We're here!

We have finally arrived safe and sound in sunny Brisbane. The last few days have been spent doing all of the mundane practical things which moving countries entails, bank accounts, new phones, doctors etc. We have had a lovely welcome from everyone especially the insects.... last count I had more than 50 bites on my arms and legs!

We had such a great time on our trip that we would highly recommend to everyone that you become unemployed and homeless....

Surfers Paradise

As we have a few days in Hawaii we decided to hire a car and go for a drive around the Island. We spent most of the day on the North Shore watching the surfers. I decided to get my toes wet, however I got a little wetter than I was anticipating, with a big wave which Iain forgot to tell me about whilst taking my photo!!!Posing for a pictureThere goes the waveLook at my wet bum!

Hawaii Sunset

Certainly a very romantic setting for Valentines day!

LA - The city of smog!

We only had one full day in LA so we took ourselves on a hop-on, hop off bus. Rodeo Drive, Beverly Hills, Farmers Market, Mulholland Drive and Paramount studios.On Rodeo DriveThe Police Station in Beverly Hills CopParamount Studios

A little trip to San Diego

As one of those weird twists of fate goes, Howard arrived in San Diego on the same day as we did. It is the furthest West he has been in the states with work so the chances of that happening was pretty much none existant! His work mates treated us to a free night on the town at the bar where they filmes some of Top Gun, at Her Majesty's expence.
We also went to Sea World and despite getting soaked on the first ride, we had a great few hours watching the Whales, Sharks etc in action.Check out the guy on his nose!!!

A very Grand Canyon

Sian and Mr J Dean on Route 66, apparently this little town was made famous by the pixar movie "Cars", although we haven't seen the show.


A very inspiring and surreal place.. There had been a fair bit of snow as well the day before so the top layers had a light dusting. Our tour consisted of a walk for about 2.5 hours around the south rim, then a shuttle ride back to the van for a few scenic lookouts. This place is awesome.


Nearly....

A beautiful photo that sian took.

I shot a real gun, well, two guns

This is my target after 30 rounds from a handgun. Impressed? Watch out!!

Viva Las Vegas

The bright lights and slots were calling us so we drove down route 95 for 9 hours to get to Las Vegas. We got slightly addicted to the sounds of the slot machines but luckily our budget only stretched to the 1 cents ones!

I think our favourite hotel had to the be Bellagio which puts on these magical fountain shows to music every 15 minutes. We spent more than an hour at a time just watching the whole spectical. Really the whole city is just amazing and we were very sad when our 5 days was over!

Snowy Lake Tahoe

Well if we thought we were going to get warmer weather now we were on the West Coast, boy were we wrong! As we drove to Lake Tahoe the weather started to get worse and we noticed snow by the sides of the road, however the snow got heavier and heavier the closer we got. Now I do like a bit of snow but when we had more than a foot on Trudy in the morning it was quite hard work to dig her out (well Iain did the work and I stood and watched). Iain is happy though as it means I am now agreeing that upgrading to a much bigger car was actually a good idea.
As I can't ski we were at a loss as to what to do, at a ski resort, when snow is falling...... but we found snow mobiling!!!! Iain was great and loved every minute of it, and tried to throw me off the back a few times.... I went one better and tried to roll us so Iain did most of the driving!
All in all a great snowy weekend.