Tonight my Mum informed me that my next-door neighbour of 18 years in Port Lincoln, Darren Mavromatis has passed away.

Darren was five years older than me and for the majority of my childhood I looked up to him as if he were a legend. I’m sure at times I was an annoyance to him, waking him up at ridiculous hours on a Saturday morning to play cricket or use his computer, but Darren never protested and always looked after me.

I will never forget how Darren was like a big brother to me, he put me in pads to face my first real cricket ball, taught me how to lean when finishing a sprinting race, we’d saw open his Dad’s golf balls so we could get the super ball out of the middle and he grew my passion for art by teaching me how to draw.

After he left Port Lincoln we lost touch but have seen each other from time to time since always remaining a good friend to me. Darren, you will be truly missed, you’ve been taken from us all far too young and I regret not seeing you more often.

To Aunty Nita, Angie and Kylie my deepest condolences, my heart goes out to you all.

Rest in peace my friend, you will be sorely missed.

Just to prove to myself that travelling through three different time zones over the last few weeks is actually hard going on your body it decided to teach me a lesson by sleeping for fourteen hours straight today. Granted I was woken twice by having housekeeping walk into my room thinking no one was there with both times a painstakingly reality check as each one was at least ninety three years of age and not wearing your typical dream state “French Maid” outfits.

I’m not particularly fussed about sleeping throughout today, I’ve been in a shitty mood since I arrived in Paris to be honest, even the Apple Expo yesterday wasn’t an overly exciting experience. The piece I wrote for MacTalk was a rather scathing attack on the lack of anything exciting being on the show floor and the Internet killing any surprises for anyone these days. I’m such a bitter little man, damn you Jobs!

The biggest problem with me sleeping all day is that I’ve actually slept through the daylight hours of my Mum’s birthday. It was about 11pm when I’d woken Australian time which is far beyond her bed time. So Mum I’m sorry, I didn’t forget you, I’m just a lazy son and I’ll call you before you start work in the morning. I hope you had a good day!

I did actually make an attempt to get out an about today. After getting out of bed at around 2pm I made my way out to have a wander around my old stomping grounds of Forum Les Halles. The hotel that I’m staying in is on the opposite side of the square from where I stayed last time I was in Paris so that familiarity was a nice change after the randomness of each city I’d stayed in over the prior weeks.

Unfortunately after barley getting downstairs to get my baguette and “Coke Light” for a late lunch it started pouring with rain (again). It would seem that my constant run of sunshine and beautiful weather has come to a rather abrupt halt in Europe. That said I continued to perserve and went for my walk in the rain. I’m not really sure where I went or what I saw, I was more moving my legs and trying to keep my eyes open rather than take in anything that was around me. I may have just had a shit load of sleep but I felt like a zombie and after an hour I just wanted to get back to my room and go to sleep again.

Needles to say I’m back in the hotel room now, I’m tired, I’m grumpy and it looks like I’m going to have to pay Macca’s a visit for an artery hit to somewhat lift my spirits. Royale with Cheese si’l vous plait.

Today marks my final day in the lands of Northern America. It’s been an interesting experience to say the least and one that I’ve quite enjoyed for the majority. How do you spend your last few hours here? By sitting in a Laundromat doing washing, hung over as fuck looking like a tool using their laptop whilst wearing sunglasses indoors surrounded by middle aged women doing load upon load of washing and a crazy little Chinese man that’s looking after the place sweeping around everyone’s feet whilst whistling Elvis tunes.

So far for the entirety of this journey I have done my washing three times, nothing particular miraculous about that you’d say, which I too would have to agree with, but the odd linking factor between all three moments is my rather lack lustre condition whilst performing domestic duties. Why I feel the need to get completely wasted and then do laundry hung over is beyond me, perhaps it’s subconsciously a way of not wasting a day? I mean what else are you going to do hung over, lay around in bed all day? I can’t do that today anyway because I’ve checked out for my flight later this evening, so why not be somewhat productive and do something I normally wouldn’t be arsed to do whilst on holidays.

Beyond laundry and the numerous jager shots that have produced today’s physical state I thought I’d take this opportunity to offer a few travel tips for any Australian making their way over to this way…. so let’s get into it

They drive on the other side of the road
Now this might seem like a rather obvious one to most people but regardless of the fact that you know they drive on the other side of the road it’s another thing to deal with that fact. Haven’t spent the last 27 years looking “right, then left, then right again” before crossing the street is a hard habit to break! Making use of the lights just makes you look like a dweeb; I can’t think of one instance where people actually waited for them to change to the green man (actually he’s normally white here).

When the red man gets to zero you’d better not be on the road!
Further elaborating on traffic law a lot of the intersections in both Canada and the US have a countdown clock when the red man appears. The clock tells you how many seconds you’ve got left until the traffic is going to start running you over should you find yourself in the middle of the road still. Think of it as your own personal death clock, be prepared for a deafening roar of horns and shouts if you’re caught out.

Light switches are upside down
This one really pissed me off to no extent. First day when I arrived in San Francisco I was trying to turn on the lights to my rather dark hotel room and I was not having any success whatsoever. At first I thought perhaps it was one of those fancy rooms where you have to put your room keycard into a slot to make the power work or something. Turns out, after ten minutes of fumbling around in the darkness I just had to flick the stupid bloody light switch the other way! Who the fuck does that, I mean seriously up does NOT equal ON people!

Americans are loud, Canadians not so much
I mumble, well actually, no… I prefer to think of my speech as “softly spoken”. At almost every encounter where verbal communication was required in one form or another I had to repeat myself four or five times. It’s not that my accent was thick or incomprehensible it’s just that everyone speaks so loudly and in the process have inherently all become deaf as door knobs. It wasn’t quite as bad in Canada, I think their relationship to Australia through British heritage may have genetically helped all parities involved with the repeating factor reduced from four to maybe twice per sentence. One piece of advice when you’re walking down a street (in the US in particular) don’t freak out when you hear people shouting at each other, it’s more thank likely they’re just having a conversation about their golf score it just sounds like someone’s about to get a “cap popped in their ass!”

Tipping’s a bitch but Sales Tax is the devil’s scrotum
I get the tipping thing, both countries do it because people are paid peanuts, 10-15% depending on the situation, blah, blah. It’s actually easier to tipping in the US I found because it feels like you’re giving people more when you hand them a note rather than a coin even if they’re both only worth a dollar. The thing that got on my goat a hell of a lot more than tipping was sales tax, or any of the other four hundred taxes they have over this way. It changes from state to state for starters, could be 5% in California, then 14% for the same item in New York (I’m making these percentages up, can’t remember what they are). Now I could even deal with that one, IF they included the tax in the price of the item on the shelf!!!! I absolutely HATE walking up to the counter, correct change in hand and then beep, beep, beep oh it’s an extra $3.45! Fuck that shit! So now I look like a complete wanker fishing around trying to figure out what these coins are worth in my pocket and give up by just giving them a note leaving me with more stupid coins that are completely foreign and I’m too lazy to interpret into their correct denominations! Get your act together peoples.

And now for the all important final thoughts….

America
Land of the free, the great American dream… where coke comes in gallons instead of small, medium and large. I really liked America, San Francisco was pleasant, nice city and all but nothing in comparison to New York. I suppose if I was looking at it from a work opportunity point of view I’d have to choose San Fran with its whole centre hub for all things interweb and so on. That said the Internet exists to let you work from anywhere so why not live in New York and work for a company in India? Maybe not. The USA was a surprise to me as to how much I actually enjoyed exploring it, New York in particular. In both locations I could have done with more time but I think that merely adds the allure as there will always be an attraction for me to go back and visit the two cities again.

Canada
Toronto rocked. A week ago I was all set to pack my bags and illegally work for cash in NYC but now I’m all set to ride the Queen’s coat tails and get my working visa for the Maple Leaf. Toronto was very similar to Melbourne, get atmosphere, great people and great night life. I made new friends at the drop of a hat and can’t get over just how amazing the people are here. Winter is the only red flag against this place or anywhere north of the mid US really but having a white Christmas and experiencing a Winter season where there’s real snow on the street instead of four hours away up a mountain is something I think I should live through… once.

This place is pretty good ay! I’ve been wondering the streets of Toronto for three and half days now and it has definitely put on the charms to woo me across the Pacific before I’m 30. That said the weather has probably influenced my opinion somewhat with gorgeous mid twenties every day with nothing but bright blue skies. The people here have been fantastic too, friendly, happy, and always happy to have a chat. In fact they could actually be bordering too polite, take crossing the road for example, despite what my driver from the airport said about Toronto being rather full on when it comes to driving (yes I said Driver, I got a town car, yeah… eat that fools!), these Canadians are so damn pleasant that they give way to pedestrians! I mean seriously guys it’s OK your car weighs just a tad more than me, I’m happy to not cross the road for another thirty seconds and back up traffic. Seriously… go!

In that respect I’m a bit like a fish out of water here. I’m not exactly the most social person on the planet and as soon as someone gets a whiff of that Aussie accent they’re all over you with questions and conversation. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I got a couple of beers from a bunch of guys (no I wasn’t in a gay bar Paul) the other night who filled me in on the local hot spots and helped me out in getting a ticket to the Hockey the other night. Speaking of accents, I sound like such an Occa bastard here, it’s as thick as vegemite! In the US I didn’t really think about it much, linguistically there it was like I was walking around in a movie, but here in Canada their own accents are a lighter American with a touch of English, it almost borders an Australian one in some respects, which is why my own stands out so much to me I think. Some have mistaken it for English, must be the South Australian in me there, but 99% get it right, saying “no worries” at the end of a sentence is a bit of give away too, they love it.

So exactly what have I been doing here… Not a lot really, which probably sounds odd considering I haven’t been doing any writing on here but the reality is I’ve just been enjoying time here. It’s such a step down from the pace of New York and quite honestly I think you could mistake this place for Melbourne, well if you forget that everyone says “ay” after anything they say. There’s plenty of Australian reminders like Crumpler and Molly Blooms to ensure you don’t forget home. I haven’t even been sight seeing (not that there are many here), I’m skipping Niagara Falls and my Driver told me not to bother going up to the top of CN Tower as it was a bit of waste of time and money. For the first couple of days I’ve just walked around and soaked up the sun, hell I think I might even have a slight tan if that’s possible. My skin’s slowly been losing any remnants of Indian heritage and pigment form the countless hours indoors I think, Michael Jackson style without the plastic!

Downtown Toronto is quite beautiful, lots of parks and lawn areas. I spent my first afternoon in a book store reading the new Douglas Coupland novel and watching people two stories below through the large glass windows of the building. It was really nice, my mind was completely relaxed and for the first time in many, many months I was content. You really can’t ask for more than that so I’ve modelled the rest of my time doing the same type of things, relaxing, enjoying the atmosphere and pondering just how bad a -30 degrees winter would be here?!

Beyond exploring on foot (I think I’ve worn my soles out) I went to an NHL preseason game between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Phoenix Coyotes. I was really glad the guys from the other night told me there were some preseason games on because seeing an Ice Hockey game has been something I’ve wanted to do since I was a kid. Similar to the baseball game in the US they’re crazed fans up here for their hockey and even though it was a preseason game the place was packed with screaming Canadians for their rather lack lustre team that hasn’t won a championship since 1976 (I think it said). Unfortunately it wasn’t their night in this particular game either as they lost 3-2 but it was just awesome to watch! Hard rock music, fast paced game, three fights! Yeah it was pretty damn cool and I much more enjoyed that over seeing a waterfall, sorry Niagara you just don’t cut the mustard this time around.

Tomorrow I’m going to meet some of my Dad’s family for the first time. Cousins, Uncles & Aunties that no one in my family has ever had the chance of meeting (well other than my Dad 30 years ago). It’ll be good to see them and if one day I do ever move over here it’ll be nice to know there’s already a support network built in for me, which is something I haven’t really had before when moving around Australia. After that I fly out to Paris for MacWorld before finishing off my trip in London…. oh how time flies!

Toronto pictures here

I’m not feeling the greatest today. My body is completely exhausted, New York has sucked the life from me and given me a sore throat and runny nose in return. Thanks Guiliani! This past weekend was been pretty full on indeed as I left the harrowing heights of Manhattan and made my way across the Hudson to Jersey. I stayed with friends in Jersey City and spent Saturday checking out the sights and relaxing after spending Friday night in a bar doing free shots of some Vanilla Whiskey they were peddling called “The Knot”. Small tip, although it may be free the aftermath of said beverage is not worth the indulgence; this was one Vanilla flavoured gift horse you would look in the mouth!

The main event of the weekend was a ball game on Sunday afternoon. We took the train from one side of New York to the other to a suburb called “Flushing” where the New York Mets have their home ground, Shea Stadium. This thing was absolutely huge! It was like stretching out Telstra Dome and adding on a few hundred extra rows, I couldn’t believe it, let alone believe how many people were there! The game itself was OK, it got a little boring after the fifth inning though, when some guy for the Philadelphia Phillies hit a home run with the bases loaded and set them up for an easy win over the Mets. Avoiding the crowds we left at the end of the eighth and headed in to SoHo to check out the San Gennaro festival.

The festival was packed, Mulberry Street was completely taken over with stalls, food and a million people trying to fit down a two metre wide avenue all moving in the opposite direction to one another. Lucky for me hidden behind the aroma of Italian sausage, pretzels and beer was a little place I’d like to call “home”. Say hello to a little pub called “8 Mile Creek“.

This hidden gem was most definitely the diamond amongst the rough when greeting me at the bar was that familiar circular green label adorning the cool glistening glass body of a Cooper Pale Ale. Ahhhh, sweet, sweet Coopers, US$6 + tip a bottle, but well worth it! Well as you can imagine, I had a couple, just to remember the home country and all and enjoyed watching the Wallabies give those Welshmen a hiding in the Rugby before returning to the train and heading back to Jersey only to wake up all crappy today. Oh well, was worth it for the Paleys if not anything else! Hehe

Today was a bit of a nothing day, I was in between accommodation locations and required to check out of my Hotel in Manhattan in the morning before making the journey to Jersey later that day. I didn’t wake up in the best of moods, having to be up by a certain time regardless of what that time may be always makes me petulant. Check out wasn’t until 11am so naturally I took it upon myself to sleep until 10:50, pack like a mad man and shower to get downstairs after only two phone calls from housekeeping to see if I’d left the room already. I really don’t know why they were in such a rush to get in there, the quality of the room and hotel wasn’t exactly superb and I swear all they did each day to make up my room was put a fresh towel in there, hrmph. As you can see my mood was by no means improving.

After checking out and having my bags put in storage to collect later on that afternoon I decided I’d beat the grumps by having a cup of coffee. Oddly enough I haven’t had a single cup since I’ve been away! I’m not sure if that’s because I’m substituting it with Coke four hundred times a day or if it’s really because I’m scared of how bad American coffee is. Regardless, I thought today might be a good day to “roll the dice” and see if I could find myself a good cup of joe. Surprisingly it didn’t take me too long to find a nice little cafe not far from the hotel that actually had a coffee machine in it rather than a couple of percolated coffee pots boiling away to nothing on a hot plate, so I went in, sat down, order myself a nice omelette for a late breakfast and a latte.

There were about three people in this place, it was a small little diner and quite kitsch really, there were two guys working the floor and a cook out the back yet between the three of them it took about twenty minutes to crack open some eggs and get my omelette anywhere near me. Have to cut them some slack though because while I was sitting there, watching the cable guy try and plug in a new high def box for them, they had a little visit from a rather stubby woman all dressed up in police-like duds complete with gun belt and digital camera.

At first I wasn’t sure what the woman was doing, she just kind of hovered out the front of the cafe until one of the guys decided that it might be a good idea to head out and see what she wants. They had a little conversation, I couldn’t hear them but the more she spoke the more the waiter’s smile turned into a frown. Eventually they’d finished chatting and he showed her in and through to the back of the place and I started to see camera flashes going off! What’d they have a dead body back there or something?! Oh hang on… fat woman, uniform, citation pad, digital camera… ahhhh health inspector!

It was around about this point that my omelette arrived being served by the second waiter. The omelette I’m afraid, was rather disappointing; somehow they’d managed to suck every bit of flavour from the tomato, egg, bacon, basil and onion that were supposedly inside and replaced all of their flavour with the taste of water. Strangest tasting omelette I’ve ever had in my life, only took half a salt shaker for me to get through it! What can I say, I was hungry, I had to eat.

As I swallowed the final mouthful of H2O omelette the uniformed woman returned from the kitchen’s depths having finished her inspection. This time when she spoke her words were distinctively clear as if it were God’s plan to now reveal her secrets to me.

“You’ve got 24 hours to fix these 5 infringements.” she said.

Oh goodie gum drops, I’ve just eaten the worst omelette in the world from the dirtiest kitchen in New York! Perhaps the flavour got scared and ran away at the site of the place? I didn’t dare

Being in the position of having no real option as what to do, having already eaten and all, I did what any normal person would. I complained I hadn’t yet received my coffee and politely asked could they hurry it up a little. Apologetic in a way that only American service can give you when searching for a tip he ran off and came back with my Latte. Now please, remember this clearly I’m saying the word “L-a-t-t-e”, Latte! Arriving a few moments later, placed beside me all warm and steamy was my freshly prepared Latte… oh yes, there it was, my latte… served in a white ceramic mug the size of someone’s head, a beautiful inch thick cappuccino froth, and topping it off; a dusted coating of chocolate powder. So there was my Mug-o-cino that I ordered from the health violating kitchen of the most wonderful cafe in all of New York, clearly. Again, me being tolerant and putting all anger, petulance, and impatience aside (yes apparently I am capable of that) went ahead and just drank the coffee. Well… actually, let’s say “began” to drink the coffee.

After breaking through the mortar layer of chocolate and froth, finally allowing some coffee to make its way through to my mouth I practically regurgitated it just as quickly back into its mug as I was not greeted with the wonderful taste of coffee, no, not at all, I mean that would make sense now! No instead I received cinnamon; yes that’s right, surprising my taste buds who were, and let’s be fair here, completely unprepared having not been used once when eating the omelette! That was it, last straw… tolerance has left the building, cash down, no tip, see you later.

What’s the point to this story? None really, I had a bad day and frankly i thought you could all share it with me, because no one no matter what they’ve done in life deserves cinnamon tainted coffee!

If there was one thing I wanted to see in New York it was the Guggenheim museum designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. It is without a doubt one of the most amazing pieces of architectural design in modern history and one that I’d studied way back in high school. There’s only one other building in the world that I would truly love to see first hand and that would be Le Corbusier’s masterpiece Villa Savoye, hmmm actually let’s chuck in Gehry’s Spanish Guggenheim too, Bilbao. Anyway, enough with the architectural appreciation class lets all focus on my utter disappointment to be greeted (after walking five blocks and taking two trains to the other end of freaking Manhattan island I might add!) with the lovely image that lies above. Let’s just sugar coat this one and say I was slightly “peeved” at my luck. I’m sure many of you are thinking “its just a building, get over it”, but let me explain something to you my little friends… you’re wrong! I want my Guggenheim damn you! F@#kers!

Right, now that I have that out of my system lets move on to what else has been happening. New York is crazy town, no way to describe exactly how much fun I’m having here and how awesome this place really is. All those people I’ve thought are wankers by wearing those “I [heart] NY” t-shirts, well you’re still wankers but what’s written on the t-shirt is exactly how I feel about this place. Can you say “give-me-a-green-card”? Woah, woah hang on a minute, let’s not get ahead of ourselves here… I must say that the weather (apart from the God like Noah & the Ark styled rain on Tuesday) has been incredible and I’d really need to see how this place operates when it snows here. That’s OK though, just gives me an excuse to visit in the off season! Mwahaha, cheap, cheap!

My hotel is a shoe-box, I’m not even going to bother any of you with a picture because half the photo would be one bare wall there’s so little to fit in the shot! Mmmmm, what else? Oh! I ran out of unmentionables yesterday and the rather uppity front desk staff informed me there was no Laundromat nearby but they could of course wash clothes for me at US$3 an item. Needless to say I declined and went on a mission to Macy’s to purchase some to tied me over until my next stop that fortunately includes washing facilities and low and behold on the way back I passed a Laundromat less than a block from my hotel. Arseholes!

Times Square is incredible, so much going on, so many people! It’s like all of Australia got dumped here and they all want to walk down Broadway! Speaking of which, I went and saw Monty Python’s musical “Spamalot” which is based on their movie “The Holy Grail”. Now I’m not really one for musicals, although… strangely I’ve seen three now this year, hmmm…. yes; as I was saying, I’m not really one for musicals but this was one of the funniest things I’ve seen! If you’re a fan of Monty Python or enjoy British based dry humour I highly suggest you check this thing out, and I say that because it’s opening in Melbourne this November! I’ll be going again, oh crap that’d make four musicals in a year….

The subway system is insane, at first glance it looks like you need a nuclear physics degree to understand it but after a day on them it really couldn’t be easier or more convenient. Up until today I’d had all sane people on the carriages with me, even at night, which had been a let down but today was most definitely nutter day with almost every ride being usurped by someone announcing their name’s and plea/sermen to the other passengers. My particular favourite was a rather tall man that required a hankie to wipe away drool with every second word informing the women of the carriage that he was available for any adultery requirements regardless of god’s wrath. Highly entertaining, as long as you avert your eyes and don’t take any notice of them. Harmless fun.

Other than all of that I have done the tourist thing and gone to the top of Rockefeller Centre or “Top of the Rock” as they call it, did that instead of the Empire State because it was a five minute wait compared to five hours, and this afternoon after the bitter disappointment of the Guggenheim I strolled through kilometre upon kilometre of Central Park. One word for both experiences… beautiful. There’s plenty of pictures from both of those and everywhere else I’ve been in New York so far here.

So it was raining and just a plain shitty day for my first day in New York so I did the only thing you can do… SHOP!

Today was last day in fair old San Francisco, tomorrow morning I’ll be waking at the ungodly hour of 5am to catch a lovely five and half hour plane ride to New York. The east coast is three hours ahead of here so I basically lose an entire day in transit but you know, lets all cry over spilt milk and get on with our lives.

The plan, as has been pretty much every day I’ve spent here, was to head down to Fisherman’s Wharf. I really have no idea what’s supposed to be so special about this place other than everyone I know that’s been to San Francisco pushing it on me as place to visit in the same way a crack dealer hands out free pipes to new clients. (Well I’m presuming that metaphor but hey, be a good sales pitch I reckon). I actually woke up a little before 10am today which was kind of weird because I really didn’t know what to do for the extra two hours before when I have been heading out each day. Capitalising on the extra time I watched TV, always on the proactive I am!

Got the bus “downtown” as the yanks put it and made my way to the trolley car stop to find a line that went three blocks and past the last sign that actually told me how long I was going to have to wait. Goodbye Fisherman’s Wharf, I’ll catch you next time round me thinks. OK so with that tourist attraction neatly crossed off the list what else could I do? Go back to the hotel and sleep was sounding pretty damn good at this point but there was something I’m sure I was supposed to do while I was here, something I was meant to see…. what is important in San Francisco… Oh crap… I hadn’t been to the Golden Gate Bridge!

The bridge was really no where near downtown, it’s in the complete opposite direction from where I’d just come but all I really had to was walk ten metres to Market St and jump on the number five to get down to Golden Gate Park and the 29 North to the bridge. Feels like I know the “MUNI” public transport system better than I do Melbourne’s and I’ve only been here five days!

So I got to the bridge. Um; how do I put this. It’s big, it’s brow-ange, it’s made of metal. You spend thirty minutes catching and changing buses to get to this thing, you see it, turn around come home. Oh actually I did have blueberry muffin and some Häagen-Dazs ice-cream at the extremely overpriced “Bridge Cafe” whilst there. The food pit-stop probably quadrupled the amount of time I spent there, lucky my sugar was low hey! No, it really wasn’t that boring, this thing is damn massive! Dwarfs that can opener Sydney calls a bridge and looks like a painting the way the mist and fog haze the towers and opposite footings. There was also a pretty little garden up there surrounding the statue of the engineer behind the bridge’s construction. Sorry didn’t look at the plaque, can’t tell you his name… who do I look like Jules Lund? Ewww, please say no!

Not particularly exciting stuff for you all I’m afraid but being there and seeing it was pretty amazing I must admit. Something much more amazing and probably unbelievable to the most of you is that the day I prior I spent the entire day in a park. Yes pick up your jaws from the floor, Rajeev Deut was getting in touch with nature by spending the day in Golden Gate Park (no where near the Bridge I might add). I didn’t want to write a full entry devoted to it just in case a few of you out there with weak hearts hadn’t taken you medication but I will say that I had a most enjoyable day exploring only at the most a tenth of this enormous parkland, one kilometre wide by five kilometres long!

The main part that I spent most of my time in was the Botanical Gardens (yes Mum I went to the Botanical Gardens without being dragged by a girl) and they were very beautiful. I took a tonne of photos, tried to get as many as I could of the little squirrels running around but they’re pretty fast little buggers! The whole time I was walking around in the Botanical Gardens (they’re a tiny, tiny portion of the actual park) you could hear these looming bass beats coming from the south towards the coastal end of the park. Whatever it was it sounded interesting so I decided to take a wander down that way only to find an hour and three kilometres later I still hadn’t arrived at their source!! I’d all but given up, my hips were at the point where they felt like they were scraping bone on bone with my legs and if I had to walk for another ten minutes I’d be getting one of those cool little scooters I’d seen people hiring for disabled folk back at the entrance to the parkland.

Fear not engrossed reader, I did not give in to the excruciating pain that boiled within me, I pressed on, punishing my torso in search of the echoing booms! And then, just when all hope was lost I turned to corner and out of nowhere came at least 30,000 people all crammed together bouncing and grooving at San Francisco’s 9th Annual “Power to the Peaceful” festival! Penny drop… this explains why I’d been smelling dope for the last twenty minutes!

The festival was pretty awesome, full of tree huggin’ hippies, but cool none the less, and quite the find! It cost a donation of US$3-5 to get in and then the rest was party time. I hung out there for a while, had a few drinks, listened to Michael Franti play his set, which was pretty cool, and then made way back to the hotel for the day!

There you have it, my last two days in San Francisco and the entire trip without one stop anywhere near tourist central Fisherman’s Wharf! Frankly I think it’s my lack of touristy indulgence that has led to me spending only US$250 for my entire trip so far, and that includes cab’s, buses and food. Damn I’m a tight arse!

Awww, look at cute Mr Squirrel on a log! Check out more pics from San Fran’s Golden Gate Park here.