Bula !

After 10 fun days of relaxing around the various isles of Fiji, I find myself rejuvinatred, slightly better tanned, missing some more basic items (towel, sunglasses - whoops) and feeling quite chilled. Some of the final point may be attributed to today's extended kava ceremony whilst waiting for my flight out of here :)

During my time I read books, played lots of drinking games with fellow travellers, snorkled and even got to dress up as a Fijian cheif during one evening of entertainments. As always, pictures will follow soon.

The only real story was the transfer between the two islands, which we attempted to do in one day going via the mainland to pick up supplies. This seemed a good idea until you remember getting supplies is not as easy as popping down Tescos - we are in a completley different culture and unknown town. So in buying food and booze we missed the bus (by choice) and got a taxi down to our dock - arriving one hour too late, which even by "fiji time" is a little tardy. The sun had set, the wharf was empty and dark and no-one seemed to be around...

Eventually we found one small shop that was still open, who called out to the island and got us a boat. Although, from language barriers, we were not exactly sure this was the case until the boat was physically there... and even then we didn't really know if it was going to the RIGHT island ! All good traveller fun - not too worrying - but a little stress reminds you how much fun relaxing on a beach is :)

Off to NZ on a 4:30am flight soon - but first time to sample the local goat curry and one last Fiji Bitter

Grand Canyon was a big hole in the floor but quite impressive. I'd love to go back there and do a 2-3 day trek into the center of it - just walking around the outside didn't quite capture how godamn big it was :)

But after a few hours of walking and gawping, we headed back into San Diego where we stayed round mission beach and partyed a few days away. Then back into LA for some final all-night benders on Sunset strip (during which our SUV aquired a new outside paint job from a new drunken friend) and then a tearful farewell to Ben and Will... sniff...

Anyhow, one 11 hour plane journey later, I am now in the tropical paradise of Fiji where I have no idea where I am or what to do and I have no local money at all. Some more reseach could of been good ! Fortunatley I have been taken under the wing of three helpful girls who have all got some idea of what they are doing, so I am happily adopting them as guides and drinking buddies !

Long time offline - apologies for current e-mail silence ! I've been through San Diego now, nice beaches and a few travelling reunions (hello to Erwann and Jessica). Whilst staying near the mexican border, a quck day trip to Tijuana was in order - which heralded a day of bad tourist shlock and cheap cheap tequila drinks !

Then on Saturday I got a lift up to Los Angles, where I met up with Will and Ben for some holiday style relaxing. After 10 weeks of solo tourism, it was nice to kick back and relax for a while, and having a car in the US is a great bonus - especially in spread out LA. We went down to universal studios and rode all the rides, went drinking on Sunset Blvd and cruised the beaches and Hollywood sign.

Then we moved onto Las Vegus and toured the casinos. Another random travel reunion (hey Joe) and some low stake blackjack games culimanated in an all night bender of dollar beers, dancing util 5am and then gambling on $5 stake blackjack whilst utterly drunk. Fortunatley I had, like everyone else in Vegus, a system ! So despite my intoxication, I just followed the system and walked off $100 richer - basically covering the cost of previous losses and 3 days of all-you-can-eat buffets.

Currently the three of us are chilling out a few miles away from the Grand Canyon which should be tomorrows expedition. Better sign off and get some kip - only got about 2-3 hours last night and feeling a little drained now !

Hey - in San Francisco right now. Just had a real moment standing outside the hostel with two American guys in the military telling us how lucky we are they were keeping us alive. Esp. from Iraq soldiers. I tried to explain to them that we invaded iraq - and that they had nothing to do with 9/11 - but they didn't seem to get it. Infact, when I conjectuered that had the 20 odd terroists been based in Britiain rather than Afganisitan, would they have bombed great britain, one guy said "yes - because they were stopping American freedom". I laughed so hard, it was like a really good Bill Hicks or Python sketch. Except real, which made it a little worrying and scary.

Anyhow, off to see AL-CA-TRAZ now. Wooo.

I'm back over the border - and into Portland, Oregon. Today was self-pampering day, as I've been in a shitty mood for days now and a little bit tired. Once I hit the hostel after the overnight greyhound bus, they had to open up a new room so I could get a bed, and this room oddly enough had 2 bunk-beds, one with a "double-bed" bottom bunk. That was soooo mine.

Napped until midday, then refereshed I had a sandwhich with healthy stuff in it (nothing fried for once) and popped into the chinese gardens for an hour of zen sitting and drinking fancy tea. Once my ying had vaguely located my yang, I headed out again, picked up a ticket for the Dandy Warhols (playing tonight) as compensation for missing lots of other musical stuff (Lollapalooza, Bumbershoot), and wondered around the Portland Art museum. Feeling very rested and up for lots of beer and rock now. Woohoo.

It's so clean and tree-lined out here - big shout out to people living out in the big smoke !

Seattle didn't get me straight away. Infact, after the first night of tourism and drinking I was fairly unimpressed. To try and kick start my flagging enthusiasm, I did the touristy stuff - space needle, Expericence Music Project (in it's crazy Ghery building) and a starbucks coffee (corpoarte whore that I am :)

This sort of did the trick and that evening - and after I failed to get up in time to get the bus, the next evening - I got happily trashed whilst watching bad movies and going out the the Green Croc. club, where I saw the Bellrays (Rock 'n' Soul music, and much improved from last time I saw them), and the next night was Northern State (basically the Beastie Girls - nothing more but nothing less).

Finally I got up early enough to hurl my self into the hound up to Vancouver which is a wonderful city. I has cheap sushi, a great park to walk / bike around in, big city stuff in a small city area and easy access to outdoor stuff (including Whistler, of course). I could spend more time here - if there was more snow !

Not too much touristy stuff to do, and I felt like a break from the beers, so I went to see "American Splendor" in the cinema, about the life and story of Harvey Pekar, writer of the underground comic the film is named after. It was a really good film, lots of comedy and real life moments, and one of the first good films I've seen in a while out here whilst sifting through the summer release garbage.

One more day out here and then I'm smuggling myself back over the boarder and down the West Coast.