California 3

While at home, my last update from California

Tuesday we drove to Los Angeles and spend the afternoon in holywood. We walked the walk of fame and saw the theater where the Oscars are given away. However the whole place was a lot less glamerous as I always imagined it to be....

 We visited the music centre in downtown LA, apparently the only building worth to see in LA. LA is about buisiness....people don't live there, as they are only allowed to have two cars, which is nog enough for a family of more than 2 people, as everyone needs theier own car. That resulted of course in long traffic jams in and out the city..... Our hotel was to the South East of the city, only 15 min from Disney world.

Wednesday was Disney world day :) Or to be more precise: California Adventure Park day. There are two parks opposite each other, and according to our guide, Disney was only for very small children and Adventure Park was for us.... Fortunately I quite like Roller coasters and scary rides, otherwise I might have been a little disappointed as there were no Old Dysney figures except from Mickey... 

But we did have cars, a bugs life, the little mermaid, finding Nemo etc etc. And there was a huge selection of different things to do. I spend the day with one of the Chinese girls that actually could speak some English and we had a lot of fun. From free falls in an elevater to a ride in which you had to shoot as many targets as possible to more beautiful rides "Under the Sea". There was wild water rafting and our two favourites: 1) a 3D film about all the beauty of california with moving chairs so you really experienced the flight and 2) the end show " Colours of the World" with many coloured water fountains and Dyney films projected on a water made scherm. We walked around from 10.00- 21.30 and were happy to see our beds :)

Universal Studios the following day was another Theme Par, but completely different. We started with a tour around the studios and stages they have there and used for several famous films like back to the future and jaws, and we experienced a 3 D Kingkong movey. Especially the animation figures are so much smaller than in real life! 

The special effects show, showed you how they put actors into different backgrounds, or use their movement to draw a caracter in their real movements. They showed how they made animations: real figures that they slightly changed for every single shot, having hundred poses for a second of a film....pfffft.

Al the rides their where variations on a theme: they played a three D movie while you were sitting in a moving vehicle and the amount of moving defined the scariness. The scariest being the mummy with a rollarcoaster ride in the dark, going backwards..... The best being the Dispicable Me one, but that is probably because I love the Minions :) And there it happened again.... About twenty years ago, when I watched the Titanic premiere in a big cinema, I got so involved in the film that when they were almost dead after the got into the water and the rescue boat came looking for them and almost passed them, I started waving in the middle of the theater....one of the more embaressing moments of life.... This time the present of the little girl almost fell of a big height, and I reached as far as I could go to get it...... Less people around this time ;) The day ended with the Waterworks: A nice acting peice of the good against the bad with lots of jumping in the water and special effect including a plane crashing down.... Quite spectacular! 

The day was just a little to short as we had to leave at 1700, but I really enjoyed it :)

Friday was the day of driving back to SF, a 9 hour drive. The only nice thing we did was an hour visit to Solin, a Danish village with lots of nice danish pastry ;)

So in conclusion about the tour:

- Really good value for money :)

- There are many CHinese in the world.....or they were all on this tour... I was deciding between going to China or to California, and now I got two for one :) 

- Chinese love taking pictures of themselves, preferably at least 200 per day

- We saw a lot, but need to come back to experience the nature parks a bit more :) But I knew that when I booked.....

- Americans really eat a lot and really unhealthy, you have to look hard for healthy food and not be distracted all the time by all the massive icecreams.... a little hard ;) 

- I am a little tired ;) and the Lindy exchange is starting tonight!