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Friday, December 03, 2010

Los Angeles, the last couple of days….

 

Wednesday,

Had a little lie in this morning, got up at 10am and showered. Kami had some work to do for her thesis paper that she has been doing for the last 12 months so i decided to go change the wheel on the rental car!

Ever since leaving Vegas i noticed the front right tyre was going down about twice a day, i was having to fill it with air every morning and every evening. I kinda put off changing the tyre but we have a long drive in a few days up to San Jose so thought id sort it out. The wheel in the trunk of the car is a space saver wheel so i jacked the car up and swapped the wheel over. Just as id finished and was about to load the flat tyre wheel into the trunk a guy came over and asked if  i need a hand. I looked across the street and he had walked from a a small garage on the corner of the street that dealt in used Porsches!  He looked at the type said give me a couple of hours and I'll have it fixed for you! he also said to just pull the car into his yard and he would change the space saver wheel back over when he was done! Again the English accent worked wonders and he was curious as to why i was there etc etc

I walked back to the hotel around the corner, by this time Kami was half way through her paper so i went and had a drink in the lounge down in the hotel.

An hour later Kami came down and we headed out for Lunch. We picked the car up off the Porsche guy and he charged us $20 for fixing the puncture and swapping the wheels back over which i didn't think was bad at all. We were driving up to Malibu and to go shopping in Santa Monica and to have dinner up there in the evening.

We stopped off at Chipotle for a few Tacos and some chips  for lunch (as we had missed breakfast) before continuing on to Malibu. I called Gina and told her we were going to Houston's in Santa Monica for dinner, one of my favourite places out here. Her, Maria and Matt were in Santa Monica and were going to see Venice beach and a couple of other places. we called in at the Krispy Kreme store in Santa Monica and had a couple of those before continuing on to Malibu Beach.

Yum yum,

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I love Malibu beach, its just nice to walk down the  beach with the beautiful houses and the weather today was perfect. it was about 70` and there was no wind at all and not a cloud in the sky. We walked a while down the beach and then sat and watched the sun go down around 4:30.

Malibu Beach                              My reflection in the glasses on Kami    Sunset on Malibu beach

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It was fun watching the pelican dive into the ocean after spotting fish and then coming up with them

Pelican diving

We drove back down to Santa Monica and walked up 3rd street promenade looking in a few shops on the way. Called Maria to see where they were and as luck would have it they were about a mile away from the restaurant. I’ve been to Houston's probably a dozen times and love the atmosphere and the food there however as we drove past earlier i noticed the name had changed to Hillstone. Hillstone appears to own the Houston's restaurants so it looks like they have just re branded it. All the chefs etc still had the Houston's uniforms on but the menu had changed a lot. Its well known for been a good steak and seafood house but they only had one steak on the menu!

We met up with Maria, Gina, and Matt and the five of us headed in and had a great meal! I had Fillet Steak with a loaded baked potato while Matt had what he described as a fantastic burger and all three girls had the racks of ribs! I've never seen them eat so much!!,lol

Kami and Maria and their ribs!            My potato and steak                          Matt and Gina

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After dinner we walked the rest of 3rd street promenade, stopping along the way to look in shops, take pictures and eat some Pinkberry and Tutti Fruiti yogurt!! Gina, Mari and Matt headed to their car and we said our goodbyes, Kami and i did the same and we drove back down to Huntington beach for a relatively early night.

Christmas in Santa Monica                        Mari, the Beatles and Kami!            Matt getting busted!!

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Thursday,

Had a lie in this morning, woke around 10am got up showered and looked at a few pictures from last night before going out for a late breakfast at ihop a couple of blocks from the hotel here in Huntington Beach. Weather the last couple of days has been great for the time of year, getting up to about 73 during the day but dropping down into the high 50’s after the suns gone down.

After ihop we walked down the street and all the way to the end of the Pier. It doesn't matter what the weather is like here in Ca there's always some surfers out in the water. They do all have wetsuits on so i guess that takes the edge of it but it must still be damn cold out there!!

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We were both a little thirsty as didn't drink much in the ihop so went into the diner a the end of the pier for a drink, however it turned into a Vanilla black cherry milkshake that we split between us but we did have a glass of water each!

View from out table at the end of the pier    Vanilla black cherry shake, was awesome

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It took us nearly an hour from walking on the pier to leaving, just watching the surfers,trying to catch the seagulls and watching the volleyball girls! (well Kami preferred the guys games)

Christmas on the pier in 70`               My volleyball game!                          Kamis volleyball game!!

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It was 3pm when we left the pier and the sunset last night at 4:30 so we just walked up Huntington Beach until around 4pm and found a couple of rocks to sit on and watched the sun go down. Was a bit chillier than last night but there were a few clouds in the sky tonight which made for a lot better looking sunset.

Sunset at Huntington Beach

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Walked back to the hotel where i am now, sat in the room chilling out and going out for dinner in a couple of hours time to Gyu-Kaku in Huntington Beach, a Japanese BBQ restaurant.

 

Album of pics from yesterday and today