I must confess that I borrowed the title for this post from a t-shirt I saw recently on Venice Beach (hey one needs to cite any non-original thinking) and while the title shot is from SoMa (or South of Market) in San Francisco – a place you tend to walk through with firm intent (read tightly holding onto your belongings and praying you won’t have to fend for your life) – I think it’s a reasonable descriptor of what is America. To spare you too much of my philosophising perhaps most importantly it just makes for a great post title :).
That said, mulling over what best captures America you come up with so many things; though terms such as red-neck, ignorant, arrogant, loud-mouthed, SUV driving, fat-arse hick seem to come to mind almost too easily... sorry just had to get that out of my system :). I guess ‘Sheet Negro!’ (insert big Samuel L Jackson voice) also finds itself on the tip of one’s tongue... though given recent controversy surrounding the ‘n-word’ perhaps I shouldn’t be using that one? (If you haven’t heard, it’s ok for a brother to call a brother a nigger as long as the brother’s not a whitie; or Reverend Jessie Jackson; who’d been calling for the ‘n-word’ to be stricken from the American vernacular for years yet thought to apply it in derogatory reference to Barack Obama without realising he wasn’t quite off air – oops :)). Just on that thought maybe ‘excessive political correctness’ should be added to the list of adjectives on America too? You should have seen how much media attention this issue got... whole hour long TV debates on the inappropriateness of the term... and this was somehow still the most riveting stuff on TV :).
Without being too biased however we’d all be surprised to note how integral America has been in shaping language, culture and life generally in the world and for all the US bashing that I’m (we’re?) prone to doing it was great to be able to travel through North America, experience its diversity, beauty and extravagance as well as its humility... nowhere’s perfect... despite what the Americans may think of their country.
Anyway, I won’t rehash Nic’s last blog – we thought we’d give you all a little reprieve from my excessively verbose ramblings for a change (you’re still not exempt from having to read this shit though Garth!) – but I will firstly say that it was great to travel the East Coast with Doug and Flick. It took some getting used to travelling with others for a change but they were sorely missed when they were gone and it was fantastic to catch up with them again at Bill and Ravit’s place in Seattle. Just on that note, I can’t stress enough how good it was to hang out at Hotel Vlandis for a week, join Billy’s Boot Camp everyday, partake in America’s favourite past time of shopping (yes we all bought shit we didn’t need!), barbeque, drink great American beer (they really do have this down pat – no not Bud, I’m thinking all IPAs including Sierra Nevada, Samuel Adams etc), play test pilot for the new Doug and Flick mobile (ugly as it is I’m sure if it survived a test drive from me you should be right :)) and to play with the Kungfu Panda, Nicolas (guys, you’re blessed to have such a great son)... while Uncle Goulasz isn’t the best with newborns it was great to meet Ethan and Mikhalya too :o). Can’t wait to see all of you again soon!
Moving right along, let me say that walking back to your fabulously priced lodging past homeless people camped out over the pavement, smackies perched on every other corner, street workers soliciting their stuff and ever other dude looking at you menacingly is a bit confronting but despite these first impressions we both really liked San Fran and thoroughly enjoyed our stay there. In fact, our only regret is that we only had 3 days there and didn’t just hang out for a little longer. We really loved the Victorian architecture that defines the city, the cable cars, how cosmopolitan it is, that you can find almost every type of cuisine there, that you can get really good French sourdough bread at Boudin (the clam chowder in their sourdough loaf is worth mentioning too) and that you can actually find a decent coffee! That they call it a ‘Gibraltar’ rather than a ‘flat white’ is another matter but the fact that you can get a real coffee and not just perculated garbage is a big thing! – remember all these guys drink is Starbucks, Tim Horton’s (dare I say even worse than Starbucks) and a whole bunch of other rubbish coffee chains.
Now, if you hadn’t noticed (you’d be Garth :)) but there are a number of themes running through this blog and the rental car upgrade theme is one of our absolute favourites. Having been disappointed in Calgary by actually having to take the bottom of the line Ford Focus we actually paid for, it was reassuring to find that our supersizing American/Puerto Rican friends at Alamo decided that the Goulaszes would be better off driving around California in a 3.5L V6 Pontiac G6 GT Coupe rather than whatever piece of junk they actually paid for. So with Nic finally winning that free tank of gas she’d been after since New York – this car wasn’t about to give us decent milage... perhaps not the 3 miles per gallon you’d expect from the everyday Dodge RAM 3500 that most yanks cruise around in but still not good – we were ready to hit the road.
One of the striking things about North America is its tipping culture. Whenever you take an ideology to an extreme you eventually reach absurdity and paying staff wages of 2 dollars an hour is the libertarian doctrine gone horribly wrong! The fact that a beer which costs 5 bucks is actually 5.50 when you add tax and ends up being 7 bucks when you add in the additional dollar a drink tip that you’re expected to give makes my blood boil. And forget about this resulting in any improvement in service either – most of these guys are pretty pissed off that they’re on 2 dollars an hour, irrespective of the fact they’re making 50 bucks an hour in tips. This is just a case of our bourgeoisie brethren being allowed to take the piss – don’t legislate war you muppets try for fair wages, public health, education and social security... hold on wouldn’t equality diminish the power of the ruling class? Anyway, you all know we’re quite fond of the finer things in life, so from the comfort of our swanky Pontiac and hiding the fact that we were staying in a dive just off the freeway outside Vallejo (rather than in either Sonoma or Napa which weren’t quite in the budget), we went off wine tasting.
Noting the above, the offshoot of the tipping culture in America is the fact that those with money are all too eager to flaunt it – should ostentatiousness be added to the list? Perhaps then it should have come as no surprise to us that all wine tastings are paid for. And in fact the more chique the place the more you can expect to pay for a tasting. When I mean tasting too, I don’t mean a nip or even half a nip, I’m talking about 10mls in a glass times 4 glasses coming in at anywhere between 10 and 40 dollars per person – you really have to be business owner to be able to afford this. The whole culture has gone a little awry as given the extravagance of most of the wineries in the Napa and Sonoma Valleys it’s also little wonder that they’re charging on average 50 bucks a bottle for anything worth drinking... the price point comparison I can make to Aussie wine here is around 30 dollars a bottle (I would say less but I’m being chastised by Nic for always spinning too much shit). I guess however they have to recoup the cost of their OTT cellar doors somehow – our personal favourite being the Persian Palace below... for the record we refused to pay the 25 dollar tasting fee here. Despite our lack of budget we managed to share the odd tasting, try some fantastic wines, extract the odd free tasting (it’s amazing how far a little bullshit can get you – trying 100 to 150 dollar a bottle Cabernets at Ledson being one such example), do a great food and wine matching at Mayo and generally have a great time.
As this is after all our world tour of wine regions and ski resorts it was only fitting that we would next move onto Lake Tahoe – the home of Squaw Valley and Heavenly, which according to my mate Matt is one of the best ski resorts in North America (pity we didn’t make it during the winter – perhaps next time). Following a beautiful drive into the Sierra Nevada we arrived at the town of South Lake Tahoe which to our disappointment however can best be described as tack central – it was quite a shock to see big casinos on the Nevada side of the town and dodgy diners spoiling what is otherwise quite a stunning environment. Despite this, we took in a great hike around Emerald Bay and drove along the western side of the lake up to Tahoe City and Squaw Valley, both of which we found quite beautiful.
For all of my continuous US bashing (it’s a bad habit I know) it needs to be said that the US is a world within a country and has some of the most glorious natural scenery imaginable. Purely by chance, with Mike, our Norwegian hotelier from San Francisco to thank, the drive from the Nevada desert back into California along Route 4 is up there as one of the most beautiful roads we’ve ever had the pleasure of driving. And just as you think it couldn’t get much more picture perfect you stumble upon an oasis such as Mosquito Lake which literally makes you leap out of the car with camera in hand and go happy snap mad (maybe that’s just me :)). Similarly, driving through the pine forests of the Sierra Nevada is in itself breathtaking and even more particularly so when you stop to have a look at the giant Sierra Redwoods along the way – the size of these thousand year old trees can only truly be appreciated from the ground up.
Next, we headed to the most visited National Park in North America - Yosemite. With its towering peaks of white/grey granite rock contrasting with the thick green pine of the valley floor it’s easy to see why this park is so popular. Without getting too put off by the hordes of people at some of the most popular vistas – the most telling of which perhaps was when we witnessed maybe as many as 70 people scare away a foraging black bear and her cub near the car park of the Bridal Veil Falls – we were able to appreciate the beauty and space of this great park. Here we did two hikes; one from Yosemite Valley along what’s known as the Mist Trail to the top of Nevada Falls and; the second from Tuollomne Meadows to Lake Elizabeth. Whilst quite different both walks made for some truly awesome scenery and provided some respite from the scores of people everywhere else.
Whilst spinning a yarn with a couple over a wine tasting in Sonoma we were advised that no visit to California would be complete without taking Highway 1 down the coast into Los Angeles. Although this meant some backtracking through the breadbasket parts of California we headed back onto the coast and started our descent south from Monterey – just near Laguna Seca for any die hard Moto GP nuts out there… we were there just days before the GP too. A quick note to anyone thinking of visiting California, there’s plenty of whale watching to be done here and we were quite gutted to find that we’d only missed the last Orca watching trip of the day here by an half an hour or so – there’s another thing to do on a return trip. We were quite fortunate however to drive down the coast as just days prior the road had been closed to traffic on account of bushfires so perhaps we shouldn’t be complaining.
Driving down some very pretty coastal road through Big Sur we next stopped into what looks like the exact place that Keanu learnt how to surf in Point Break – Pismo Beach. And following a quick stop the next morning at the place of Nic’s favourite teenage soap, Santa Barbara, we were about to hit LA.
The first thing that struck me as we dropped off our car at Los Angeles Airport was that this was the only airport I’d ever been to that seemed not to exhibit any public transport directions. You could find virtually any car rental company transfer service imaginable, getting to any of the 50 different airport parking lots was a relative cinch but finding out how best to get to Venice Beach by bus was proving to be no mean feat. Without sending even the most vehement reader to sleep (I’ve likely lost you already) we obviously made it out to our hostel by public transport. I guess the point I’m seeking to make here is that I think LA epitomises our obsession/reliance on cars and is perhaps the least people friendly and maybe the most car friendly city I’ve ever been to. With respect to this, it is perhaps also important to note that on first impressions I thought this was one of the ugliest cities we’d ever been to.
Following an afternoon of hanging out on the beach, just getting to Hollywood by bus the next day reinforced this perception and given the difficulties that this place presents with regard to getting around we soon found ourselves relenting and naively handing over 50 bucks for a tour of Hollywood and Beverly Hills. As is the case usually with these things 50 bucks doesn’t include tax, the advertised stretched limo is of course a Ford F250 van and what they forget to tell you is that they’re not paying the guy driving the truck so your tips are in fact paying his wage. Having said that, we did get a good tour of Sunset Boulevard, walked along Rodeo Drive, sighted many a beautiful gate in Beverly Hills and Belaire and learnt that Aaron Spelling (you know the guy with that really ugly daughter) spends 80k a month just cleaning his 150 room mansion – is that the definition of largesse? All vital stuff however!
With one further day to kill in the US we figured rather than braving the lack of a public transport system in this place we would just hang out in Santa Monica and walk back from Santa Monica pier, past Muscle Beach, ‘Real Riders’ showing off their super cool wheels (wouldn’t you just love one of these low riders – see pic below) and plenty of street artists and vendors back to Venice Beach. This is of course the actual place ‘where art meets crime’ and whether or not you like the aesthetic you need to acknowledge that it’s one cool place to hang out.
We’re now in Huaraz Peru so stay tuned for further adventures from Latin America.
Hasta luega!
