West Coast - Travelogue

After quite a bit of planning since long time, we decided it was a time for us to get out of hot and humid Houston and visit some of the very famous tourist attractions on west coast of America. With the labour day weekend passed and the kids back to school, we thought this should be the best and possibly cheapest time to travel. With our Ramadan fasting also just getting over, it would be nice little break for us too. So luckily we found that continental was running some promotion to fly to beaches in California if you take the weekday flights. We booked our flight, booked the hotels and started our journey.

September 2011:
Started the journey on 7th - Wed

We left home around 3:45 pm, parked car at the eco zone @IAH and reached the airport at around 4:45 pm CST, Flight was at 6:00 pm, Continental Airlines.
Reached LA around 7:30 pm  PST, took a shuttle to Enterprise Car rental, rented the Chevy Avio and  Reached hotel, Howard Johnson, Fullerton at around 9:30 PM

8th Sept - Thursday ( Universal Studios, Hollywood, Los Angeles)

Day started around 7:30 am, had a breakfast in the hotel, went to Walmart which was nearby to purchase some fruits and other things. Left for Universal studios around 8:30 am, hoping to reach Hollywood by 9:30-9:45 max for 30 miles drive.. First mistake of under estimating LA traffic, reached hollywood and universal studios at around 10:30 am !

Nice day at Universal, enjoyed most of rides and shows, Lulua also seemed to have a good time. Enjoyed Shrek 4D and Simpsons rides most. Also the tour of studio for 45 mins was just great. King kong 360 4D and scene creation for earth quake and flooding was mind blowing. Got some ideas on how the movies are made! Over all a good day.

Left  the Universal at around 6:00, to go to very famous Hollywood Blvd, visited all the famous land marks like Chinese theater, Kodak theater, Madam Tussuad (didn't visit the studio), Hollywood sign!.  Had dinner at California Pizza.

Reached hotel at around 10:00 pm, retired to sleep.

9th Sept - Friday ( San Diego):

Left for San Diego, early at around 8:00am after having a breakfast at hotel. Traffic relatively OK proably because took car pool lane, Took a I-5 South. What a beautiful drive, with mountains at one side and sea coast at other, just amazing. Reached San Diego, Balboa park at around 10:00 am. Weather was really pleasant, much needed relief from Houston's 105 degrees weather. Visited couple of free museums, botanical garden. Wanted to visit very famous San Diego Zoo, but didn't have enough time! On the local's suggestions, went to Old town, San Diego. Nice little laid back historical place with lots of Mexican food joints. Had a lunch, nice Tex Mex at state park and visited couple of beautiful shops selling souvenirs.

Took a late decision to check out the very famous San Diego Downtown skyline. After some research, realized the best place to see it is, from Coronado Island and the bridge that connects the Island and the city is really cool. Took a nice drive at the Coronado Island. Took some photographs. Traveled back to LA

San Diego from Coronado Island

10th Sept - Saturday (Las Vegas):

Took a 3 days 2 nights, tour bus to Vegas and Grand Canyon South rim. Left at around 6:30 am from hotel after having breakfast, parked rental car at holiday Inn La Miranda, and bus journey started from around 7:30 am. Reached first to factory outlet malls, stop for 45 mins, and then had a lunch at In and Out burger. Reached Vegas, Tropicana hotel at around 2:30, for Sight seeing the strip and taking photographs. Reached hotel Stratosphere at around 3:30, checked-in to the hotel, relaxed and took a short tour of hotel and casino. Took a night tour via travel bus. Went to see, Mirage, Venentia, Ballagio and Old town, oldest hotel golden gate casino. Watched free shows of foutains near Ballagio and Men made volcano at Mirage and the Fremont street show on the Ceiling. Reached hotel at around 11:00 pm

Eiffel Tower, Paris hotel

Newyork Newyork

11th Sept - Sunday ( Grand Canyon -SouthRim and Vegas):

Left early at around 5:30 to Grand Canyon, South Rim. Checked the Hoover Dam in between. Real nice work of man made architecture and continued to Grand Canyon, heard news on the way that its raining in south rim and if its cloudy and rainy, it will spoil our plans as you don't get the best view and you can't enjoy much. Reached South rim around 11:30 am. Rain has just stopped and its bright and sunny, watched the brilliantly made IMAX movie for Grand Canyon. Had lunch here. And as soon as we came out, well its raining cats and dogs!. Though everything got cleared up in 15-20 mins thankfully, Its pretty common there I suppose as Grand Canyon being at the very high altitude.Then entered the Grand Canyon National Park and the view of Grand Canyon is just breath taking, literally, no words to describe. Just beautiful. Spent around one and half hour and journey back to Vegas.

This says it all!

Reached Vegas around 6:00,  Left for the Strip again. Checked out some of the hotels like Eiffiel Tower at Paris and checked some shows. Reached to hotel back, went to the top of the Stratosphere hotel, spectacular view of vegas.

12th Sept - Monday ( Back to LA):

Checked M&M and Ethel M Chocolate factory and Cactus Botanical garden, very close to Vegas. Time was given 1 hour which was quite less for the things to do there. Had a chinese unlimited buffet brunch on the way. Again 2 hours stop at the factory outlet.. Mostly because of their commitments with the shops owners.

Reached LA at around 6:00 pm. Went to Disney land and Disney down town. Nice but nothing compared to the one in Orlando.

Reached Chirag's sister's place at around 9:30 pm. Had a nice time with the family and proper gujarati delicious dinner after a long long time.

13th Sept - Tuesday (LA - Back to Houston):

After spending some time with Chirag, left for Santa Monica Pier. Around 50 miles drive from Irvine. Very beautiful beach and Pier. Had a good time on white sand beach after spending lots of time on galveston's dirty, black sand beaches with weeds. Left back for houston, retuned the car and flew to houston. Reached houston at around 10:30 pm CST, and home at around 11:30 PM.


So overall a good vacation, went as per the plan, could've clubbed couple of more things may be, could've seen the San Diego zoo, if planned little properly. But took it little light because of 3 year old and BOW :)

In the future, would like to go to Vegas with friends and would love to do a camping, hiking boating trip in the Grand canyon.

The Poster

When you sit idle, your mind wanders, it wanders to the distant old memories and most of the times those memories make you smile. So around 10 years back, I was in college (TEN years!!!). We used to stay in the hostel. One morning when I got down from my room, the security guard, who knew us, caught me and gave me a package. I asked who gave you, he mentions a girl on the scooter came and gave him and asked him to give it to me. I asked A GIRL!!! Well that was a surprise if not a shock for sure. Well packaged looked like a poster or calendar of some kind. I went to my room and opened it and found it to be a poster of:

This is not the same poster. I couldn't find originial on google! 

None other than Aishwarya. Now I had a big crush on the ex miss world Aishwarya (I still like her but I guess I have moved on!), and most of my friends were aware of that fully, so that could have been one of them (though I would be really surprised then too!). But who was this mystery girl, I asked all my girl- friends, around in college and some of them even ridiculed me that a GIFT for YOU! why would I do that! So here is the mystery that I am still not able to solve. That poster is still with me though in my cupboard at my home in India, but I am still waiting for that mystery girl to come out one day and tell me it was me!

PS: In a hindsight I think there is a high chance that some of my friends have pulled a trick on me by may be just bribing that security guard and tell him that a girl gave it to him.. Though I would still like to think otherwise :)