way to the Seqouia National Park which I planned to explore the next day so I decided to sleep in the car at a rest area. However, after 5 minutes I had some trucker asking me all sorts of dumb questions and he was probably going to solicite me for some sexual act sooner or later so I made my excuses and drove on! I eventually slept in the Seqouia National Park's car park as there was no-one there.

What I didn't realise was that the National Parks are more like drive-thru national parks and it's all quite spaced out so I wasn't able to see much of the park as I was low on fuel. I did manage to see the Giant Forest and the General Sherman Tree which is believed to be the largest living thing in the world. However, I was caught unprepared again and my camera ran out of batteries so I don't have any pictures of the Seqouias! There was a lot of wildlife on the roads like deer and squirrels and rabbits, but there were no bears as forewarned which I was glad about. There had also been fresh snowfall in the mountains which made me nervous to go any further because I had no snow chains for my tyres. I didn't think it through that well, really!

Around Sacramento, I had a bit of an accident in the car and scraped the bumper on a low wall of a drive thru ATM - It was a bit silly really and I didn't even see the wall - I was thinking of covering the whole front of the car in mud to hide the scratch but I may as well just face the music, eh?

I decided to make my way to Reno and I stopped at the bottom of the Sierra Nevada mountains for some food - food portions are so huge here that I have had very few meals because each one is the equivalent of 3 british meals!

The American people I had met had been quite worrying too - when I explained my accent and that I had been travelling, some people would know where New Zealand is! Most people that you meet on the road are very weird too - If people don't expect a tip, they hardly notice you exist! I was also accosted by a bible basher in Subway which is the last place I expected to be approached by Jesus' teachings - as I left they called out to me "God Bless you! Remember Jesus died for you". It seems that turning to religion is an excuse to be insane in this country.