Children's Museum Richmond VA

Friday 29th July 2011

Today I met up with Mel and we took the kids to the Richmond Childrens Museum. It was about an hours drive South of Fredericksburg.
It is not your average museum, it is more a hands on, exploring centre. The kids really enjoyed it despite the people at the register thinking the 4 older kids may not like it so much!

We finished up at the museum and headed over to Maccas for lunch! a great day all up :)

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Fredericksburg, Virginia

16th July ~ 29th July 2011

After a good night sleep we are shown around the area. We headed to Downtown Fredericksburg, which I LOVE! It is an historic town with lots of interesting shops and things to do. We will go back on a weekend and do the trolly tour through the Civil War areas.

Monday we met with one of Mel's friends who is a realtor and started the painful process of house hunting. There was one possible option but it needs a bit of work done to it before we move in, like painting and gardening. So we will keep looking around for now.

Had a few 'issues' with political red tape, which has thankfully all been sorted for now.....we think!

Friday 22nd July we leave Dan and Mels and start out stay in temporary accomodation at the Marriot Towne Suites. It is a 2 bedroom small suite with a kitchen, bathroom and living area. The Hotel has a pool which is gfreat as it has been between 100-110F and really humid!

On monday (25th July) we said farewell to hubby as he set off to start week one of a 2 weeks course down in Virgnia Beach. As it was a 3hr drive away he just came back to the Hotel for the weekend inbetween.
During this 2 weeks period I was still searching for a house to rent. It was starting to get stressful as we needed a signed lease in order to enrol the boys into school and Mitchell into pre school!

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LA ~ Washington DC ~ Virginia ~ LOST suitcase!!!

Up bright and early and once again hail a cab to the airport. The driver was a little on the odd side but got us to where we needed to be. the highways here are in sane, 6 lanes accross both ways in most instances!!!

Checked in (Business Class again) and headed straight for the equivilant Qantas Club lounge for some breaky. Mitchell enjoyed watching the aircraft coming and going through the glass walls!
We boarded our flight with America Airlines and guess we were a 'little' spoilt with Qantas!! Seats were much smaller, one tv between 2 rows of seats with cabin crew control....infact the same movie played on all screens!

The next pic a view over LA :)

We had the most scenic flight imaginable. Huge Mountain Ranges higher than the clouds at times, waterways and even towns and States!!
Here is a snippet of some of the view from the plane window!

The highlight of the flight was this announcement "this is your Captain speaking, for those who wish to view the Grand Canyon, it will be on the right hand side of the aircraft in approx 2 mins time". You little ripper, I had a window seat on the right of the plane!! Although we were a distance from it, we could still see the magnitude of this landmark. the pics really dont do it justice!

We touched down in Washington DC at the Dulles International airport, where we were met by Dan. He, his wife Mel and their 2 children are currently living in Fredericksburg, Virginia with Dan in the position that Col will soon fill.
We were waiting at the baggage collection point eagerly awaiting our cases to come through so we could hit the road. We still had about a 2 hour drive before we got to Virginia/Fredericksburg. (Lots of traffic!!) As we had flown Business class, all the priority luggage comes out first, which was ours. Case after case we piled the trollys high and then waiting, waiting, waiting.........one case missing! After much searching of the airport, incase someone had picked it up by accident, Col went to report the case as missing. He was a little, ok VERY stressed as the whole case was full of all his Navy uniforms, bling and medals.
Fortunately, it was due to all his buttons and bling, that they required to screen check and open his case to ensure it wasnt a threat. The case was on the next flight over and was to be delivered to Dan and Mels as soon as it arrived!!

After a fair bit of traffic, we arrived at what would be home for the next week :) Dan and Mel have a gorgeous house and were fantastic hosts to us, we really appreciated it guys :)

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San Diego Zoo

Thursday 14th July 2011

So day 3 of 3 in SD and we head to the zoo. We called a cab and the driver took us through an amazing area filled with museums, gardens and statues which was just around the corner from the Zoo. Really wished we had a bit more time down here as it would have been a day or 2 at least of exploring this part of the area. Here are some pics taken out of the cab window of the amazing buildings that lined the streets:

So time to hit the zoo with one mission.....the Pandas! The line was quite long and it was a little disappointing to only have one Panda on display and we were kind of rushed through but it was pretty cool to see all the same :)

We saw many animals, as you do in the zoo, but some we had not seen before like the Black Bear and we watched a hummingbird eating nectar. There wwas a few odd characters around and hubby could not resist reconnecting with his inner Gorilla!!!! LOL

Then we came across the most spectacular remodel of our very own aussie Ayers Rock.....ok not quite the replica expected!!

We left the zoo and grabbed a cab back to the hotel, got all our luggage and headed to the Amtrak station for our 3 hour train ride back to Los Angeles. We had a 9am flight to Washington DC the next morning! Hubby sat back an enjoyed an 'Old Bastards' beer, the kids coloured in and played DS and I enjoyed resting after a full on 3 days in San Diego!



We arrived safely in LA and cabbed it to the Hollywood Inn Hotel. After a 14 hour day the last thing we needed to here at 9pm was "sorry, we dont have your booking"! Lucky I had the print out of our booking and payment as proof and they had one room left for the night. So we bunked up in a grotty small room with 2 tiny double beds for the 5 of us. Not even a kettle to make a cuppa!! Thank god we were to tired to care and checked out early for our flight!

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San Diego ~ Sea World Resort!

After a huge day a Legoland yesterday it was time for another full day of fun! Today we headed to Sea World and thankfully this theme park was only a 5 min cab drive from the Hotel! We arrived at 10am and once again hit the rides early! We first went into the Sesame Street area, which was perfect for Mitchell! Infact all of us could go on these rides together :)
this was one of Mitchell's favourites :

As Sea World is a lot about the animals, there was no way we were missing the Shamu Whale Show and of course we wanted the full experience so sat in the thickj of the splash zone!! We got wet and just quietly it was rather pleasant as the mercury was rising! It was totally amazing to see these whales jump through the air, flip, splash and interact with their trainers. The kids really enjoyed this experience and here are some of our favourite snaps!

This last picture shows how big Shamu is compared to his trainer! totally amazing and we swent back for the finale show at 10pm and fireworks display to....yes we spent 12 hours at sea World!!!
back to the rides........We went to a rapid one but Mitchell was too small to ride, so we left Col, Rhyce & Korey in line and went on our own little adventure! He enjoyed the touch pools and checked out a star fish:

After a look at the touch pool and dolphins we headed back to the rapid ride to spot the others coming through the start of the ride. Mitchell had much pleasure in positioning a water telescope and firing them as they went by!!

Then it was time to move on and check out a few more locals. We came accross a pool with White Beluga Whales. Wow what a gorgeous looking whale they are!

The final ride for Col and the boys, before the fireworks display, was the really high Atlantis! Another water ride with a huge drop at the end of it!

Needless to say, we LOVED sea World and it is definately on our "go back to" list next year!

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Happy 10th Birthday Korey!!!!

It's Tuesday 12th July and today Korey celebrates his 10th Birthday!

The day started really early with a cab arriving to drive us from Anahiem down to San Diego at 6am. Korey got to choose which of the prepaid activities he would like to do and between Legoland, San Diego Zoo and Sea World.....we headed to Legoland!
We were fortunate enough that the hotel let us drop our mountains of suitcases off as it was too early to check in.
We arrived at legoland and hit the rides right away! The kids had a ball and all the statues around the place were made of real lego. Many man hours and glue I can tell you!! lol
Here is a pic of the boys at the front entrance:

We had a great day and enjoyed a nice boat cruise around a mini island which displayed the Opera House, Eiffel Tower, Statue of Liberty, Las Vegas and much more. It was a really hot day so we LOVED finding the Skipper School rides which had loads of water, splashing and a log ride!

After a long, fun filled day we headed for the bus to take us to the Amtrak station to get a train back to San Diego City. Of course it could never be that easy! The bus pulled up as the LAST train came into the station. We, along with other passengers, had no way of getting to the other side of the tracks to get on the train. Thankfully a really lovely lady told us about another bus that could take us to thew main station and we could catch another train from there. She was even kind enough to travel with us to ensure we got to where we needed to go!! Some of the other passengers followed us!
We finally got to the station and had to wait almost an hour for the train. Finally on the train and headed for San Diego. We had a really nice sunset at least!

In hind sight we should have just caught a cab the hour back to the Hotel. by the time we got 2 buses, a train and a cab it was a 3hr trip and $5 difference in price!!
Of course not to forget it was a also a special someones birthday and no birthday is complete without a cake! Happy birthday Korey, we hope you had a really awesome day :)

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It's Hollywood time!!!!!

Monday 11th July 2011

We got up in the morning feeling great! Went for a walk up to a tourist booking centre and sorted out our activities for the next 4 days!
First stop was a Hollywood Tour! It was a 7 hour trip that started with a courtesy bus pick up from another hotel to drive us to Hollywood.
We then boarded our tour bus and had a really awesome tour guide, full of knowledge and a real laugh! First stop was a lookout over Miami Beach. It was really nice and of course we had to get a pic of the route 66 sign!

Then it was back on the bus for a trip through Beverly Hills & Bel Air checking out all the houses of the rich and famous! We stopped out the front of the likes of Demi Moore & Ashton Kutcher, Calista Flockhart & Harrison Ford, Tom Cruise & Katie Holmes, Jacki Chan, Julia Roberts, Leonardo DiCaprio, Will Smith, Jennifer Anniston and the list goes on!

The next stop a walk down Rodeo Drive. Heaps of designer shops, hefty price tags and tourists! we did a little celeb watching a 'think' we saw one of the Kardashian sisters riding in the back seat of a black convertable Jeep! She was ducking down, trying to lay accross the back seat and a heap of Japanese tourists were hovering over the car with their cameras trying to get a shot. She sat up briefly which is when we saw the hair and think we were close to identifying her! We also saw THE hotel used in the movie Pretty Woman....along with the shop where Julia Roberts marches in and declares Big Mistake in said movie! It was a pretty cool experience :)

From Rodeo drive to Hollywood Boulavard for a walk down the footpath of 'stars'! We saw many famous stars and enjoyed the sights of the Chinese Temple and Kodak Theatre. this is where you find celebs hand/foot prints and autographs set in concrete. The theatre is where they hold the Oscars every year. There is many a 'character' found along this strip and for a small donation you can stop and have your photo taken with them!

The tour ended with a drive up a Mountain to get a very distant glimpse of the infamous Hollywood sign. We were a little disappointed as we thought this would be the highlight of the trip, but it really was just too far away. We will go back next year but will drive ourselves to a GPS address I found online where we can walk to almost the fencing of the sign and get a better picture and look!!!

     
The view in the opposite direction was pretty good and here is a pic of Col, the boys (Rhyce, Korey & Mitchell) and I at the top over looking LA :)

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