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helenandpaul


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1 Trip
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Trips:

The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!

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http://blogabond.com/helenandpaul




Home sweet home!

Eastleigh, United Kingdom


Left New York Sunday afternoon, luckily not having to join the end of the huge queue for take off that was causing delays.

Plane half empty again so we stretched out a bit and Paul tried to get some sleep before we landed and he went to work! Unfortunately, he was too tempted to stay awake and watch the films!

Landed nearly an hour early at Gatwick, at 5.30am.

So right now we're not really sure what day it is, what time it is, or where we are! Hopefully we'll feel a bit more human after a proper night's sleep! Helen has already done 4 loads of washing, only one more to go!

We've had a really good month, have seen some wonderful things and been to some great places. We've only scratched the surface of the huge USA and although some of it seemed a bit "whistle stop" we've seen lots of places and places we'd go back to explore!

So over 3000 driven Miles, 8 flights, nine US states, and two countries later, we're home!

We hope you've enjoyed our blog! Time to plan the next trip now then.....!

permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 19, 2008 from Eastleigh, United Kingdom
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Corruption and an absolute cheek!

New York, United States


Flew from Cancun to New York ready for our flight home.

Our hotel was reached via a dirt track, a road that was still under construction and still made of rubble. It had a 40 kph speed limit, and any faster than that and the doors would probably have shaken off the car anyway!
About a minute after leaving the hotel, and about 2 seconds after crawling over a speed bump, we saw a Police Car at the side of the road. As soon as we got to them three Officers jumped out, waving what looked like a hairdrier at us telling us we were travelling at 60 kph! We weren't even doing 40 kph, let alone their alleged 60!

We pulled over, and were told we'd get a ticket and would have to go to the Station and pay a $100 fine. As you can imagine, Paul was having none of it! He got all the paper work out for the car and the flights, standing his ground that we were not travelling at 60 kph! 48kph or 52kph or something similar then maybe we'd have thought twice before dismissing their corrupt money making accusation, but 60 kph was too rounded off and just too fast! The road was a dead end, there was no need for them to be there, no one went down there expect people going to the couple of small hotels there, so they were obviously just there to con the tourists!

After ten minutes of "heated debate" one of the Policemen asked Paul his occupation. Paul said "engineer" and suddenly everything changed! Until then we were told we had no choice but to pay the fine, but after a mention of a profession that they respected we were sent on our way.

Not a great end to our time in Mexico! Paul had read in the guidebook about the corrupt Police and we can now say that it's true!

Arrived in New York about an hour late at 9pm. To top off the Wedding theme one passenger got the Pilot to propose to his girlfriend for him over the speakers. Luckily for him she said yes!
We then had to join a complete free-for-all to get through Customs. There is a lot to be said for a good old English queue! Hundreds of people, plus luggage, trying to funnel into the one Customs desk that was open. Luckily the moaning and shouting of a few Americans paid off and they opened another desk. We thought there was going to be a riot when one passenger decided he was going to ram through the barrier and got pushed back by the security officer.

Excitement over we arrived at the airport hotel about 11pm, tired and hungry. The front desk got a Chinese delivered to our room so we had a midnite feast!

Got the Subway into New York City this morning to look for Ugg boots for Helen. She has now looked for them in the whole of America and has had no luck. There is an official Ugg shortage! So to make up for it Paul had to go to Hugo Boss and buy something! Typical!
Was really nice to go into the city though - even if we were only there a couple of hours!

permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 18, 2008 from New York, United States
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Sun, sea, sand, and "I do"

Puerto Morelos, Mexico


Helen's friend from Uni, Becky, was the reason for our divert to Mexico. Her and her fiance Lee had chosen the swanky El Dorado Royale for their Wedding location. The hotel was only about fifteen minutes down the coast from our hotel. The location was lovely, and the Bride looked absolutely gorgeous! We had a really nice day!

Congratulations Becky and Lee!



permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 16, 2008 from Puerto Morelos, Mexico
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Hot, hot, hot!

Tulum, Mexico


Although the thought of lazying around doing nothing was very appealing, we thought we'd better do something a bit more active before we moulded into the hammocks!
It's so hot during the day though so it's difficult to find the energy to do anything!

We decided we'd visit some Mayan ruins, the closest of which were about a one and a half hour drive from the hotel. Thankfully our car had air conditioning otherwise the trip would have been ruled out immediately! Although we'd had some hot weather in the USA, the heat in Mexico is different altogether. It's relentless and intense and there seems very little shade! At night it settles at about a sticky 28c.

The Mayan ruins we visited were at Tulum. They aren't as big as the ruins at the major Mayan site of Chichen Itza, but that was a three and a half hour drive and with the Mexican roads (and drivers!) being as bad as they are (and the heat!) we didn't fancy it! We're glad we didn't go as we found out the next day that the temperature there was 46c! At least Tulum is on the coast so it has a sea breeze. The beach was gorgeous, the water was such a beautiful colour.

Sunstroke had already started to set in however, so we found it difficult to properly concentrate on what we were looking at or read the information signs. We'd drank so much water, worn hats, found shade, and put on so much suntan lotion, but we still got caught, and Paul spent the evening rubbing aftersun into his burnt feet and arms and Helen spent the evening in bed with heat exhaustion, topped off by a migraine and being sick!

The ruins were nice to see, although if we'd been feeling 100% we would have probably have got more out of it! As with everywhere else in Mexico, there were iguanas everywhere, sunbathing on the ruins and on the paths!




permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 15, 2008 from Tulum, Mexico
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Hola Amigos

Puerto Morelos, Mexico


Arrived in Mexico yesterday (Tuesday) evening after a very bumpy flight. Had paramedics meet the plane on the tarmac after a lady became ill and needed oxygen in the air. Landed a lot quicker than normal, seemed to drop out of the sky very fast and the captain announced over the tannoy that we´d be "touching down at full speed". Excellent - not scary in the slightest then!!!!

Picked up the hire car and drove about 20 Miles from Cancun to our hotel. We´re staying in a really cool beach hut type thing!!

Hard to describe, but it´s right on the beach and we have a brilliant view from our hammocks on the balcony!

Without starting to sound like nautical geeks, we have had another "ocean first" when we both swam in the Caribbean sea for the first time today. No getting used to the cold - just run straight in!


Had the beach to ourselves, worked on our tans, did some swimming, and saw some tropical fish.

Had a very lazy day so there´s not much else to write!!
Have added pictures to LA, San Francisco, etc.

PS, HAPPY BIRTHDAY VICCI!!!




permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 14, 2008 from Puerto Morelos, Mexico
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Reliving our childhood

Los Angeles, United States


Carried on our drive down Highway One - classic driving road!! Along the "Big Sur" coastline.


Saw hundreds and hundreds of elephant seals on one of the beaches. An amazing sight. They were females shedding their "winter skin", and males fighting in the waves!

Arrived in LA at about 9pm, and after battling with their road signs once again we found the hotel.

So two adults with one day in LA before their flight to Mexico. What do they do? Go to DisneyLand of course!! We were probably the most excited people in the queue to meet Mickey Mouse!!!! Went on the main rides, and saw lots of Disney characters. Barnaby met Mickey too!

Got to try and jam everything into our suitcases now ready for Mexico tomorrow!

permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 12, 2008 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Steve McQueen eat your heart out

San Francisco, United States


Arrived in San Francisco and after getting a bit lost round the city streets Paul decided he wanted to re-enact Steve McQueen by driving up and down all the steep roads which scared the life out of us both! The roads are amazingly steep! Houses very pretty. Seems like a nice city.

More by luck than judgement we found ourselves at a marina and had a walk along the marina wall watching the sailing boats with views of Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge.

Drove over the bridge and walked back along half of it. Carried on driving into Marin County, where mountain biking was invented and which greatly excited Paul!
Found a nice beach and we both paddled in the Pacific for the first time. To be fair, it's just as wet and cold as any other sea!!

Headed South on Highway One, following the coast - which by now was unfortunately covered in sea fog.

This made us both feel right at home - we hadn't had bad weather at all so far!! To get out of the bad weather we just had to get off the road for a bit at a shopping mall - hurrah!!

Drove down to Monterey for the night.



permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 11, 2008 from San Francisco, United States
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Bear spotting!

Yosemite Lakes, United States


Left Mammoth Lakes and drove to Lake Tahoe. As we were leaving Mammoth we went to see the ski resort at Mammoth Mountain. The snow wasn't as bad as we'd been told, but it was too late by then! Paul was gutted! We drove back to the main road via a marked "scenic route" and stopped in a car park signposted "craters". The road became too snowy to drive down so we didn't see the craters, but as we were turning round we saw...... our first bear!! Only a baby one (we think, with our expert bear knowledge!!!!), and he was camera shy so we have no proof of this sighting, but you'll just have to take our word for it!!

Arrived in Lake Tahoe after a four or five hour drive - which the girl at the hotel reception in Mammoth said would take 45 minutes!! And we all thought Paul was a fast driver!
Lake Tahoe was nice - some of it has been a bit over developed, but we found a quiet bit and had a walk along the beach.
After a very stressful "are we about to run out of petrol in the mountains" and "why are Californian road signs soooooo rubbish?!" kinda drive we arrived in Oakdale (via a long detour to Sacramento thanks to the afore mentioned rubbish signs!!) and got a room for the night.

Went to Yosemite National Park which was spectacular. Saw El Capitan and Half Dome which rose impressively from no where, and walked to the bottom of Bridalveil Falls where we got absolutely soaked!!!
Considering Yosemite is meant to be the place to see bears, we saw a grand total of zero! (Barnaby was very disappointed!!)
Paul asked about staying in the Park for the night, and was told they had one tent left. He thought he'd better run it via Helen first, and after going to see it she decided a metal frame with some canvas thrown over it and metal boxes outside to lock food in to keep it from the bears did not pass her stringent "bear proof" tests, so the idea was scrapped!

Watched the sunset from Glacial Point, overlooking the valley.


permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 9, 2008 from Yosemite Lakes, United States
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Viva Las Vegas!

Mammoth Lakes, United States


Vegas was every bit as awful as we expected, but there's something about the place that makes you kinda like it! It's busy, brash, over the top, hot, loud and Bright, but it's got something about it! You certainly don't need more than a couple of days there - you'd go insane and completely lose touch with reality!! And despite it being absolutely scorching hot don't expect us to have a sun tan! Vegas is designed to keep you inside your hotel and give you no reason to actually go out into the open air!

There were people gambling at all hours of the day and night, and people who looked like they hadn't left the chair in front of their slot machine for years, decades.

We visited most of the major hotels - including Caeser's Palace, the Ballagio, the Luxor, the MGM Grand, and the Venetian. Helen had seen Bruce Forsyth on a programme once on a gondola ride at the Venetian so she of course had to have a go!

We put $1 in a machine and got 50c back!! That was the extent of our gambling!! We were so proud going to the cashier to claim our 50c winnings!!!

There are no pictures of "Barnaby does Vegas" - he stayed in the hotel room as it wasn't felt appropriate for a teddy bear from Year 1 to be in the gambling Mecca of the universe!!!!!

Left Vegas and headed for Death Valley. Drove through Death Valley - the lowest point in the USA and one of the hottest places on Earth.

The temperature reading on the dash board reached 104F, about 40c?? Bizarre landscape - very dry, very sandy, very low and flat, but then mountains suddenly rise from no where and the whole place is covered in volcanic rock.

We're now in Mammoth Lakes, California. There's some snow left on the mountains but we've been told it's not great so we're going to give it a miss. The road to Yosemite is still closed for the Winter though so we're trying to find a divert round it and get to Lake Tahoe today.

Have added pictures to the Grand Canyon entry.

permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 8, 2008 from Mammoth Lakes, United States
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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Vegas Baby... almost!

Las Vegas, United States


After leaving Lake Powell and the Glen Canyon dam we drove past Horseshoe Bend where Paul risked everything for the perfect picture!!!!!

Drove to the Grand Canyon, which was spectacular. Can't be described! Was one of the bits of the trip Helen was most looking forward to - not quite so much when Paul decided to read aloud from the guidebook "it is common to see groups of tarantulas scurrying back into the canyon in the evening for warmth". Great! Well thankfully we avoided tarantula bed time and the only wildlife we saw were deers and baby lizards.


Drove along part of the historic "Route 66" on our way through
Arizona.


Tonight we are staying next to the Hoover Dam - Helen is braving her dam fear once again!!

We are about 25 mins outside of Vegas and are going to "hit the strip" tomorrow, after locking our wallets up to avoid loosing everything!

Pictures to follow of the Grand Canyon, but the computer won't let us right now!

Only a short one today - internet isn't a freebie at the moment and it's ticking down fast!!!

Love Helen and Paul x

permalink written by  helenandpaul on May 4, 2008 from Las Vegas, United States
from the travel blog: The good ol' US of A, and a bit of Mexico thrown in for good measure!
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