A New Start

Welcome to Living Life Today. We have packed up and moved to blogger. This is my second blog. Same name. Different place. It may be permanent or may be temporary... let's find out together. You ask, why did we move? Living Life Today needed a change. I needed motivation. 

Thanks to my family and friends who follow me. 

Feel free to leave any comments, in fact I encourage them! You are my inspiration and laugh. 

{Visit the original LLT here}

Our Last Stint

A late night/early morning and many laughs with Jamie ended our holiday in America on a high. Today we hopped on a plane, prepared for twenty-four hours of flying. We got through the first flight of nine hours with no sleep and company of some good movies, like this one. The second flight, we managed to get 7 uncomfortable hours of sleep and the view of a gorgeous sunrise. It didn't take long to get through customs and security in Sydney but due minor delays we missed our flight to Adelaide, which then followed by us being informed that Jamie {apparently} didn't have a ticket home. A couple hours later, and after some communication with staff and our travel agent we sorted the problem out and were on our way to our home city {after picking up some of these of course!}. Joining some Australian olympic athletes and an ex-Getaway cameraman we made it home to see family greeting us at the gate. Excitement filled my body to see these friendly faces and to start sharing stories. I stayed up as late as I could to try and conquer jet-lag.

Some things I've learnt and realised while being away in America & Canada

• I love ice-cream {sometimes way too much!}.
• God's timing is perfect and He will get us through anything and everything.
• Everything involving a public toilet is automatic - the flush, the water, the soap, the dryer.
• Tipping is a must,  not an option.
• 1 cent coins are a pain and have no use {no wander we got rid of them!}. They are easy to collect but hard to give away.
• Public transport is easy and inexpensive.
• Wake-up calls were lifesavers.
• I love adrenaline rushes
• I love my family and friends an incredible amount. For their support, prayers, thoughts and guidance prior, during and after this trip.
• Chill out time is sometimes just as important as a jam-packed day.
• Money has a skill of disappearing faster than expected.

Play Ball

Mr J and I caught this and the subway to here for some baseball today. Mr J said he has never used his voice at a sporting match as much as he did today. For those who know Mr J, that's amazing. He loved it and so did I. The atmosphere was exciting and fun. The game was worth the money. Go Giants! We cheered and watched for over three hours but it felt like so much less. Excellent! We caught the same transport home but in reverse as earlier.

Tonight we have enjoyed the heated pool, organised our last shuttle to an airport in the states and packed our gear ready to leave. As we lay in our hotel, Mr J and I are amazed how fast the past 6 weeks have gone. Tomorrow we start our many hours of flying. We are sad our holiday is coming to an end but very excited to share the stories and photos with family and friends.

Mr J and I didn't have time to see the Golden Gate Bridge other than this day but we did find out some cool facts...

• The total length of the wire used in main cables is enough to wrap around the earth 3 times (129,000 kms)!
• They used 297,475 cubic metres of concrete to build the bridge
• The bridge weighs 811,500,000 kg
• It took 1,605 days to build the bridge
• See the photo of me with a cable for more facts!

I'll talk to you when I'm in another timezone, bye for now.

Travelling Around

Mr J and i got a semi-sleep in this morning before eating a yummy chicken, tomato, cheese, lettuce crepe for brunch. We got to try some of these popular candies as we walked to find the line for the cable car. Mr J and I caught a ride on our very first cable car to Union Square where the shopping was at. The conductors make sure there is no room to move on these cars and they are also quite slow but definitely worth the experience. I managed to find some outlet stores within Union Square and spent a couple hours browsing through shops. Mr J secretly enjoyed this too. We caught another cable car to a very popular street in San Fran. Lombard Street. Amazing! Who ever knew that you could drive down a street so windy and steep? & who was the one who designed this? After taking photos, walking down and up and witnessing many tourists filming themselves as they drove down the street we caught another cable car back to Fisherman's Wharf to dress in warmer clothes and grab some dinner. I then fell asleep to this.

Sights and Alcatraz Island

Mr J and I rugged up and put on our hats to join a group of people for an Urban Safari around the city of San Francisco. We drove through the hilly city, stopped at the Palace of Fine Arts for some photos, drove past the wonderfully architectural City Hall, drove past houses that are worth no less than $950,000, enjoyed the view of the city from Twin Peaks and stopped at the Golden Gate Bridge. We weren't able to see the bridge through the fog for most of the day but had a good time looking through the souvenir shop - we will be venturing back there some other day. Our group stopped for dissatisfying food at lunch but were thankful the safari organised our Alcatraz tickets and dropped us at the gate. Mr J and I boarded our boat to cruise over to Alcatraz Island at 1:45pm. After a 10 minute trip we arrived on the Island ready to explore.

As Mr J and I didn't have a lot of knowledge about Alcatraz we sat through a documentary about it before we did anything else. 18 minutes later we trekked up to the cell house where we received our audio tours and moved through the entire cell house hearing stories and facts about this high security prison. We went though the cells, the library, the dining hall, the head quarters and the visitation area. Our experience was definitely worth it and if anyone has some time to spare in San Francisco you should definitely cruise over to Alcatraz! Some cool facts we learnt were:

• The last inmates left Alcatraz on March 21, 1963 and the prison officially closed it's doors a few months later.
• The prison closed because of deteriorating buildings and high operating costs. It is now a National Park Service and will remain so.
• Alcatraz Island was not only resident to the criminals but also to families, children, individuals and staff of the prison who had apartments and houses there. We were shocked to hear that these residents hardly ever locked their doors either!!
• The cell house was never filled to its capactiy. The maximum prisoners were 302 but there were 336 cells available.
• In 29 years, 36 prisoners tried to escape. All but 5 were recaptured or accounted for. 3 that were unaccounted for participated in the same breakout which is now in a movie, called 'Escape from Alcatraz.'

"You are entitled to food, clothing, shelter, and medical attention. Anything else you get is a privilege."
Number 5, Alcatraz Prison Rules and Regulations, 1934

Time for dinner. Mr J and I had a wonderful experience a Bubba Gump's. This restaurant is dedicated to the movie "Forrest Gump" therefore all the walls are covered in quotes, our waiter gave us a quiz on the movie, the names of the dishes resemble the movie in some way and all the decor is recognised from the movie. It was fun and we gained a glass to take home! Tonight we also tried a Strawberry and Nutella Crepe between the two of us. Talk about melting in your mouth, this is exactly what it did!

For those of you at home. We traveled through Woodside today! As proper tourists, we took a photo of the sign just for you which we will show you in less than a week!

San Fransisco

Bargain! This morning Mr J and I saved at least $40 by catching the local train to the airport rather than a taxi. It was easy, an experience and only $3.75 each! Our flight to San Francisco was our fastest yet as Mr J and I slept the entire way and woke up for 15 minutes of the descent - good way to do it. From the airport we caught a shuttle to our hotel, which we have done previously and witnessed the beautiful San Fran weather. After settling in, testing our sleep number and watching some Olympics Mr J grabbed a burger from the very retro Johnny Rockets {It reminded me of the cafe in Greece}. We explored the outdoor entertaining and swimming pool within our hotel before we strolled down Fisherman's Wharf and Pier 39. Our hotel sits on Fisherman's Wharf which is extremely convenient. Mr J and I window shopped past many chocolate and candy stores, sports stores, souvenir stores, a lefty {left-handed} store, cheap sun glasses stores and investigated what bakeries, restaurants and cafes were close by. So far, San Francisco gives off a relaxing, calm and beautiful atmosphere with so much to see. We had a view of the Alcatraz {which we are touring tomorrow!!} and the Golden Gate Bridge from a distance. Near Pier 39, many sea lions gather to sun bake - it was amazing to watch.

After all this walking, talking and exploring Mr J and I had built up an appetite. We decided to try the famous Clam Chowder served in a sourdough roll for dinner. It was big therefore plenty to share one between two. Yummy. We continued walking for a while before going back to our hotel.

Chill time. We are looking forward to some time to relax and take our time in a place where the weather is beautiful during the day and allows us to have a comfortable sleep overnight. The last stint.

Last day on Contiki, Last day in Canada

Last day of contiki therefore last day in Canada. After a hot breakfast Jamie and I explored parts of Vancouver. Chinatown and their Chinese garden received a visit from us, it was beautiful and we also got to meet the biggest goldfish we have ever seen {at least a foot long!}. We walked the streets, visited some interior design stores and grabbed something to eat from 7 eleven, including two free slurpees! Slurpees are the biggest cause of brain freeze ever. We relaxed in front of some live music for an hour before we headed to the local Sears for some shopping therapy {keeping in mind that we need to save money for our last adventure in the States, we resisted many ridiculously low prices}. On our way back to our hotel we visited the local candy store and then rested prior to meeting our fellow Contiki-ers for a dinner cruise at 5:30pm.

The dinner cruise was wonderful. 49 of us made a little extra effort to smell nice and look fancy. We sailed around the entire Vancouver Island which took over two hours. During this time we relaxed, socialised and consumed a very tasty buffet dinner followed by chocolate cake for dessert. We finished the cruise in the dark, dancing under a disco ball. The group traveled on our Contiki coach for the last time back to our hotel. After we got dropped off we walked to a night club for a couple drinks, a dance and to say goodbye. Saying goodbye was hard - we had spent the last 10 days with such a lovely group of people, people that live all over the world. Where possible we have all connected on facebook and now have contacts in Germany, England, New Zealand, Dubai and other areas in Australia in case we need a bed in the future. What an experience we have had - Jamie and I would recommend travelling this way to anyone {between the age 18-35}. Go here if you are interested.

Tomorrow we say hello to San Francisco and cable cars!!