Innumerabilis

Some last pictures of taipei (the airport, since I didn’t venture out of it!).

Xu Shen and Jiawei.

Kenny, Danny and me.

海鲜拉面 in the airport. The good thing is they accept both USD and NT, since I didn’t have any NT with me. The bad thing is it costs 7 USD when the equivalent in NT would be about 6 USD. I think it is still expensive either way.

Their nappy changing room has a Hello Kitty theme!

That’s it, wat2008 is concluded. It has been a wonderful journey, and I have no regrets going for it.

The wee hours of today was spent searching for a motel. We thought that nearer to the airport, there should be plenty of motels with space, but alas, that is not so. So I reiterate: if you are going to San Francisco during the summer holidays, book early. In the end, we found a place that had only one room left, only took cash, with rooms that weren’t exactly big, and was rather expensive. Oh well, beggars can’t be choosers.

Just before leaving the motel. One of our last photos of the US together.

The beach at Marina Drive. Unfortunately, it is too windy and cold to take a dip in the ocean. The famous Golden Gate Bridge is behind us, shrouded in the San Francisco fog.

Another view of the beach/park.

At the San Francisco Airport, after we’d returned our rental car.

San Francisco Airport, where we boarded the flight. I’m returning to Singapore via Taipei, while Danny, Kenny, Jiawei and Xu Shen are staying in Taipei for a few days.

The next day, we left the car at the motel and walked to Fisherman’s Wharf. It was a nice place;  Xu Shen scrapped his knee there, we had a crab and seafood lunch (the crab was fresh and delicious while the fresh oysters were heavenly!), we saw sealions at Pier 39, took pictures with a submarine (didn’t go in, entrance fee was too expensive for us misers) and went back to Chinatown for shopping and an early dinner.

At night we went to Vista Peak to take pictures of the famous Golden Gate Bridge.

I’ve heard that San Francisco had lots of hills, but it wasn’t until I saw it for myself that I realised just how steep, and how undulating the terrain of San Francisco is!

“The crookedest street in the world.” It keeps winding and winding down (it is a one-way street) and certain lives up to its appellation!

Fisherman’s Wharf, with all the fishing boats behind us. If you have time and money to spare, these boats take tourists out for a day of fishing.

The Fisherman’s Wharf sign. This is where Xu Shen, being too intrepid, scrapped his knee.

Battlescars.

The artificial island (Forbes Island) was built by a billionaire who wanted both opulence and privacy. It is now a restaurant.

Pier 39. Sealions made it their home in 1990 and never left.

The restaurants at Fisherman’s Wharf. We had our crab, prawn and oyster lunch here and it was superb!

USS Pampanito, a former submarine which has been restored and is now open to the public, for a fee of course.

Back to Chinatown. This time we took a picture of the iconic entrance.

Golden Gate Bridge at night.

A statue commemorating sailors, both military and mercenary, at Vista Peak.

Driving from Yosemite, we reached San Francisco at about 2 am in the morning. We tried several motels and even hotels, but all of them were booked solid. A piece of advice: if your visit to San Francisco coincides with the summer holidays and with a weekend, you’d better book your accommodation in advance! In the end we slept in the car; it was cramped and most certainly not a pleasant night.

San Francisco is very windy. In the day it is not that bad, but when night comes it can get really cold. The next day we found lodgings at a motel which charged about $120, and they only had room for one day. Oh well, we didn’t have a choice.

The first day was spent touring Chinatown. Unfortunately, we parked in the yellow zone and the car was towed away! We spent hours searching for it until Xu Shen asked the shop owner who confirmed the car was towed (we think he’s the one who called the cops). We paid about $300+ for the car in the end, but now we know - do not park in the yellow zone in San Francisco!

Chinatown in San Francisco.

The streets in Chinatown have an official English name as well as a Chinese name, but the two often have totally different meanings.

A banner congratulating China on obtaining the rights to host the Olympics.

The place where our car was towed away to. A very expensive parking lot indeed!

After the episode, we parked the car in a private garage ($10 per entry) instead of at the roadside before we went shopping. In this picture, you can see how strong the wind blows in San Francisco.

We tried to rent a car today to drive to San Francisco, as per what we had planned. Unfortunately, it didn’t take us long to discover that Budget, the one recommended to us, was entirely out of cars. Avis offered us a truck. Hertz had only an SUV, but after an hour when I checked again, they had a saloon, a Toyota Avalon. I booked it on the phone and rushed over, and at about 2 am we finally had our car.

Day 11 was spent covering the distance between Hollywood, Los Angeles and San Francisco. It was just miles after miles on the highway.

On day 12, were still on the road, but with a few detours. In the morning, we stopped by some lake (we saw the sign from the highway) which was really beautiful. Next was Sequoia National Park where some of the largest trees on Earth could be found, and then Yosemite National Park.

We drove through the night after that to San Francisco.

The road to San Francisco involved travelling miles and miles of highway.

Our rental car, the Toyota Avalon.

The beautiful lake whose name I’d sadly forgotten.

Sequoia National Park early in the morning. 8.15 am, to be exact.

Me and Danny with a sequoia tree, the biggest trees on Earth.

Sherman Tree Trail is a trail to General Sherman, the biggest of the sequioas, and hence the biggest tree on Earth.

You can see how big the sequioas are.

We’ve reached Yosemite National Park.

Behind us is the famous half-dome of Yosemite.

Yosemite Falls, one of the tallest waterfalls in the US, had dried up. =( By then it was about 5.30 pm and we didn’t have enough time to reach it anyway. We set our goal to be Columbia Rock, the halfway point, but we didn’t even reach there before we turned back. I was unprepared for the hike, with old shoes that had almost all the traction gone. I nearly slipped a few times, and did fall once. Luckily I was crouching and low to the ground, and fell down on my butt so it didn’t hurt much.

The point where we turned around. This point offers a nice panoramic view of the sight below too, so we were satisfied having made it to here.

Back at the bottom, with a mountain behind us. A last picture of Yosemite’s amazing natural sights before we leave for San Francisco.

Today, we went to the last attraction included in our California Citypass - Universal Studios! After that (it was quite late at night) Xu Shen, Danny and Kenny went to watch Dark Knight in a cinema, Jia Wei went back to the motel to bid on his cors, and I walked around Hollywood Boulevard (which is near our motel) for about half an hour before returning.

This is the new Simpsons Ride at Universal Studios. The system here is very different from Disneyland’s. Over there they don’t bat an eye if you photograph the photograph they took of you on rides, but here they have staff actively preventing people from doing just that. We took this before they could stop us (we didn’t know it wasn’t allowed).

Krustyland with Danny.

Just outside the Simpsons ride. The hazy quality is because they have water humidifiers spurting out water droplets to cool the place down.

A poster of the Hollywood sign. Looks much clearer than the real thing!

A picture with Shaggy and Scooby-Doo.

A picture with a plastic replica of The Hulk.

While we were leaving, we took a group picture of the famous Universal Studios logo.

Back to the Hollywood Walk of Fame. We have to pass through this everytime we go somewhere because our hotel is in a side road accessible from Hollywood Boulevard (which is where the Walk of Fame is). This star shows the five different stars that a person can get.

We started off the day by going to the Kodak Theatre, then the wax museum (both attractions included in the Hollywood Citypass) and ended the day at the Santa Monica Beach.

Outside the Kodak Theatre, where the Oscars are held annually. They’ve just signed a contract with Cirque du Soleil for a new show here, so the theatre itself would be upgraded pretty soon. The security is so tight that we’re not allowed to take photos inside the theatre.

Of all the many stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, only Muhammad Ali’s star is mounted on a wall. This is not because he was never knocked down in the boxing ring (he was, and by more than one person), but because of his religion. It is forbidden in Islam for people to walk on the name of “Muhammad”, hence his star gets special treatment.

Outside Grauman’s Chinese theatre, where all the handprints (and sometimes footprints) of stars are found.

Hand and footprint of Johnny Depp outside Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. In Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre across the road a stone’s throw away, Lucy Liu is filming her new movie. Too bad we didn’t get to catch a glimpse of her.

Inside the wax museum. We were trying to emulate the classic Charlie’s Angles pose.

Santa Monica beach. The beach simply stretches for kilometres in either direction, further than what the eye can see.

There is an amusement park at the beach, but after Disneyland and California Adventure, these rides seem trivial.

We went for a dip in the ocean. Unfortunately, I lost my spectacles when a huge wave caught me unaware; looking for it would literally be 海底捞针。Fortunately, the specs was quite old and I have my new spectacles in my bag, so I wasn’t too upset about the loss. You can see how dark we all became (the hands and face at least) after days of walking in the sun.

After the swim, at the Santa Monica pier.  I think I suffered some abrasion in the sea when the sand washed pass, because when I put on my t-shirt it hurts whenever the cloth comes into contact with my skin. Ouch!