We stayed at a wonderfully cosy little place called the Bridge Street Inn. We had originally booked the last room available at $65 per night, which was above our budget, but we didn't want to be left room-less or pay exorbitant weekend prices for the mostly oceanfront hotels and decided to go with it. Later that day, the Inn called to inform us that another room had just been freed up and it would cost $54 instead. Aren't these people just lovely?! I mean, why would you bother to offer something cheaper when your guest had already agreed to pay for the more expensive room? But they bothered. And the gesture didn't go unappreciated.

Bridge Street Inn used to be an old Presbytarian Church, built in 1874. The owners bought it over in the 1990s and converted it into a hostel.

Bridge Street Inn - one of the hostels under the Hostelling International network.

Lovely blue and white colours of the inn.

Pots and pans for all to share!

The backyard for outdoor gatherings - when it's not so cold.

It has it's very own sandy beach for beach vollyball!

The cosy stone fireplace in the common lounge area provided a much welcomed source of warmth.

The house is dotted with eclectic furnishings from the owners' great-grandparents, like the old wooden Wilson tennis racket resting on the stairway. Carvings from Thailand and India, fabric from Nepal and dishes from Vietnam fill the remaining nooks and crannies, all amassed from the owners' backpacking trips to Southeast Asia.

Even the toilet seat covers were delightful! I wanna do this to my toilet at home now!

I explored all the bathrooms in the inn just to look at the interesting little knick knacks in there.

I thought this print titled "Doing the Inventory" was quite amusing. It was hanging in one of the bathrooms.

The Book Keeper - keeping up the books.

The owners are big on the sustainability drive and make many small contributions towards saving the earth in the way they run the hostel. Only biodegradable soaps are offered for guests' use. Laundry is line-dried - no dryers used. Guests are encouraged to bundle up in cold weather instead of turning on the heaters (sorry - we humans of tropical origin could not resist the charm of the heater.) Water recycling here is pretty innovative - the water used to wash your hands is channeled into the cistern and used to flush the toilet!

All the toilets have this strange little bowl sitting on the cistern lids...

... this is how it works to recycle water used from washing hands to flush the toilets afterwards. Not the other way round, mind you.

Our bedroom was a room within a room. It's located within a mixed dorm. The good thing is, the strange layout certainly seeks to promote interaction between strangers. There's no escaping talking to your neighbours when you have to squeeze past them in the tiny room 15 times a day.

Our room is a room within a room. The entrance is through a dorm with 3 beds.

The room can sleep 4 people - 2 on the double bed and another 2 on the bunks, but we had it all to ourselves. It was nicely furnished with quaint touches - a wooden ladder for a bedside shelf to place your belongings on, a stick with nails in it to hang your towels, etc. I thought it was lovely.

Our private room - 4 people fit well in it but it's only better when there's only the 2 of us!

It was nice chatting with fellow guests. Masami-san, a nice Hawaiian gentleman of Japanese descent living in Sacremento, gave us tips on what to see along the Pacific Coast Highway and recommended a lunch stop at the Nepenthe restaurant (see upcoming blog entry.) Another lady told us where we could see elephant seals on the beach along the way. People were from all over the world. A French guy and an American lady were exchanging reasons why the French didn't have a good impression of Americans and vice versa over breakfast. The best thing is - they both agreed that through traveling, they discovered that certain stereotypes don't hold water and the experience they had in each other's countries changed their perceptions for the better.

Hostels - where you meet people from all over the world.

Printed on a note stuck on the back of our bedroom door was this:

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness." - Mark Twain.

Need directions?

Now if everyone could just step out of their daily lives once in awhile to explore the universe beyond their doorstep, the world would be a better place.

YL

written by  DanYilin on April 3, 2009 from Cambria, United States
from the travel blog: go.
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So we've decided to stop at 2...

... when it comes to IHOP pancakes, that is.

Breezing through the online menu the night before our breakfast visit to IHOP, I was resigned to settling for the Seniors Special. At 3 pancakes per portion, it was the smallest serving on the adult menu. Dan had already been seduced by the newest kid on the block - the Butterscotch Rocks pancakes - so there was no changing his mind. Plus, it's a well-known fact that men do not share their food due to some residual caveman tendencies residing in their genetic makeup.

But just as I was about to decide on the 3-stack portion for the Buttermilk pancakes (I decided against the Senior's Special cos I thought I would have to show my ID to prove that I was really 65 years old), I heard a meek "Baby... would you like to share the Butterscotch Rocks with me?" emitting from behind the menu sitting opposite me.

And I'm glad we did. Check out the monstrosity:

If Butterscotch Rocks can't rock your boat, I don't know what will.

1) Men do share their food.
2) Sharing is good.
3) Stop at two.

YL

written by  DanYilin on April 2, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
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(1) Drool while riding a coaster. How can you NOT when you're dangling horizontally facedown on the Tatsu?

(2) Claw onto your other half with a death grip... with the very same hand you used to wipe the drool off your cheek.

(3) Take every opportunity to hone that unique signature Whimper-Sob-Scream combo war-cry on every ride.

(4) Starve yourself and refuse to eat anything until you've completed all the rides. Or at least the Maximum Thrill ones.

(5) Make a return trip to the park JUST to queue up for 2 hours to ride on the X2. Because it IS that awesome.

(6) Go on each ride a second time - just so that camera can capture a photo of you with your eyes OPEN this time. Search excitedly for the photo and then refuse to pay USD10 for it.

(7) Be clueless and pick a Maximum Thrill ride called the Goliath for your virgin Six Flags ride. Just cos it's located nearest to the park entrance. SUCKER.

(8) Sit out on the spinning non-coaster rides. Cos it's these seemingly harmless rides that make you really REALLY sick.

(9) Beg your partner to please please pleeeeaaase help scratch that itch on your elbow - you can't reach certain parts of your body while being strapped in a harness.

(10) Fervently wish that all your friends and family could be here with you breathing in the happy gas and having loads of fun together.

View of the coasters from the parking lot - can't wait!!

People loading up on the Tatsu.

The point where we realised that we're not going on just another ordinary coaster...

The lame ride that made me feel sick.

The universal sign for "Stop the ride, please. I need to throw up... NOW!"

X2 - the most awesome coaster there ever was!

Riders going off while lying down baaaaackwaards! See ya later guys!

Riders cheering as they're being hauled up the track backwards.

Superman zips through the skies just to come say hi!

Scream your lungs out!!! Yeahh!

And onwards to conquer the rest of the Six Flags parks within this season!

YL

Santa Monica beach

Drove down to the beach. We were told by a friendly guy at our motel that it's cheaper parking on the left side of the pier, when you face the sea. But I was still a novice at left-hand drive, and making multiple U-turns along the highway next to the beach wasn't an attractive option, so we ended up paying USD 6 instead of USD 2 for parking.

The beach itself is a wide swathe of sand, probably about 400m from turf to surf - you can literally plonk yourself at a spot and not get bothered by anyone walking within 10m of you, if you wanted. Seagulls, though, follow different social rules.

Goodfeathers at Santa Monica beach

We walked along the beach up to Santa Monica pier, which houses an aquarium and an amusement park. Hand-in-hand, we strolled down to the tip of the pier, which was probably another 300m out over the water.

View of the beach from Santa Monica Pier

Unlike Bedok Jetty at East Coast, this area is not merely a resting place for skaters and cyclists. It's actually a place to commune with the ocean. Sure, there were a couple of guys fishing, but what struck me more was the cool, crisp ocean breeze and the warm sun on my face. We took a seat facing the Pacific Ocean and listened to the melodious crooning of a very talented busker by the name of Terry Prince. Terry was performing songs that he composed himself, and singing about love, beauty, appreciation, imagination - all nice and calming tunes, set off perfectly by the gentle lap of the waves beneath us. I looked out to the ocean, and was mesmerised by the dancing sunlight sparkling off the waters, creating a lighted path towards the wife and me. It was one of the most peaceful experiences in my life.

Tip of the Santa Monica Pier

We spoke to Terry as we were about to leave, and found that he had just finished a one-year contract performing at Harrah's at Las Vegas. Such a nice guy! Purchased his CD for USD 10 (eventually ripped it into iTunes, and iTunes did detect his CD info, btw) which was a little pricey, but probably worth it, because I don't think we will otherwise get a chance to listen to his music again.

After this delightful experience, we took another short walk along the beach, and eventually made our way back to the motel. Lovely day, lovely place. Lovely as a peacock!

Very Coo Pigeon

DC

written by  DanYilin on April 1, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
tagged Beach and SantaMonica
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The item that really got my attention was the USD 49 offer (One way!) to the Bermuda Triangle.

Is that meant really to be a one way trip?

DC

written by  DanYilin on April 1, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
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It's all very strange seeing my friends live their lives 15 hours ahead of us. At this point, we're still very connected to Singapore and it's a bit perturbing that while winding down after a day out on Monday night, my friends had already finished sleeping, completed one meal, half a day's work and were in the midst of lunch. It's like looking into the future. Anyway, I hope we get adjusted soon. Falling asleep during the Terminator 3D show at Universal Studios today was not the coolest thing to do. Even the elderly Korean tourists were more spritely than we were.

Some thoughts that were milling around my head over the past hour while tossing and turning in bed:

Sometimes I forgot how small my world is back home. Not just in the fact that I can walk anywhere I want to and nobody tells me that it's too far. (Today, Guy At Hotel looked at us in horror when we said we would walk half a mile to the car rental company office... "NONONO!! You don't walk, you tell them to drop the car off here!" Isn't half a mile approximately 800m, which is just 2 rounds around a running track?)

I feel it in terms of scale of the things coming at us. My senses feel like they've taken a beating. At Universal Studios today, it was as if the sound systems were operating at 300%. There I was waiting my turn on the Simpsons Ride with my fingers in my ears cos Krusty the Clown was yelling at me. I was going from ride to ride with a splitting headache after awhile with no access to the Panadol which I had brilliantly left in the car, which was parked on another planet, which in turn was - you guessed it - too far to walk to.

At the hotel, the bright neon lights from nearby shops spill into the room (even through the slit of a window in the toilet) and I can't sleep. Advertising screens are bigger, brighter and louder. Even the TV advertisements seem to yell at me "BUY NOW!! EAT NOW!! SUE NOW!!" (Side note: it's very bizarre to be watching Comedy Central and all you have are advertisements for 99c fastfood, and calls for sufferers of asbestos poisoning and retirement home abuse to come forward to file class actions, then all of the sudden it becomes a relentless onslaught of trailers for girlie videos! Wait a minute - weren't we watching South Park just 2 minutes ago?!)

I guess that's all part of traveling - experiencing life in a totally different way than what you've grown so accustomed to at home. And I guess we'll get used to it soon... which leads me to my next thought.

I have to remind myself not to keep comparing life here with how things are back home. On the bright side, it makes me learn to appreciate the little comforts we have. Thank you PUB for letting me be able to drink water straight from the tap so that I don't have to buy drinking water or constantly boil it. Thank you SBS Transit for those comprehensive info boards at every bus-stop telling me which bus to take and listing every single stop on each route. Thank you LTA for not planning a useless MRT line that doesn't bring people where they really want or need to get to. It's good to be reminded of our blessings, but I just don't want to go around being comparative. Guess I'll be able to tune these thoughts out after awhile.

The great thing about being in LA is that people have been really friendly so far: offering suggestions on where to eat, what to see, areas to avoid (like downtown "cos the whole place is filled with bums!") This guy at our hotel spent 15min of his breakfast time helping us check up on car rental options on the Internet and advising us on what to do. He also helped another guest search for driving directions so that the guest could return to his room and get his stuff ready. A customer at the supermarket used his membership pin while we were making our purchase to help us get a member's discount on Reeses.

And not to forget the folks at home. It's so great that people are actually following our blog and telling us they enjoy reading it and are looking forward to updates. Friends whom we haven't been in regular contact with are coming forward to with recommendations on their favourite places to eat at in the US (bearing in mind our budget even.) Friends who have been to the places we're going to are digging out their itineraries and travel contacts from past trips to share with us. People are asking us where we're heading so that they can ask their friends staying overseas to help or host us if needed. Acquaintances made more than a decade ago have contacted us just to say "hey, I'm here in the US too - let's meet up and I can give you some travel tips."

It really is heartwarming. Thank you all very much. It brings to mind a quote from Paulo Coelho's "The Alchemist" about following your dream, that "when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it". I've never quite been able to fully comprehend this idea.

Now I do.

'Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it - boldness has genius, power and magic in it.' -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

written by  DanYilin on March 31, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
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HOLLYWOOD

Great view of Hollywood Boulevard from 4th floor of Hollywood and Highland Centre.

B-Boy street performance along Hollywood Boulevard - cool!

Bumble Bee made an appearance in Hollywood!

Hollywood & Highland Centre - bizarre mix of Egyptian and Indian elements in the architecture.

Grauman's Chinese Theatre

Fanboy goes to Hollywood!

UNIVERSAL STUDIOS

We got our rental car - a spiffy little Japanese compact - and zipped off down the 101 Highway to Universal Studios Hollywood. Visiting a theme park is a great way to burn calories cos we were hurrying from ride to show, show to ride and only squeezed in half a hotdog each for lunch while standing in line for a show. We bought our passes online, which is pretty cool cos you get one free day to come back again and you zip straight to the turnstile with your print-at-home (or in the office, heh heh) ticket and skip the ticketing queues!

One good tip - offer to do the visitor survey at the entrance. You get rewarded with a priority pass for the Studio Tour which means you get to skip the queue and sit in the first car near the host. Super!

The new Simpsons ride!

Entrance to Jurassic Park ride

Splash down point on the Jurassic Park ride

Guardians of the entrance to The Mummy ride

View of the studios and Warner Bros. in the background.

Placing your order with Donkey can be a huge headache!

The make-up counter in the Special Effects show

Explosive action on the Waterworld set

Horrible fake shark which sprayed water on me

Hard Rock Cafe & giant guitar at Citywalk

Mega guitar at Hard Rock Cafe

Universal Citywalk - for food & shopping after the theme park closes.

written by  DanYilin on March 31, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
tagged Hollywood and UniversalStudios
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“Hey baby”, I said, “go do some funny pose there and I will take your picture”

The wife said, “Aiyoh… so paiseh. Okay, you count, and I’ll quickly do a pose. Once.”

And I agreed.

“One… two… three!” I counted, she posed and I snapped the shot.

“Umm… baby, what the hell pose was that?”

“I was drinking from his water bottle.”

Incredulous stare. “Water bottle?!”

“Ya… “, and she turned around and noticed Bart holding the same thing in his hand… the same spray can of paint!

You could see the gears turning in her head... should she pretend that she knew it was a can of spray paint all along and was just "testing" me? Nahh.... I obviously could not be fooled by now!

After laughing my posterior off, I finally got a proper shot – of the wife sulking.

DC

written by  DanYilin on March 31, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
tagged Funny, Universal, Studios and Simpsons
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Imaginary Interviewer (II), take it away!

II: I heard that you had to quit your job to make this trip. Are you nuts?

DC: Yes. I must be. But think about this... I like nuts, I have nuts and I am nuts. And nut-thin' seems to be able to cure this!

II: Uhh...okay, incurable ailments aside, why leave the job? Times are bad, yadda, yadda?

DC: When you ask your employer for a year's leave, they either allow it or they don't, based on the company's policy. When times are good, it's actually a higher opportunity cost for the individual - you miss out on higher wage increments, bonuses, promotions, etc. Think about it that way, I don't seem really have that much to lose.

II: It is our understanding that you have never had an argument with Yi Lin before. Do you think the close proximity you will share during this trip will break this dream relationship?

DC: You're right. We've never had a serious argument before. We've always been able to think things through calmly before it escalates into a fight. As long as Yi Lin apologises quickly enough, I don't bear grudges. I don't see why this should change. We're very emu-tionally attached and understand each other intimately. That's a blessing right there.

II: The other side of the coin then. When you share every minute of every hour of everyday like that, are you worried about running out of things to say?

DC: Well, I think there was some concern about the quality of conversation that Yi Lin will get. But I am not worried about the lack of intelligent conversation, Yi Lin is! But what I lack in depth, I make up for it in humour.

II: Nice. So, what are you looking forward to, for this trip?

DC: Well, for one, I'm looking forward to attending my cousin's graduation ceremony from University of Carnal-Mellon in Pittsburgh. I'm really proud of the dude. Gave him tuition when we were younger, you know. We always ended up playing, but hey, now he's doing games design! Oh, and I think it will be nice to hit some nude or topless beaches during this trip.

II: I have a copy of your itinerary right here. I don't see any mention of nude beaches. I do see Machu Picchu, Niagara Falls...

DC: What's all this Pikachu and Viagara Falls nonsense? We're hitting nude beaches. That's why I got my injections! Next question!

II: Okay, moving right along then. What will you miss most in Singapore?

DC: In no particular order - family, food, friends (including all those weddings and birthday parties), the toilet bowl...

II: The toilet bowl??

DC: Yup. The toilet bowl. That's where I sit every morning, nekkid, while brushing my teeth. If some toothpaste dribbles out of the mouth onto the tummy, no problem, the shower's just next to it. Here, I took a photo of it. Check it out.

The toilet at home

When we stay in dorms with shared bathrooms, I can kiss that little freedom goodbye. Sigh, can you imagine?

II: I'm not sure I want to. Okay, any final words before we close off the interview?

DC: Well... a last shoutout to all my family and friends. Don't worry too much about missing me. There's facebook, this blog, and also the upcoming hoarding all over Marina Bay, that will feature me as the new Face of Marina Bay (as promised by the god folks at URA). I'm more concerned about missing all of you, so please post pics and comments anything else that will help us know what you are doing!

DC

written by  DanYilin on March 30, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
tagged Interview and Dan
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A few reasons for being such wide-eyed wonders at this time of the night:
(1) It’s 7.57pm in Singapore. Dinner time.
(2) We fell asleep while marking Earth Hour in complete darkness at 8.30pm last night. It became Earth Six Hours.
(3) Saturday night traffic along Sunset Boulevard is keeping us up (I’ve heard more sirens blaring in 1 night than over 2 weeks in Singapore. More amazingly, we can still hear people’s conversations above the roar of traffic, which proves that human beings are the noisiest things on earth.)

We’re rooming at the Econo Lodge along Sunset Boulevard, Hollywood. It was a decent find off www.hotwire.com for US$50 per night – the same amount we would have paid for 2 dorm beds in a hostel in the same area.

Econo Lodge Hollywood - our home for the next 6 nights

Dannie checking out the TV channels and the pastries from Aroma's Bakery Cafe across from our hotel.

Econo Lodge Hollywood is in West Hollywood and sits along a busy stretch between The Strip and Hollywood Boulevard. Brilliant location – which is why we’re not too fussy about the noise level. The problem was in getting here and the problem started right at LA’s International Airport. We were ever-so-happy to see our bags appear on Carousel 1 after being misinformed by the inflight announcer that they would be arriving on Carousel 3. It didn’t help that the announcer over the airport’s PA system intermittently changed her mind over whether our luggage was arriving on Carousel 1 or Carousel 2, as if it was a matter of what colour of underwear she should wear for the day. Immigration was painless and we passed quickly in search for the Tourist Arrival information counter which we found at the…. Departure Hall??! The counter staff gave us fairly clear instructions on getting to Sunset Boulevard via public bus and we followed her directions to turn left at the exit and continue walking until we see the shuttle pick-up point. After traipsing halfway through the airport without a pick-up point in sight, we approached a couple of security staff to ask for directions. Turned out that the brilliant lady at the info counter told us everything except to take the escalator back down to the Arrival Hall first before turning left. Duh. We made a beeline for Shuttle ‘C’ and then transferred to Line 3 on the Big Blue Bus for $0.75 per person.

It took us an hour to get from the transfer point into Hollywood, passing through Marina Del Rey, Venice Beach area and downtown Santa Monica. During that time, we met a very friendly garbage man (I don’t know what to call him really, he was only picking out recyclable waste from bins, so not quite a garbage man) who chatted with us and another really nice passenger on the bus who plucked a sprig of fresh rosemary from his shopping bag to let us have a whiff of its aromatic leaves. The latter related stories of interesting local personalities – like the hermit millionaire who built Marina Del Rey and whose will was faked upon his death, the roller-skating singing Indian guru who has been picking out “shy ladies” to serenade for 40 years along Venice Beach, how Mr Arnold ‘Governor of California’ Schwarzenegger used to work out at the outdoor gym at Muscle Beach, the posh café which served Hollywood celebrities soups and burgers at US$25 a pop, etc.

We dropped off where the Give-Incomplete-Information Lady told us to and tried to walk along Sunset Boulevard in the direction of Hollywood towards our hotel. We walked and walked and walked – two scruffy backpackers sticking out like sore thumbs in a spiffy neighbourhood, realized that we were lolling along slower than 2 snails on a date and decided to hop onto a bus to get us to Hollywood. Big Blue Bus came along and told us to try the Orange Metro Bus. Orange Metro Bus does not turn up. We backtrack to the nearest major intersection to try and get a cab. Orange Metro Bus whizzes past us. Damn! No cabs. Nice Local Boy taps on his iPhone and gives us the number for Sunshine Yellow Cab. Incredibly, we spot Empty Green Cab along the road and hop in.

We ask the driver whether it’s too far to walk to Hollywood. He looks at us and says “You can answer that when we reach your hotel after 30min.” 30 frickin’ minutes?! Turns out that Sunset Boulevard passes through Brentwood, Bel-Air, Beverly Hills and West Hollywood neighbourhoods. Now we can swear that the travel guides are speaking true when they say that no one walks in LA. I repeat, NO ONE walks in LA. The cab driver gave us a magnificent audio tour of all the areas en route and even pointed out Playboy magnate Hugh Hefner’s oh-so-famous Playboy Mansion housing his oh-so-cute female pet bunnies. We saw lines of people queuing outside popular clubs for ‘live’ Saturday night acts along The Strip and the driver gave us tips on where to go, when to go, what to eat – all while we watched the numbers on the meter jump like frogs on a hotplate. US$50 later (ouch, it hurts just typing “US$50”), we reached Econo Lodge Hollywood.

Welcome to Hollywood, Baby.

YL

written by  DanYilin on March 29, 2009 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: go.
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