Day 10 Thursday 29th September 2005

We checked out of the Orbit Hostel and made our way to the airport to return the rental car and catch a bus to San Diego, setting for the movie of the moment, Anchorman.

On the way we pulled over at Denny`s for yet another breakfast. Two things were accomplished here, firstly that I wont be having any more Dennys, and secondly we would keep the car for the drive to San Diego. This made sense as we could do our own thing and the cost difference would likely be not worth worrying about.

There is a road that follows the coast of LA right through the city, called the Pacific Highway. It was this road we decided to follow, instead of taking the freeway. This turned out to be a quality idea (I take no credit for this decision, it was taken when I was on the toilet). The initial stages were slow going trying to get out of the city, but when we got going it was an awesome drive.

We stopped off a couple of times, firstly at Redondo Beach, where we took a wrong turn and ended up with a panoramic view of the whole of LA from across a bay. The most shocking thing was the cloud of yellow smog that hung over the city like a blanket. It goes to show the damage we are doing to the environment with all the cars we are driving. Admittedly we didnt give this a second thought when we had found the right road and cruised off in our people carrier, doing less than 30mgg and switching the AC on full blast! How fickle we are.

Next stop was a random beach where the temptation for Dave and I was too great, it was a quick change into swimming gear and a dip in the sea. A bit fresh but definately a good place to have my first swim in the Pacific Ocean.

We reached the very outskirts of LA, and found the suberbs to be fantastic. They definately seemed like something out of The OC. Chicks cruised along in their 4×4`s, sailboats floated by in the bay, yachts were moored up in the marina`s and beautiful summer houses lined the shores. I decided that this would be a great location to hire a beach house and throw a party, and was getting all wrapped up in the dream when Dave pointed out that it was all well and good doing all of this, but there would be no-one there as we knew absolutely no-one in the area! Oh well, it was nice while it lasted!

We pushed on and arrived in San Diego shortly before sunset. Traffic was bad getting into the city as there was a local derby between the two baseball teams, so we pulled up at the beach and watched the sun set and let the traffic pass. Surfers were out in force, and so was Chris` camera. We never knew he had such a passion for a sunset. He snapped away happily, trying to get the pefect shot of the sun disappearing over the horizon. Unfortunately for him he missed the money shot as he had stood on something and was busy hopping around trying to extract the mysterious object from his foot when the sun finally vanished for the day.

It was one of the best days of the holiday, but unfortunately the evening was a bit of a downer for us all. We checked into our very shabby hostel and went out for dinner. The dinner was actually very nice, a shrimp and lobster salad. The bar we went to afterwards was also really cool, and packed with honeys. It was pretty much the place we had been looking for all holiday, $2 drinks, chilled out and very busy. We were just too tired to appreciate it, and ended up standing around waiting for the night to end. When it finally did, we walked back to the hostel, vowing that the final night would not turn out the same way.