The Finale!

Now, the moment you've all been waiting for... The finale of our vacation!

On Monday morning we headed off to Universal Studios. We got there before the park was really open, and so we had to stand around for a while. But the opening was funny. It was someone telling us to act like a crowd at the opening of an amusement park over a loud speaker. We then got our super cool special access passes, and headed off to the Universal tours. It was really fascinating, and although we didn't see anyone famous, we got to see where they shoot movies. We were also treated to several special effects.

I can't really remember the order in which we saw everything else. We went to the animal show where they showed us some tricks they have animals do. It was pretty cute. We saw Terminator 2 in 3D. I really enjoyed it. It was a mix of live acting and an actual 3D movie screen. I have been inspired to actually watch terminator now. Then we got lunch. We had hot dogs, and they were pretty good.

We then went and watched Shrek in 4D. Now I know the 4th dimension is time, but that wasn't what they meant. Our seats moved, and there were a few other special effects. I didn't enjoy it as much Terminator, but it was still good. Then we headed down to the lower section. We all watched backdraft, which was basically a bunch of fire effects, and then we split up. Dad and Brenna went on the Revenge of the Mummy, and then on the Jurassic Park rides. Mom and I went and saw a show about different movie effects. It was lots of fun. They showed us the green screen, makeup, and sound effects. Then we had delicious ice cream.

As we headed out we decided to go to the Simpson's ride. Everyone was saying it was great. So we lined up, and as we waited we noticed a warning sign that told us this was a highly aggressive ride. We asked the lady at the front what that meant, and she said we'd all be fine. She turned out to be wrong. You are put in a roller coaster cart in a room. The entire room is a movie screen, and your cart moves with the screen. It jerks around a lot. I had my eyes closed, and my ears plugged the whole time. Brenna had to tell me when the ride was over. Dad (who was excited for the ride) felt really sick. He spent the ride staring at his shoes. Mom and Brenna (who were both worried) enjoyed it. Brenna enjoyed it the most. I pretty sure she loved it. Dad still felt really sick after, and I wasn't feeling great either, so we decided to go catch our shuttle. Unfortunately, the shuttle picked up in a different spot then it dropped off so we missed it twice. (It was full both times) So we went and had supper in a restaurant near by. Mom and Dad found it cold, so they both got Universal sweaters. the meal was pretty good, and then we went out to catch the shuttle again. It was full this time too! So we wandered around the small tourist town near by, until the guy came back.

The next day of course we flew home. The flights were fairly uneventful, although this time we had private tv's in each chair. Dad rocked the plane at trivia, until someone else came and beat him. We were glad to get home.

It's been hard adjusting back. Life has been pretty busy, and Brenna had a lot to catch up on after missing two weeks of school. I think we're finally caught up.

Stay tuned for more updates... (Although probably not as excited as these past few)

San Diego Zoo

Due to the LA Marathon, we decided Sunday would be a very good day to leave LA, so we headed out to San Diego to visit the zoo. The trip there was fairly quick. We got our tickets and began to walk around. We saw a lot of animals. In this one exhibit for cormorants (fishing birds) many local birds had flown in. We watched a cormorant catch two fish, and egret trying to steal the fish, and a heron flew in and caught a fish. It was really neat. They had lots of flamingo exhibits. In one the zookeeper was walking away and a flamingo was following her. They were all under 10 months, so she cuddled the flamingo for several minutes and then when she left he stopped following her. He was really cute. We saw Pandas, a mom and her baby were asleep, and the other one was eating. We saw Koala bears climbing around. They were really interesting. There were three babies. We saw elephants, giraffes, rhinos, hippos, gorillas, and orangoutans. We saw a tiger playing with a log. They had a lot of pigs. They had many birds, but only two macaws. We saw plenty of other animals too.

On the way home we drove along the coast and saw the sun set. We had dinner in a diner and the food was really good.

Four Dogs and an Arm

On Saturday we did a tour of star's homes. We saw all sorts of famous people's homes, or rather their gates. We saw Orlando Bloom's mailbox, Jay Leno's street, the house where Micheal Jackson died, Tom Cruise's roof, Ozzie Osbourne's house and the Beckham's roof. Our tour guide also pointed out many famous places along Sunset Blvd. Peter Falk's four small dogs were on his balcony, as we left we saw an arm. We're not entirely sure whose. The tour ended at Grauman's Chinese Theater, so we looked at footprints, and took a walk along the stars. It's a little strange there, because there are tons of people dressed up like movie characters. There was a Micheal Jackson, Marylin Monroe, somebody from avatar, Goofy, Darth Vader, Catwoman, this old super woman, and others.

We headed back to our hotel for lunch, and then we went out to visit the La Brea tar pits. They have a museum there, which we enjoyed, and also several tar pits. The pits smell really bad, but they're a treasure trove of fossils. They don't have any dinosaurs, but they have birds, plants, insects, large mammals, and small mammals.

We went out for dinner, and got ready for our early morning. (I posted Dr. Phil's House)

We liked all of it, except the... the... the artwork!

Today we took a slow day. We woke up late, and went out for breakfast. I had a waffle that was supposed to be covered in fresh strawberries, but apparently covered means one. (No, I'm not bitter at all...) Everyone else had eggs, and Dad got pancakes too (the pancake combo). After we finished we headed back to the hotel to get ready. On the way back Dad swore he saw someone in the movies. Not a main character, but a popular background person. He was driving a porsche, so whatever he is he's doing well at it!

We then drove out to the J. Paul Getty Museum. (Which is an art museum) The architecture was phenomenal! We skipped the medieval art and decided to focus on everything after the 17th century. The art was lovely. I really enjoyed the large portaits. They had a sketching gallery where you were provided with paper, pencils, and inspiration. Brenna drew a lovely sketch, and I attempted one. Brenna says she likes it. The lady running the section told Mom she had two budding geniuses, I think she meant it about Brenna's, but was being nice about mine. We walked through the photographs, some were nice but there were a few wierd ones. We had lunch in the cafe. We then went and investigated the lovely gardens. All the stone is white, and the flowers were so beautiful. Mom was pretty envious. They could definitely do wedding photos there. On our way out Mom got asked twice to fill out a survey about her visit. Dad wanted to fill it out and his comment is the title of this blog. (Mom wouldn't let him)

We then headed to Santa Monica beach. We spent hours playing in the rising tide. We went and checked out the pier, but it was designed towards small children. We went out for supper in a very nice restaurant. Mom and Brenna had steak, which they enjoyed. Dad had raviole and I had a vegetable salad. As we drove back to the hotel we did not take the freeway. We drove along sunset boulevard, into Hollywood. Mom and I saw two people getting their pictures taken, but we're not sure if they're famous. It's a pretty glitsy end of town.

These are Washington Navel Oranges

Today we drove from Three Rivers back to LA. On the way we had to stop and do some caching. As we descended from the mountains we entered orchard county. Vineyards, olive trees, orange and lemon trees, and something that looked suspisciously like apple trees lined the roads. After finishing our last cache (right beside an orange orchard) a pick up truck drove up. "Are you taking pictures?" he asked. Since we weren't picking the oranges, we decided that yes was a safe answer. He asked us where we were from and promptly got out to show us around. He picked the oranges off the tree and explained that they are washington navel oranges. He peeled two for us and they were delicious! He showed us different trees, and explained that the orchard is over 100 years old! (This was actually his neighbours orchard, but his was down the road) He was very kind and answered all of our questions. He even gave us an orange to go! Then we continued our drive back to LA. We had chinese food for dinner, and then went to the observatory in Grifith park. We watched some demonstrations (some were completely unrelated to space) and then went to the planetarium. The show was pretty good, and it was basically a history class of space theories. It was the first planetarium show Mom's ever watched, that she hasn't fallen asleep in! The observatory is on a hill, so we got to see LA at night from high up.

Hope everyone's having a great March Break at home. :)

That was what? Four ticks, I think we're good...

Today we went for an epic hike. The original hike is 6km up to marble falls. We only hiked up 3 km though. The hike was beautiful, it had lovely views and was fairly challenging. When we got to the car we each did a tick check to our knees. We all passed. It wasn't until we were almost home that I noticed I had a tick. When we got back we got rid of it and everyone checked for more. Both Mom and I had one in our shirts that hadn't attached, and I had another one that had attached. After getting rid of it we decided to go get ice cream, and discovered a delightful ice cream store in town. The ice cream was homemade, and they also sold candy, some of which was homemade. We explored town and then came home to have tacos for dinner.

I never thought I'd be hiking through snow in California

Today we discovered Sequoia National Park. At first there is hardly any vegetation and it's all desert vegetation. But as you go higher up the mountains the tress become bigger and the snow becomes more frequent. We visited the General Sherman tree which is the largest living being in existance. It was big, but so is everything else. I can't really provide proper persepective. We hiked for awhile and then headed back. On the way up we had stopped at look outs, the Giant Sequoia Musem, and the visitors center. The view throughout was spectacular. Near the sequoia's there is at least a meter of snow. It's pretty crazy. We still haven't decided what we're going to do tomorrow.

This place is kind of primitive...

We started the day at 5am. We all got up and headed out to Montreal. From Montreal we flew to New York on a very small plane. We had a very funny flight attendant. We arrived in New York and got some lunch. We then had six hour flight to LA. It was on a large plane, but everyone was really nice. We arrived around 4pm. We then began the drive to Three Rivers. We enjoyed supper at a barbeque and grill. The food was really good. We drove for a very long time to get to Three Rivers. (I was asleep) We're staying in a very quaint inn. Brenna made this comment "This place is kind of primitive". We all like it though. It backs up on to a beautiful river. The view here is amazing.