Tony & Wendy's Travel Blog

Thanks to the scrots from our Coronado home exchange we have been let down at the last minute. But all is not lost, thanks to Chris and De-Shaun, we spend 3 nights with them up at San Marcos. Then another home exchanger has stepped into the breach with a two bedroom condo down on Mission Beach.

Lazy morning in the hotel after the worst breakfast ever served in the garage of a Comfort Inn. Choice hotels really are loosing the plot. There’s always some sort of screw up with them.

After lunch we drive up to Chris’s lovely new home in San Marco. Get settled in there and meet the dog pack. Wendy wants to take the cute little poodle cross home with here.

In the evening we go out for dinner in the Mall. Good choice on the menu, I even get to have Tappas, which only in America includes pizza. Love the home made Jalepeno sauce. Cant believe the wine prices, why they even make NCL cruise prices look cheap.

We both slept like a black bear in hibernation. I think we’ll be trying to sneak this mattress out in our luggage when we leave.

Set off to Carlsbad for a wander around and lunch. Carlsbad village is all very up market and pleasant.

Then drive up to Oceanside. Lovely beach resort. Typical California beach town complete with pier. Full of healthy people enjoying plenty of fresh air, exercise and the beach – no excess adipose tissue blobbies around here. Have a stroll down the pier and afternoon tea at a traditional American diner at the end of the pier, complete with typical American diner waitresses.

Pick up a Mexican takeaway for tea on the way back to Chris’s.

Off down to San Diego Safari park for the day – well afternoon. Walk the whole zoo and do the safari tram tour. Neat zoo, I enjoy it but Wendy’s not so impressed, apart from the Gorilla with baby in arms. Knackered by kicking out time.

Take away tonight is a Quesiddila and Taco – it is Taco Tuesday after all, half price everywhere. Both were awesome. Taco had like pork kebab in it. Really must start to have Quesidillas at home.

Leisurely day at Chris’s as we can’t get into our home exchange until 16:00. Supermarket and bank for some cash to pay for our Park City stay in February – can’t wait – first snow has fallen today, somewhat belatedly this year.

Drive down to our new home, on Mission Beach, for the next 8 days. It’s clean and comfortable, only 50 yards from the beach. Thanks to Martha for stepping up at such short notice, saved us from Hotels or VRBO.

Lazy morning with the excitement of a trip to Ralph’s for Wendy and I while away an hour at Starbucks. There’s a crazy geezer sat outside. Can’t tell what sex. Every time someone comes in he begs them, louder than a constipated opera star, for coffee, not money just a coffee. Eventually it gets rewarded for all the excruitiating whining. There really should be a sign saying “don’t feed the wildlife” it only encourages them. Apparently yesterday he was lay down in the middle of a 4 lane road, outside Starbucks, whining and raving for coffee. Is this what happens to you if you drink too much Starbucks.

After lunch we set off down to Torrey Pines State park on our way to Janelle’s for dinner. Drive up the coast. Traffic is like an exodus of arthritic tortoises, nose to arse tail all the way. By the time we arrive at the state park it’s time to leave for dinner so we give it a miss.

Drive on up through even worse Interstate traffic to Janelle’s.

California traffic is dire. I’all not rant about traffic at home after this trip. Well, not for at least a week.

Lovely dinner with Janelle and Mike, along with their friends Bob and marilyn who will also be up at PC when we are there, so good to meet them. Good company, great food and an enjoyable evening putting the World to rights. They were all keen Trump supporters. Amazing how similar the problems and views are the World over.

2nd attempt to visit Torrey Pines State Park. This time we made it.

A pirate at the entrance robs you of $15 to enter. Nice visitors center and we do a few of the easy walks around the cliffs and woods. All very pleasant, but Wendy’s incensed that after putting down a sizeable deposit on the park, just to enter, she cannot eat her lunch on any of the walks.

Then we drive down to La Jolla. Have a pleasant stroll around the beach front and then onto the cove for a starbucks and stroll around. With all the birds and seals around the sea caves it stinks worse than a knackers yard on a summers day. Of course there are warnings not to approach the seal but it’s amazing the level of illiteracy or stupidity in this country. One young blobbie, very akin to the seals in the amount of blubber she’s toting around, just can’t resist trying to get a selfie with a lazing seal.

La Jolla is very up market and you couldn’t mistake it for anywhere other than California.

Have a stroll down Mission beach.

Stop for an Italian espresso by the beach. People watching, the healthy lythe young eye candy roller blading, volley balling, cycling, jogging or just walking. Typical California beach life.

Chris and DeShaun come over for lunch.

Then in the evening we catch up on some BBC.

Well we’re off on our next great adventure, a 7 day cruise around the Hawaii Islands. As with all cruises there’s wifi available but it so expensive we’d both have to sell both kidneys, 8 pints of blood and a heart to pay for any sensible wifi access. It’s the equivalent of going to the dark side of the moon with a bunch of greedy pirates.

Therefore blog will posting will be a tad tardy.

Dropped the car off at the airport, got a shuttle to the port and then joined the usual boarding queue. Being silver members we got expedited registration but it still took 42 minutes of the usual misery.

Ship, boat or whatever they call it – Pride of America – has about 2,000 passengers and layout is quite good. Buffets area is smaller than normal but there are quite a few smaller restaurants around.

Up at the 6 bells for breakfast and to catch our first Wallace Arnold experience with the “Best of Maui” tour. Great they treat my 16 year old mind like that of a 90 year old imbecile with a memory span of a geriatric goldfish – if in doubt repeat it until boredom sets in.

First stop a surf beach to watch them surf.

Second stop a sugar plantation with the usual Disney style trolley tour complete with informative narration on my favourite subject plants!

Third stop an aquarium for lunch and the chance to ogle pretty fish, sharks and coral.

Our driver is very informative and one of the most amusing guides ever and we get to see a lot of the island.

Back on board our floating gin palace for a lazy afternoon and dinner.

Up and out for the crater tour. 07:50 departure.

A long drive up to the Haleakala crater which is at 10,000 feet. No longer an active volcano but worth the trip and another National Park hat to add to the collection. Spectacular views.

Afternoon lazing onboard. Wendy toddles off to make a Lei, otherwise known as a shell necklace. I pass up this tempting opportunity. Back in the day only Hawaiian royalty could wear these. Now any old riff raff can buy or make one. If you’re feeling really stupid then you can buy an expensive “Lei shell making kits”. They’re selling faster than toilet rolls at a dysentery outbreak. The average American and her greenbacks are soon parted.

Cruise ship leaves early due to 40 foot waves predicted at our next port, Hilo, so captain, quite wisely, avoids that. Probably because they don’t have enough pewk bags. Tomorrow becomes a sea day rather than Hilo and the volcano National Park. Some passengers are left stranded as they decided to leave early, after we’d departed the ship. Fortunately we were on a ships tour so although our tour was cut short we got back before they high tailed out of there.

The volcano National Park houses one of the few active volcanoes in the world. The highlight of the itinerary. Fortunately I’ve got 3G access on my mobile and manage to book a car for Wednesday and a longer drive down to the volcano. We’d have been devastated to miss it.

40 foot waves down the East coast of Maui so Hilo and the volcano’s off the menu and we have a sea day.

Well at least we get a lie in. No crack of dawn tours.

Lazy sort of day. As usual most of the activities seem to be aimed at geriatric bingo brigade and paleo bargin huntresses. You can learn how to wrap a sarong, Hulu dance, weave a hat from palm leaves, play endless trivia or how to fold towels into animals. Haven’t come across any talks on colonic irrigation yet. The only morsel of intellectual stimulation is a Hum-back Whale talk.

As a result of our complaining about an obstructed view they’ve tried to compensate us with 4 free speciality restaurant meals each – about $30 a meal. So now we have to eat at a speciality restaurant every night. Tough life.

Start off in Cagney Steak house – lobster bisque and a tea bone. Lobster bisque gives me a touch of the squitters. Really think I need to avoid shell fish. Love crab cakes but they certainly don’t love me.

Cruise by the bottom of the volcano to get a glimpse of the red hot lava flowing into the sea. Sadly it’s a good distance to the shore – no risk of a Greek tragedy with this crew – so it’s nothing but a red glimmer in the distance. Then dash back in to watch the rest of the election programmed. Finally go to sleep when they’ve called it for Trump. Shock and awe. Tomorrow there’ll be a lot of long sad faces on the ultra smug democrats who “knew” that Clinton was obviously going to win. Best not speak to any Americans for a few days.

We live in interesting times. All the pundits and poles got it wrong. Lots of similarities to the BREXIT result.

We had nothing booked today so I went through web hell to book the cheapest herzt mobile I could find for a trip down to the volcano. It’s a 2 hour drive but I was dammed if I was going to miss the highlight of the cruise.

Pick up my hertz mobile. Breathe a sigh of relieve as it’s not a fiat 500 but instead a Chrysler 300, very spacious very comfortable. We share the cost of the trip with Lynell from Australia.

Pleasant drive down. Visit visitors centre, buy yet another hat for my collection, and get to see lava in the cauldera, how awesome is that. Drive around the various craters and the volcanic landscape. Walk down a lava tube. What an awesome day. Not only do we get a personalised tour with stop offs where we choose, rather than a couple of stop offs with the bus tour, but we also save £250 in the process. So yesterday’s disaster turns into a real plus.

Get back in plenty of time to board. A well planned and well executed trip – moral again is better to do your own thing.

A fantastic day and then in the evening we get another freebe to the Italian speciality restaurant. Followed by the ??? show, which Wendy really enjoys and I manage to snooze through. Mind you a bottle of merlot did help.

I do the helicopter tour around Kauai. Wendy passes.

Well it cost an arm, a leg and a kidney, but I’m always reluctant to say this, it was worth every cent. What a fantastic island this is the Waimea Canyon and the Napali coast are unbelievable. Get a pilots front row seat, manage to retain my breakfast and nearly overflow a memory card with awesome pictures. It’ll take a month to cull and edit them.

Then in the afternoon we catch the free shuttle into the Mall. Well the less said about that the better.

At least it looks like we’ve got a home exchange in San Diego to replace the one a scrot has welshed on.

In the evening we do the Teppanyaki meal in a Japanese restaurant. All very entertaining but all those veggies before we get to some decent meat is just too much for a carnivore.

Up early for Waimea Canyon tour. I’d already seen it from the helicopter but the tour was well worth it for Wendy and we both enjoyed it. Stopped off at a market – could have passed on that; then the canyon; coffee farm with lots of free samples; then a blowhole. Thankfully no coconut husking demo. Great narration from our tour guide. Excellent and well worth it. Must be loosing my grip, that’s twice I’ve said that this week.

Back to the ship for lunch then lazy afternoon as we set sail for Honolulu. Pass on the invite from the captain to a select sail away party.
Sounds like he’s a bit of a Billy no mates, always wanting us to be his friend.

Joy for the first time ever we get to walk off a floating gin palace with on immigration or other delays.

Then to spoil the jubilation we meet the two clueless screw ups who are trying to organise our Speedishuttle back to the airport. It’s total chaos. So much for a shuttle every 20 minutes, it takes 45 minutes in the gruelling sun and a near riot from the massed passenger revolt to get on a shuttle. My fault I should have used Uber instead of these jokers.

Finally get to the airport. Survive the rude Hawaiian airlines check in staff and fortunately we’re TSA pre-checked.

Then we’ve 5 hours in the worst airport lounge ever. No food, no alcohol and to top it all they close for 30 minutes for lunch. Customer service, what’s that? Are all the Japanese mentally retarded or is their inscrutable gormless look just a way of deflecting complaints?

This airport must be the most expensive on the planet. A burger from burger king is over $10.

Ryanair are really missing a trick. Why not do what Hawaiian Airlines do, turn the temperature down so that it’s colder than a witches tit and then sell blankets. Another example of Hawaiian excellence in customer service.

Lazy do nothing day.

Drive down to Kapolei for a decent supermarket. Do our last shop and then back down the Farrington Highway.

Don’t you just love how the marketing machine of the mighty dollar cholesterol cathedrals panders to the blobbies. Never more so than with Baskin Robbins and their latest perversion Turkey ice cream pie. Ready for thanksgiving no doubt.

Off down to Hanauma Bay for some beach time and snorkelling. It’s a nature reserve. All very pleasant and very safe snorkelling. I’ve only got my mask and snorkel, no fins, but I cope. Manage to see some pretty fish and the odd bit of coral.

We can only manage an hour lazing in the sun before we have to escape. Sunning ourselves on the beach really isn’t our thing.

Then it’s more pantomime time from Fox, MSNBC and CNN. Fox may be crazy but at least they have a nice piece of eye candy in Megan Kelly and they make it more interesting and entertaining than that rabid bitch on MSNBC. They’re all so bias that they’d make the Klu Klux Klan look like black baptists by comparison.

Drive down to do a plantation tour. So well hidden you only find it if you have eyes in the back of your head. Not very busy and when you look around at the desolation you can understand why. Pass, not going to spend $13 each to have a tour around someone’s allotment.

Abandon plans and return back down the highway from hell for a lazy afternoon.

Head off to downtown Honolulu. I drop Wendy off at the Ala Moana shopping mall where she’s going to take our credit cards for a leisurely stroll around the 7th largest mall and largest outdoor mall in America. Hopefully they’ll not get to see daylight.

Meanwhile I drive down to the Diamond head state park for an ascent up Diamond head. The suns blistering hot and it’s 83 F. Of course in true English fashion it’s mad dogs time. Anyway make it, all 600 feet to the top and end up wetter than a water hogs backside. Stunning views and quite a pleasant walk, certainly does my twice broken femur good. Quite pleased takes just 32 minutes up and 20 minutes back down. I use a young couple as my pace makers. They reckon to allow 1.5 to 2 hours.

Back to the mall to pick Wendy up. And by way of a change we nip into Starbucks. Wendy meanwhile treats herself to a lavish ice cream – $7 – she’s really getting into this frittering the kids inheritance away.

Call in at the Apple Store. How could I resist it, they’ve none of the new MacBook Pro’s with touch bar on display or available.

Then it’s back to the pantomime, beer, wine and pack ready for our next adventure. Best of all a whole week of no driving.

You know what the problem is with American politics and the media? They can’t tie a tie properly. Most of them have a tie that so skewed to one side it looks like a drunk Lowry stick man. It’s not difficult to tie a decent knot but these numpties haven’t a clue. No doubt they have trouble tying their shoelaces too. Sure sign of lying sleaze balls.

Lazy day and then in the evening we go to the Paradise Cove Luau. All traditional Hawaiian food and entertainment. It’s the sort of touristy thing you are obliged to do before they’ll let you leave the island. Food was good, never easy mass catering, but they had a good choice and not massive queues.

Entertainment consisted of traditional games; demos of all those useful skills needed in Blackburn such as how to tie a towel around you, net fishing, climb a coconut tree and open a coconut; music and dancing girls – amazing they managed to find so many slim natives, the thought of your average Hawaiian Walrus gyrating and shaking their adipose tissue in a grass skirt is enough to send anyone into catatonic shock.

A good evening.

Catch the late evening pantomine. New bombshell as it turns out the FBI are again looking into Clintons email. Apart from that nothing new, the same old. Although I fell off my surfboard of life due to uncontrolled laughter when I heard the Fox News slogan “Fair and balanced coverage”.

There’s some rain forecast so we decide to have a drive around the North shore.

Call in at the Dole plantation where we’re treated to a demonstration on how to fillet a pineapple.

This side of the island is not quite as poor as our neck of the woods. Some lovely beaches. Waimea Bay is gorgeous and World renowned for great surf, up to 30 foot waves. Just our luck today the best rip curl we saw was about 3 inches.

Had another one of our lavish lunches amidst the peacocks at Waimea Valley. We were going to splash out and have a hike to the waterfall but rain scared us off.

Called in at a lovely Temple – see photos – only to discover, as we guessed, it was a Mormon Temple out here amongst all these pagans.

Came across a Budhist Temple so to maintain balance we kicked our trainers off and wore out a pair of sock – respect. Again very beautiful and tranquil with a backdrop of the heavily foliated serrated green mountain valleys. Have a go at Budhist bell ringing and pleased to see that the Zen garden had been raked by a masteraker (not a predictive text masterbater).

The act of raking the gravel into a pattern recalling waves or rippling water has an aesthetic function. Zen priests practice this raking also to help them focus their concentration. Achieving perfection of lines is not easy. It can take up to 10 years to become a masteraker.

Back home in time for the ongoing pantomime, a thirst quenching Pilsner Urquell and a California red. Well it now seems that Clintons the focus of scandal as the FBI rake up the email saga again and start to scour 65,000 emails for more evidence of wrong doing. The press have now turned like a pack of wolves on an injured Bambi. They smell blood. It was all becoming too calm and settled as Clinton coasted to victory, but now they’ve the opportunity to stir the pot and create more mayhem. What a pantomine, two diabolical villains as the only candidates and the press raking up the mud at every opportunity. You’d think that anyone with a skerrick of dignity and pride, with their track records, would just do the honourable thing and impale themselves on a sharpened toilet brush.

Trump is irresponsible. Clinton is dishonest. Trump is reckless. Clinton is untrustworthy. Trump is undisciplined. Clinton is unethical.

Decide to do the South East Shore drive.

Sulphur, I smell sulphur every time we drive down the Farrington Highway. Does this mean there’s a volcano about to erupt? Well if so at least it’ll do some good by destroying this accursed Farrington Highway.

Park up at the Kapiolani Park with a superb backdrop of Diamond Head. Walk along the beach to Waikiki beach for lunch. Happen to stumble upon a Starbucks. Not difficult here as there are more of them than ABC stores. Waikiki beach is buzzing and yes it’s very busy but we do find it quite alluring.

Stroll back through the park. There’s a free brass band concert on, sadly we don’t have time for it, and we watch a bit of Lacrosse, which seems very popular.

Drive past Hanauma Beach, we’ll save that for a full day, then onto to the Blowhole. Stop off for various stunning photo opportunities along the way, culminating in the Pali Lookut. Pity it wasn’t a blue sky day but awesome views and a wind strong enough to blow the wax out of your ears.

The Pali Lookout is a site of deep historical significance. Named “Pali” meaning ‘cliff’ in Hawaiian, the Pali Lookout is the site of the Battle of Nuuanu, where in 1795 King Kamehameha 1st won the struggle that finally united Oahu under his rule. This fierce battle claimed hundreds of soldiers’ lives, many of which were forced off of the Pali’s sheer cliffs.

Visit Laniki beach. Judging by the amount of broken glass in car parks and the SUV with a broken rear window I would guess there’s a high crime rate around here. Not surprised with the number of dossers lingering around. Some of their encampments are mini Calais Jungles. One thing there doesn’t seem to be is any perambulating black bin liners, oh how we miss multi-cultural Blacburn.

Note that the Pali Lookout is also known for its strong and howling winds. You’ll understand why the Nuuanu Pali Lookout is one of Oahu’s best scenic points when you feel the wind push up against you, hear the winds whistle through the mountains and see the breathtaking views of Oahu’s lush Windward Coast.

Then it head back home. For once the Farrington Highway not a nose to exhaust tortoise crawl, but the traffic lights still do a great job of making the journey a nightmare.

A long day with a lot of quite enjoyable driving. We got to see a lot of the Island again and have now covered all the major roads.

Amazing difference between the East (windward side – rainy and cloudy) side and the West (leeward side – drier, sunnier and poorer) side of the island and yet they’re only about 40 Miles across. I suppose it’s the mountains on the East side that create the clouds and moisture as the wind blows in from the Pacific laden with all that moisture. Geography lesson over.

In the evening we watch the first episode of the remake of “Hawaii 5 O”.

Up and out for 11:00 as we head over to the far side of the island to visit the Polynesian Culture Centre. Run by the Mormons, which I found quite surprising that they should be promoting these pagans. But, hey ho another day another dollar. It’s actually run as a non-profit organization and helps the 1,000’s of students, by providing part time work, fund their way through the Brigham Young University.

A great day out. The place is a mini Disney with villages of all the Polynesian Island culture. Each village has typical housing, events portraying village life and a show celebrating the songs, dance and culture of that village. Pleasant canoe ride through the villages and awesome film on the Hawaiian Islands. You really need a full day here. We only had 5 hours and it was a rush to cram it all in.

The Luau looks great and was only an extra $20 just a pity that we would have been back so late.

Having had a great day out we have to pay the price as we drive back through the dark. Not too bad until we hit the hell of H1. 7 O’clock, 7 lanes, 7″ apart nose to bumper. How do people cope with this every day. Here they are in an Island paradise and yet they have this to cope with every day of the week, morning and night. Perhaps the dossers living in their tents with their surfboards really have the right idea!

Late back so it’s a subway for dinner.

Well I never thought I’d say it but after 4 weeks of desert living it’s a real treat to see clouds.

Our lovely new home exchange for the next two weeks is on the 19th floor of the Makaha Towers with floor to ceiling glass windows and doors in the lounge and bedroom looking out over the valley and sea. Awesome views. The building looks a bit dated from the outside but from inside our one bedroom condo is ideal, modern, well equipped, clean and best of all good wifi. After our 3,500 square foot home in the desert, where we wore out two pairs of shoes just shuffling around the house, this place is nice and compact and the space flows well. There’s a narrow balcony but the idea seems to be open your patio doors if you want to sunbathe. 19 floors below is a full sized pool, sun lounger – not a German beach towel in sight, mind you there’s probably a whole chapter in the Mein Kampf rule book for this place on pool don’ts.

Lazy day after our travels. Pop into the office for a parking permit, AKA, money milking scheme.

Take a drive up the coast. Call in at the Kaneana Cave. Where there’s fresh fruit and vegetables laid out. It seems it’s to feed and appease the local gods. Apparently this cave was used by the Shark Man to store his victims on a slimy stone until he was hungry.

We have a chat with a couple of young girls, who despite being well educated and seeming intelligent, tell us they sort of believe in such pagan superstitions. They also tell us that Hawaiians resented being drafted into the USA as the 50th state. Seems that there’s still quite a lot of resentment and prejudice against Caucasians – easily identified as anyone who is not obese.

Get back to a missive on our door from the TSA gestapo who pose as security guards. Seems we’ve committed a heinous crime and are in violation of one of the many rules, in their no doubt 6″ thick rule book. “Failure to return parking pass”. Oh you actually mean “Sorry we screwed up and gave you the wrong pass, could you please pop into the office to swap it out”. I guessed when we arrived and saw some of their anal retentive rules like park inward; don’t cross the white lines when parked, that this place was going to be just one big TSA theme park of rules, regulations and unrelenting trivia from a band of TSA rejects.

Another day and another violation posted on our door knob. This time it’s a stark parking violation. What it should have actually read was “we told you wrong yesterday, would you please park in the upper parking lot”. On the last day I’m going to sort out these anal retentives and give them a fiesta of violations, we’ll hang towels out on the balcony; park in the bottom lot; reveres the car in; park diagonally over 3 parking spaces; serenade Wendy from the ground floor when Noddy’s well past Big Ears; drive clockwise around the towers. That should give them severe hand cramp writing all violation tickets out.

Up early and out for a trip to the Pearl Harbor memorial – yes I know that’s not spelt correctly but consider how bad it would be if we stuck with the Hawaiian alphabet of the 5 vowels and just 7 consonants. Could that be a reason why the language is withering.

The drive down Farrington highway is a nightmare. Just too many traffic lights.

Pearl Harbor memorial is excellent, as always for anything run by the National parks. Film on that fateful day followed by boat trip out to the USS Arizona memorial to over 2,000 lives lost when the nips launched that heinous attack. A very sombre and reflective visit.

Then we decide that it would be a good idea to visit Wholefoods market for a decent supermarket. First one doesn’t even exist – that made my surfboard of life get a tad slippy. Finally find the 2nd one. Fortunately there’s a Starbucks next door. Pop in for a coffee to help my grip and balance on my virtual surfboard on the drive home. Decide to splash out on a pack of Kona coffee. I know it’s an expensive coffee but when she rings up the price – $25 – I take a nose dive over the bow of my virtual surfboard. Is there a defibrillator anywhere near.

Drive home along H1 and H201 – their freeways. Nearly as bad as LA. Then we have the Farrington highway to cope with. A nightmare of traffic lights and a superb gridlock creation scheme they call “contra flow”. Stupidity 15 : common sense 0.

Decide to watch “Pearl Harbor”. Not available on Netflix, so we compromise and watch “Tora, Tora, Tora”. Don’t think we’ve seen it before. Made in the 1960’s, so certainly beyond the reach of any of our memory synapses, but unlike the sop, romance and piffling side tracks of “Pearl Harbor”, this is much more factual. Despite its age it has some great attack scenes. Really enjoyable and helps put it all into context.

Classic of SNAFU of that fateful day has to be:

Radar operator “Lieutenant, there’s a large detachment of planes coming in from the North.”

Lieutenant “Well, don’t worry about it. They’ll be ours.”

Yes, that actually happened.

A lazy day after all that driving yesterday. Traffic’s the main problem with this place. We’re only about 30 miles from Honolulu but the Farrington highway is a night mare at rush hour and the few freeways they have aren’t much better.

Drive down to a local Beach. Visit the remains of an Hawaiian temple and then have a walk along the Beach. Watch a few intrepid surfers. It certainly is an island paradise and our end of the island is very much the locals end. Plenty of ram shackled housing. Lots of vagrants dossing out on the beach, it seems a way of life and unemployment is high. Reminds us very much of your average little chicken shit Caribbean island.

Followed by the inevitable Starbucks treat.

Get our early evening pantomime fix with a mixture of Fox, MSNBC and CNN. Must be masochists. As for that repitious rabid reviling bitch Rachel Maddow, she must think all Americans are so thick that they need to hear the same bile 3 or 4 times for it to really sink in. Cut the pandering repetition and her raving 60 minutes could be distilled down to 5 minutes. What a nightmare waking up with that velociraptor on your pillow would be. Oh I forgot, I’m safe, she’s a lesbian – what a surprise!

Miracles, VPS have just paid me for my consultancy after much chasing on my part. It’s an omen. Watch the long awaited Apple announcement on MacBooks. Want one – 13″ MacBook Pro fully specked out. Need one, mines well past its retire by date. At least now I’ll be able to afford one.

Drive down to Honolulu for the Waikiki Trolley bus tour of Honolulu. Decide to pick up the trolley in China town. What a dump. It’s grey, miserable and raining, but at least it’s warm. Spend an hour trying to find parking. End up having to each sell a pint of blood and a kidney to pay the parking fee.

Trolley is a great way to see Honolulu. Once we get out of china town the place improves dramatically although spoilt by so many high rise buildings.

Get off at the world famous Waikiki Beach, have a wander around and enjoy watching the surfing and the eye candy on the beach. Busy and touristy but much better and more civilised than expected. Lash out on lunch at the beachside at the exclusive Moana Surfrider hotel – no complaints!

Back on the trolley to finish our tour.

On our way home call in at a civilised Safeway for some vital supplies. No more 3rd world supermarkets. We thought California was expensive but in Hawaii I think the decimal point is always right shifted. Battle our way back through the traffic. Not too bad tonight.

Off to the living desert zoo. Didn’t have great expectations of this but we were pleasantly surprised. Not too big, fabulous gardens and cacti, well laid out and very enjoyable.

Called in at Barnes and Noble for a book on Hawaii. Need to get the most out of our next adventure. Book shops seem to becoming rarer than bible sellers in Tehran, thanks to the Internet. Mind you when I over hear a Barnes & Noble saleswomen fobbing off a customer who’s complaining about her Nook, “Well you have to understand the software gets tired!”, I’m not surprised. What balderdash people talk. Perhaps the real reason was she hadn’t fed the Nook recently.

Starbucks for lunch and Internet. Oh how I’m looking forward to our next home exchange, which apparently has proper wifi.

Catch up on the 3rd and thankfully the final presidential slanging match. The same old. But I have to say that even though the moderator was one of Fox News crazies he did seem biased against Trump – he was asked about his groping and yet she was not asked about her emails and the Clinton foundation. Just like a woman she got away with all the rattle.

Lazy morning and trip to Starbucks. After lunch we have the almost daily visit to the post office to see if Wendy’s tablets have arrived. Surprise , surprise they’ve still not arrived after 4 weeks. You’d think it would be possible for two leading western democracies to sort out a decent snail mail solution. But then again you need to abandon all hope of service or efficiency when you enter a USA post office. Obviously accurately modelled on a UK Post Office.

Wendy packs in the afternoon.

Evenings a melange of Fox, MSNBC and CNN.

Interesting to watch Trumps Gettysburg address, where he at long last comes out with some concrete proposals on what he’ll do in his first 100 days. Quite an impressive list. Why hasn’t he stuck with this rather than his childish tantrums. Typical that Clinton trashes it in her typical lying, cold blooded reptile like fashion. Not a mention of his proposal just his threat to sue those women.

Telephone poll on Trump versus Clinton is advertised on TV. “If you’ve already called, call again.” Bizarre, only in America.

Even more bizarre is how Trump gets most of the media coverage / time, yet it’s so biased against him. It’s almost like they’re a load of sharks smelling blood and going in for the kill.

Up early and we’re off on our next great adventure, Hawaii. The 50th state and our 44th state visited. Just 6 to go.

Call at the post office for our last trip to futility and then we’re off. And no the tablets still haven’t arrived.

Get about 10 miles into our journey when I realise I’ve still got the garage door opener. A few choice words. Major crash off my virtual surfboard of life.

Rather than drive to San Diego via the quickest route, which seems to involve 10 lanes of snail like LA traffic, or over the mountain range, we go for the shortest, more scenic, route via Borrego Springs. The Borrego Springs state park is the largest in the USA.

Stop off in Borrego Springs, where we catch the tail end of a parade – had some paleogeezer not forgot the garage door opener we’d have caught it all – typical American parade and festivities. Hotter than the Devils armpit but everyone, apart from Wendy, seems to be coping.

Then we drive through more of the park and down towards San Diego. Stop off at a small state park visitors centre for a wander around and chat with inquisitive Rangers.

Check into the airport hotel for the night, have a well deserved Starbucks after our 6 hour trip and then wander around the harbour. Sat on the rooftop patio overlooking the harbour we have our subway dinners. Boring I know but I have my favourite Italian subway, with enough jalapeños to set fire to my anal glands tomorrow.

Browsing the 1,000’s of channels, all with nothing on worth watching when I come across an interesting documentary on “Why Planes Crash”. Wendy doesn’t want to watch it!

Up at 06:00 for a paupers continental breakfast. Even the waffle managed to taste like a grilled soggy corrugated cardboard sandwich. A fried grizzly bear fur sandwich would have been preferable.

Then it’s off to the airport. Let the misery begin. Hawaii here we come.

Well Hawaiian airlines have to be complemented on being the only internal flight to provide a free meal. But why is it there’s only one choice and guess what? They only pander to veggies, those tree hugging herbivores. Why does everyone assume it’s ok to expect us, normal, carnivores to cope without some blood on our plate? From now on I think I’ll become a Meatatarian and form the Obligate Carnivores Society (Obligate carnivoresor “true” carnivores depend on the nutrients found only in animal flesh for their survival. While they may consume small amounts of plant material, they lack the physiology required for the efficient digestion of vegetable matter.).

Strange isn’t it how this is considered an internal rather than an international flight. Yes I know they’re the 50th state, but 2,500 miles away.

Pick Hertzmobile up, a snazzy Buick, very up-market.

Get to our new home for the next 2 weeks. It’s a nice one bedroom condo on the 19th floor, with awesome views over the ocean – more pictures to follow on the next blog. Yeah, there’s reasonable wifi.

First impressions of Hawaii. A mixture of poor shanties and luxury gated communities. Awesome scenery and flowers, a tropical paradise. Looks like everything was built in the 1960’s with lavish use of concrete. Visit the nearest local supermarket. Are we really in America? I thought, being such an expert on supermarkets, that we were in a supermarket in Spain or on Audley range. Good to see some clouds and even 10 drops of rain after 2 weeks in the desert.

Lazy day as the paleo-rockers are swarming for yet another concert this evening. Bald heads with withered pony tales and a surfeit of adipose tissue everywhere. Fortunately this weekend they seem to have turned the volume down so we’re not kept awake by them.

Tootle off down to Starbucks for my caffeine and internet fix.

They’re all there doing there homework, complete with MacBooks and Apple EarPods, even Mum and daughter. I can’t help noticing, probably because I’m nosey, that none of them, from the 8 year old to those in their mid twenties and thirties, use joined up writing. They’re raising generations that have no awareness of the world outside America; they’re not street wise, thanks to being Molly coddled by the yellow bus; they can’t even breath without EarPods and music in their ears; they can’t spell; they can’t even use joined up writing – I wonder how they go on with their signature.

Spend the afternoon deleting and editing 100’s of awesome Joshua Tree pictures.

Boy it’s hot again.

Lazy morning and then we set off to explore Salton sea an inland sea – I thought they called them lakes.

Don’t ever bother. Salton sea beach is the most desolate habitabed place on earth. Just desert and trailers. Must be an Indian reservation it’s so bleak. A basic guide to identify Indian reservation land – “Is it worthless, inhabitable and so desolate that not even an ebola virus would want it”. If the answer to all 3 is a resounding yes, then Uncle Sam probably gave it to the Indians in trade for the paradise they called home. Oh and if it has a giant casino in the middle of nowhere then it’s certainly an Indian reservation. Still at least Uncle SAMs given up on practising eugenics on Indian women.

Never mind says I, aboard my optimistic virtual surfboard, we’ll go down to Salton City. Sounds rather grand. I wonder what the cathedral’s like? It’s the same sprawling desert with a few houses, more up-market than trailers, dotted around. More roads than homes. Oh, and it does have a motel and a cafe. Don’t bother. Why would anyone want to live there. You could turn it into an open prison and they’d all want to escape.

Supermarket and home!

Trump’s Mrs gives an interview. What a tasty piece of eye candy – Trump locker room talk. She comes across as calm, rational, coherent, intelligent and a good speaker. Not a bit like her husband.

Drive down to Tahquitz – sounds like the name of southern softie stock broker who was bullied at public school – Canyon. An Indian canyon. Well first signs are not good. Employee parking only near the visitor centre, customers down the hill. $12 each and not much to it. Pass.

Drive down to Indian Canyons – there are more of these places than Starbucks. They’re only $7 for us geriatrics and there’s 3 canyons and a trading store. Splash out.

Have a our grand cox’s pipin picnic and a stroll around Palm canyon. Then go and walk up Andreas Canyon. Wow there’s even a flowing stream here in the desert, rarer than a Taliban girls college.

Call in for a leisurely Starbucks and Internet on the way home.

Meet up a Starbucks for a coffee with Rudi and Gaynor, home exchangers from Melbourne. It’s amazing how our paths have crossed. We did a home exchange with them about 5 years ago. As we were travelling through Hong Kong back to England, they were travelling through back to Australia so we met up for dinner – yummy snake. Now they’re just 5 miles down the road on a home exchange in La Quinta.

In the evening we go out for dinner with Rudi and Gaynor. An excellent all you can eat dinner at the local casino and reasonably priced with cheap wine – my sort of place. After dinner we go people watching in the casino. All very entertaining with these giant machines that require you to have an advanced degree in Human Computer Interfaces just to put money in. I give Wendy $0.83 to invest, but she doesn’t bother. Probably because there are no poor people’s money consumption machines.

The media’s all hyped up for tonight’s final presidential campaign debate. Just 3 weeks to go. Plots, leaks, lies, accusations and slagging one another off. It’s just unbelievable how vile it is. A sad reflection on American society, but you only have to watch the adverts on TV – difficult not to, easier to dodge a incoming asteroid – to realise how uncritical they’re becoming. Your average advert seems to be aimed at an 8 year old who’s had a lobotomy.

Adverts for pharmaceuticals have to be the most diabolical on American TV. 10 seconds telling you how to cure dry skin if you suffer from diabetes and then 2 minutes warning you about all the dire side effects that may well even kill you. Stick with the dry skin.

The most unbelievable product has to be Act tablets for dry mouth. Have they forgot what water is? Then you’ve got Probiotic for kids and dry skin cream for diabetics.

Up and out early. Exciting day, off to the Joshua Tree National Park, just 30 minutes down the road.

Well the Joshua Trees are ok, but the rock formations are spectacular. Perhaps they should rename it Awesome Rocks NP. Turns out that may well be necessary as the Joshua Tree is threatened with extinction, due to climate change, and may well have died off by the end of this century. It’s not really a tree but a Yucca and only grows at elevations between 1,300 and 5,000 feet. What’s really narking me is why does it only grow in this altitude range? Well apparently it won’t grow above 5,000 feet because of snow and frost damage, but I can’t find out anywhere why it won’t grow below 1,300 feet.

Another awesome 7 hour NP day. I’ll now have to spend weeks culling 100’s of pictures of rocks, but well worth it, and free with our NP pass.

In order to maintain a sense of balance in this pantomime of an election campaign I’ve decided that on odd days I’ll watch Fox News and on even days I’ll watch MSNBC. Day 1 of the crazy voices from Fox. Will I survive MSNBC tonight? For newspapers I’m reading Wall Street Journal and New York Times.

Perhaps I should just watch reruns of the Magic Roundabout – time for bed said Zebedee.

Kurt’s birthday, 32, where do the years go?

Lazy morning and a trip to Starbucks.

After lunch we drive down to Palm Springs to see what all the fuss is about. Well it’s a vary pleasant town with the centre being full of restaurants, clothes shops and “don’t need, but if brain dead, might want” shops.

It’s that hot that most of the restaurants have mist sprays to keep their outside clients cool. We have similar in Belthorn, it comes naturally and is called rain.

Call in at a supermarket, joy, for the weekly shop. Beer section has the usual parade of nats urine but not a decent beer, even Pilsner Urquel, in sight.

Well it’s a repeat of the big concert tonight through Sunday so we’ve decided to keep a low profile and have a couple of lazy days to avoid the crazy people and their gridlock. Who knows with Bob Dylan being a Noble Laureate there may be even more of the crazy people.

After much digging it seems like the best theory on why the Joshua tree does not grow below 1,300 feet is down to lack of moisture – rainfall and transpiration at lower levels. That also seems to be the reason that alpine trees only grow above a certain altitude.

Lazy morning and then for lunch we have a drive down to La Quinta village. All very swish, but not really much to it. Wendy spots a Trader Joes and a Lidl, so like a couple of intrepid trolley spotters we explore – how sad is that.

Wendy lunches at Panera Bread. Then back home to the secret entrance to our gated community, manned by one TSA reject, but at least there’s no queue. With all the bald pony tale crazies (Dylan fans) around it can take upwards of half an hour to penetrate our ultra secure gated community – who knows what they’re protecting us from is it Paleo-BanTheBombers, flea infested rag headed jihadis or Trumpkins.

Watch Captain Philips in the evening, followed by Poldark and an aged Question Time with some gobby American wench, God only knows why we ever granted her citizenship. It really is about time David got a grip. Raw sewage buckets poised over heads could help them engage brain before gobs.

Well were settled into our new home exchange for the next two weeks here in hells sauna – 102F / 39C today. It’s another awesome home – see pictures. 3,500 square feet of it. We’ve already wore out a pair of shoes just walking around it. It’s another gated community home. Our home backs onto the golf course, completely wasted on us.

Have a leisurely day. Lack of wifi is a real pain but at least we can get internet on our phones. Nip down to Starbucks to complete last weeks blog. Was going to walk or use the bike but it’s just too hot for either and the bikes obviously designed for a 7 foot basket ball player. If I ride that I’ll end up as a eunuch talking in a very high pitched voice.

Evening we watch some HBO. At least there’s no adverts. Who knows perhaps we’ll get to watch Bill Maher.

Up and out at the crack of sparrows for our drive down to Mission Viejo – no we’ve not suddenly got an overdose of religion – we’re visiting Paul and Doris for the day. They’re a by-product of fixed dining on our recent cruise. We did fixed dining on the cruise with a little trepidation but had a great group on the table and got on well.

Have breakfast at their home and then they take us down to Laguna Beach, where we have a pleasant stroll and some lunch and a Foo Foo. What you may ask is one of them. Well now I can tell you. It’s a fancy girly style drink, as per Dell Boys tiple, usually served with colorful umbrella and trimmings. Entering into the spirit of this alcoholic perversion – I usually prefer my alcohol un-polluted – I try a pina colada tequila. I nearly threw a tantrum as I instead of an umbrella I got a slice of orange and a cherry. Have to say it was very nice. Goes down too easy, you could soon get rat arsed.

Then we have a drive down the coast. All very lovely, sun, sea, sand, surfing and that most boring of pastimes paddle boarding. Typical California, expect the beach boys any moment.

Then it’s back to their home for wine, pizza (Round Table pizza, one of the best in America) and putting the world to rights. It’s what us old folk do best. We pass on watching the Trump & Clinton debate. Why spoil a great day.

Stay overnight.

After breakfast we say goodbye and thanks to Doris and Paul as we head off back to our Indio home. Start the day with a Starbucks, getting into the swing of California. Call in at the Nixon Museum, but just my luck half of it is closed for refurbishment. Do what all Americans do in this situation. Go to the local Mall.

Rather than going back along the Freeways and Interstates we head back over Mount San Jacinto. It’s a typical scenic route over the mountains. Call in at the National Monument visitors Centre. Have a pleasant stroll around their dessert garden and Wendy’s rewarded with the siting of a Road Runner – awesome.

A full days driving, especially down the freeways of the LA area, wouldn’t be complete without being dragged around a supermarket – oh joy.

In the evening we catch up with the Trump & Clinton slagging match on my iPhone – it’s the only Internet we have. They’re going at it like two fish wives having an alley cat fight; of course they don’t answer the questions and the moderators just let them get away with it; very little substance, mainly vitriol; God help America if either of these numpties get in, they’d be better off with a Typhoon Tea chimpanzee. I though our debates were bad, but they even make the Corbyn (an unelectable communist and if he was running in the US instead of Hilary, then Trump would win with a landslide) and Smith, leadership debate look like an intellectual Oxford Union debate. All part of the greatest pantomime on earth – the USA Presidential Elections. What a great time to be here with all this free comedy.

After being a freeway warrior yesterday we decide to have a lazy day today. Just relaxing and enjoying this lovely home and the road melting heat. Highlight of my day is a trip to Starbucks -muse rant below. meanwhile Wendy’s still chunnering on about knitting patterns.

Around tea time we have a walk down to the club house. I think I’m starting to acclimatise. The torrents of sweat seem to have subsided to mere rivulets.

After the delights of the debate and the rambling aftermath of mind numbing analysis I’ve decided to implement my balanced observation policy. After all when you’re riding the wave of life on your virtual surfboard it’s important you don’t lean too far to the left or right or you’ll fall off. Odd days I’ll watch Fox News and even days it will be MSNBC. Daily newspapers will be Wall Street Jouranal and New York Times.

Well as HBO seems to have disappeared from our screen we get 2 hours of Fox. Now I know what it’s like to hear crazy voices. Its certainly an alternative reality and enough to make one believe the multiverse theory. Perhaps East Enders might be a better alternative!

Set off early, that’s 09:00 for us paleofolk, for our day in Kings Canyon National Park.

Watch the visitor centre film and then visit the giant General Grant Sequoia, allegedly the 2nd largest tree in the world, but then again you have to remember this is America.

Drive all the way down the canyon to the Roads End, 35 miles (1 hour) down switch backs. It is quite spectacular, more rugged and barren than Yosemite, but as the canyon was created by water erosion it’s a lot narrower than Yosemite and not as easy to see the majestic rock formations. Have a wander around the meadow and are rewarded for all our efforts with a bear siting. Yes there it is in all its glory just 10 feet away, rooting around and not bothered by the 3 or 4 orgasmic photographers. Nearly ran out of film as it poses for us all. Awesome.

Then it’s 35 miles back out of the canyon.

Then it’s a drive through more National Forest and Sequoia NP on our way to our hotel in Three Rivers.

The governors highway out of sequoia NP has to be the worst road ever for zigs, zigs and hairpins. It should be renamed the Huey & Ruth Highway, as I’m sure the lay-bys are littered with masses of congealed diced carrots as passengers part with their last meal.

It’s a hard days driving, all 8 hours of it but most of it at 30 miles an hour on switch backs.

Less said about the hotel the better. Try getting in the room. Silly me, of course the door handle has to be pushed upwards to open. This does not bode well. Very clean and comfortable, we even have a suite with a jacuzzi, but within 10 minutes I’ve fell off my surf board of life as I go into battle over the elusive high speed wireless internet. I’m more likely to find a giant tortoise in Sequoia NP than a connection in my room. Why do they taunt me so.

Subway for tea and a bottle of wine to help me regain my balance on the surfboard of life.

Up early for a mediocre breakfast. Wendy’s fell off her skateboard of life (she doesn’t swim so no surfing) as they’ve run out of tea bags. What is this country coming to. I blame Obama.

Drive back up the Huey & Ruth Highway for our day in Sequoia NP. Start off at the general Sherman Sequoia, this is the largest, allegedly. Fact check: turns out it is the largest living tree in the World by volume and is about 52,500 cubic feet (1,487 cubic meters) in volume.
Good exercise walking down and back up to the tree.

Then we head to the Lodgepole village for some lunch – someone forget our picnic.

Visit the free museum and off to Moro rock. This one you can climb up, all 350 steps. Wendy stays in the car as her knees giving her some gyp. I set off with some trepidation for the top. Get about halfway up, when the sheer drop offs get the better of me, and I wimp out. I don’t do heights. The views and the drop offs are awesome. Well worth my half hearted effort.

Drive up to the meadow for a picturesque stroll. No bears this time. Then drive through the Sequoia tree and back down the Huey and Ruth highway. It’s quite a pleasant drive when you’re not so tired and the sun’s out.

Tea consists of a Mexican take away. Whilst we’re waiting we have an enjoyable chat with one of the locals. I think he’s a it of a tree hugger, although certainly not a veggie, judging by what he’s eating, but he’s certainly well informed, even on BREXIT – which he thinks is a good thing. He claims American IQ has gone down by 20% over the past 50 years. Well that got me thinking. No way has there been such a decline but I did come across this graph which showed IQ by state. Mississippi comes out lowest, no real surprise there then, but as for Fargo and the portrayal of Minesotans as slow bouncers it turns out they’re one of the highest IQ states – see graph. Great news he informs us that Bakersfield, our next stop, is the armpit of California and Fresno is another orifice. Despite having lived here all his life he is very disparaging about California’s Central Valley and the US Government – now there’s a surprise. Once his 90 year old parents kick their clogs he’s off to New Zealand.

Take a pleasant, leisurely drive down California’s Central Valley to our next stop over, Bakersfield.

The Central Valley of California is a tourist black spot apart from the NP’s, but driving down it does evoke powerful images of Oakies escaping the dust bowls to a better land; turtles crossing roads; fruit pickers being exploited; Steinbeck country. Perhaps the illegal / un-documented Mexicans are the modern day Oakies of Steinbecks novels.

Our friend from last night was certainly right about Bakersfield. There really is nothing there. But never mind we go to Costco to try and get some Citrus Green Tea and for a bit of excitement. Fortunately our hotels excellent with great wifi so we have a leisurely day after two days of NP’s.

Why did I choose Bakersfield? We’d done the coast a few times and I’d always wanted to see the Central Valley; I’d heard of Bakersfield but hadn’t a clue about it; to break the journey up so we didn’t have to drive too far in one day.

For tea we try a new gourmet venue, Carl jars. One of the many big brand fast food chains. Burger was pretty good and service good.

Early start from Bakersfield and we drive down to Big Bear Lake. It’s a good 3 hour drive. Up through the San Bernardino mountains.

Quaint little tourist trap. Lakes not all that impressive, mainly because it’s drying up. A bit disappointing but the scenery is beautiful.

Set off down the mountains to Redlands, next to San Bernardino and by way of a change the roads closed. Of course they don’t bother to tell you this until you’ve driven 10 miles out of town. Drive back into Big Bear Lake and take the other route down the mountain. Again great scenery down a switch back road.

Get to our hotel in Redlands. By way of a change its a great comfort suite – restore my faith in Choice Hotels. I think the best rule is stick with comfort suites only in the big towns. Comfort inn and quality inn tend to be inconsistent in the smaller locations. Sleep inns can be quite good although breakfasts are a bit basic. It seems it’s all due to lack of quality control.

For tea it’s a Taco Bell at last. There’s one just opposite the hotel. It was meant to be.

Wow I didn’t realise that corporal punishment in schools was still allowed in 16 states over here. Nothing like a good flogging to instil a little discipline.

Lazy morning. We have a drive into San Bernardino. Sadly nothing much there either. Attracted to it by the mountains I suppose. Not one of my better choices.

Nip to Walmart and Best Buy. Then it should have been a 1 hour drive to our home exchange in Palm Springs for the next two weeks. Takes nearly 2 hours what with interstate roadwork and the biggest outdoor concert clogging up every road. Well I’ve certainly fell off my board trying to ride the wave of life with this lot. I’m ready to use my surf board as a lethal weapon on the paleo baby boomers who should have more sense. Our foray to the supermarket means we have to spend 35 minutes dodging gridlock.

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Then to add insult to injury we’re kept awake well after Noddy past Big Ears, with the racket from the Rolling Stones. It’s over a mile away but they’re still sharing it with us.

More on our awesome new home exchange and pictures follow on the next blog.