San Francisco to Auckland

We were pleasantly surprised by the USA Hostels in San Francisco. I had heard good things about it, so when I booked myself into their 'Economy' room I didn't worry too much about what it might be like, though I suspected it probably wasn't as nice as Brianna's ensuite, girls-only dorm.

I was half right - the room was situated on the ground floor, above the lounge, which was pretty noisy at night (this isn't a problem if you've packed earplugs, which I luckily had), but was really close to the kitchen, where they made pancake batter for guests to use in the morning, and provided breads, fruit and cereal for a semi-decent breakfast. The thing that really bothered me about the room was the stench as I opened the door; the smell of weed was pretty overpowering. The source of this was to become apparent later that day when a greasy, thin man who was probably about my age lumbered in. I attempted a cheerful 'hello' to be met with a grunt, and when I turned around he was gone. Ah, well. The joys of hostelling. You never know who is going to be chucked in with you. My roommates seemed to change every day, and there was only one other girl, Danielle, who I clicked with straight away. She seemed to be doing a similar thing to me, travelling solo before pushing hard with the whole career thing - and she was veering down the path of journalism, so naturally, she also wrote a blog, which I have to say is superior to mine in just about every way.

Anyway, I was in San Francisco, and I'd be damned if I was going to hang around a hostel all day, so Brie and I took off for our semi-planned breakfast (now to be brunch) with some of the girls from our tour. After an abortive attempt to hit Mama's in Washington Square (the prospect of an hour wait in line...) we ended up trudging a fair distance to Boulette's Larder, as Gordon had told me it was good, and if there's one thing that Gordon knows besides how to fix my computer, it's good food. There was a bit of a wait (I had to practically beg them for a table) but it was worth it.

I wasn't disappointed. I spent a hideous amount of money on some very good toast and apricot jam, a coffee and a berry / shortcake / yoghurt combination that was beyond delicious.

Brie and I meandered down the road back towards Union Square, popping into various shops and taking in the sights along the way. We wandered, taking snaps until about 6ish, then headed back to the hostel and enquired about where to buy food for dinner. Unsurprisingly, were directed to the shop across the road which was a) the nearest by a bus ride b) was clearly taking commission as it was a total rip off. We bought the ingredients for the world's most basic pasta dish in order to save money and invited Danielle to join us, which helped with the costs and the enormous amount of food that I had accidentally made.

The next day, I had Alcatraz booked, so I decided to hit the sack early. Weed man wasn't there, but he slipped in at about 7am, and shouted at Danielle for turning on the light at 8.30. He was a total prick, for lack of a better, more polite way of description.

I wolfed down a quick bit of fruit toast and tea for breakfast, and missioned up to Alcatraz, where I enjoyed a pleasant boat ride across the bay, and a brilliant audio tour of the prison itself. There were some informative talks by the National Park rangers who run the place about the Anglin brothers and Frank Morris' escape in 1962 by means of digging a tunnel using spoons, climbing up a ventilation shaft and sailing away on a makeshift raft.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_1962_Alcatraz_escape

Evidence released only recently suggests that they were the only prisoners to actually make it away from there the whole time it was a functional prison.

Anyway, I indulged in the full experience and wandered into the solitary confinement cells, took lots of snaps, and a short walk outside to look at the birds and flowers that call Alcatraz their home. It was great - but book a long time ahead if you want to go - quite a few people attempted to get tickets on the day, hoping for cancellations, but I didn't hear of anyone that managed it. At the time, it was sold out until mid August, and this was 23rd July.

The next few days I explored the city on foot and on the buses, which were reasonable and pretty regular. I walked to Lombard Street (the wibbly-wobbly road) and cycled on a tandem bike across the Golden Gate to Sausalito with Brie. I wouldn't rush back onto a tandem - negotiating the slack-jawed tourists walking on the Golden Gate while trying to keep the bike upright was beyond annoying.

Having heard from various people that Haight-Ashbury was my cup of tea, I visited twice during my stay. I absolutely loved it - in fact it was like temptation was sent to me to throw away all my money before I hit New Zealand. Vintage shops, tattoo parlours with rockabilly / pinup clothes and books in them, cafes, bars... I kept uncharacteristically cool about it and didn't buy anything. Mainly because it, like everything else in SF, was all incredibly expensive. I hit the Musee Mechanique, a motley collection of coin operated games and musical instruments. I tried a few of the machines out with the remains of my spare change and enjoyed it all immensely. It was like someone had crammed all the dodgy entertainment of seaside piers across the world into a warehouse. They even had one of those terrifying puppets that predicts the future, like the wizard from the 'Big' film with Tom Hanks. It was creepy, fascinating and really cool in equal measure. I checked out Castro, the gay district, and the Mission too, where I was ripped off by a second hand bookseller. Hey, ho, the trials of the foreigner who is slow with mental arithmetic, eh.

After some excellent Mexican food with Danielle and a beer or two round the corner from our hostel, I spent my last night in San Francisco before bussing it down to Santa Monica. I had planned to drive down the coast to L.A, but I had well overspent my budget by this point, and the bus was only $30 plus 'optional' tip. This was secreted from us almost by force by the unfriendly, Hitler-esque bus driver, Eddy. I wasn't going to miss this rip-off-the-tourists tipping culture, that was for sure.

I sat next to Carmel, a girl from Oakland which is the next city across from SF, and is considerably poorer. She was an LGBT / political activist, and we got chatting about Couchsurfing. She told me her experience of a Couchsurf in Washington, where she walked in on a bunch of naked people scraping wax off of each other. With nowhere else to go, she had to sit in the kitchen with her headphones on until it was all over. I can't say it endeared me to the Couchsurfing community, but I am sure this was a one off bad experience...

The bus journey was dull, so I won't go on about it. I said goodbye to Carmel in downtown L.A and the bus dropped us off in Santa Monica at about 8.30pm. I checked into the Hostels International and had an unsatisfying, but cheap, meal of microwave noodles and went to bed. I forgot I had to check in to my flight to New Zealand, and woke up at about midnight, cursing my idiocy. I couldn't check in for some reason, so I went back to sleep. The next morning, I woke up to the news that my flight had been cancelled. I called STA Travel with a sinking feeling. They assured me they'd sort it out, and to their credit, and after chasing them with a few incredibly expensive phonecalls, they did. I was back on the flight. Feeling cheered by this news, I walked down to Santa Monica Pier and to Venice Beach, where I met a random man called Michael at a cafe. It turned that out he worked in VFX and knew the place where my Mum works, and he invited me to see the Olympic opening ceremony at a nearby bar with his almost-girlfriend Roxanne. We drank beer and chatted in the strong Californian sunshine. It turned out the opening ceremony wasn't going to be on until about 9pm, annoyingly. However, it was amusing watching their clumsy flirting, especially as they were both about 15 years older than me. Roxanne confessed to me after her fourth beer that Michael didn't wine and dine her enough for her to be truely interested in him - I decided to remain neutral and after much 'mmm's and 'aaah's of understanding, decided I probably ought to head back to the hostel, pack my gear and be off to the airport.

I was glad I left when I did. It took over an hour and a half to cross from my hostel to LAX airport, which is only about 22kms. L.A traffic is appalling.

When I eventually got to the airport, I was met with the reality of waiting. I bought an overpriced sandwich and drink from a bar near the gate and watched the opening ceremony. I think I must have been the only Brit in the bar. Me being me, I got a bit tearful and felt a stab of homesickness. I think it was probably because my cousin was dancing in the ceremony and I was in possibly the worst place I could be for such an occasion, in a crap airport bar, by myself. I stopped watching after a while and had a look for somewhere to charge my phone so I could listen to some music on the plane. As every other person at the gate seemed to be Chinese, there were no plug sockets left. This is because every Chinese person I have met travelling appears to have about 5000 gadgets with them that require constant charging. My patience and emotions stretched to a limit, I managed to find a free plug socket in the hallway of the toilet, so I sat there using the free wifi, tramplike, until my phone was charged and my back was sore. Fortunately this took so long that my flight was called and I was able to board the plane and bed down on a window seat for the next ten or so hours. I watched The Godfather and slept a lot. I had to have the subtitles turned on because I couldn't understand Marlon Brando over the hum of the engines. As far as I remember, it was a good film. There was an awkward moment about five hours into the flight when everyone was asleep and I needed to pee, but luckily the couple next to me were kind and didn't mind me poking them in the shoulders and stage whispering in what I hoped was an apologetic fashion that I needed the loo.

I transferred in Sydney in a zombielike state, and waited at a considerably smaller gate for my connecting flight to New Zealand. The truths of economy travel were slowly revealed as the gate filled with people. A screaming baby, probably as sick of flying as I was, a coughing elderly woman, sounding on the verge of croaking it entirely, my complete confusion at crossing the international dateline. For example, which day's pill should I take? There was nothing on the biblical-sized leaflet that is enclosed in every packet to suggest advice in this situation. I decided it was probably best to just sleep on the flight and sort it all out when I landed in Auckland. This was what I did - waking briefly for food and to hear the fifty-odd woman next to me listening to the Spice Girls' Greatest Hits. This wasn't just the jetlag, a quick look at her entertainment screen revealed that I was hearing correctly and wasn't going mad.

After flying over 14,000 km over what was technically two days, I landed in Auckland. And from here, the New Zealand adventure began.