Calfornia dreamin'

Hi all,

Hope you're having a nice Christmas Day. As promised, here's a recap of the whirlwind Cali trip...

Some intro stuff - The whole premise of the trip was to see the All-Japan Grand Touring Car Championship (JGTC) event, GT Live. Of course, I had to throw some sightseeing in. It was my first time in California since who knows how long. The track was an hour away from Los Angeles, so we decided to fly into LAX and go from there. Drew (my travelling buddy) and I left on Thursday night and got back waaaay early Monday morning.

The original plan was to leave Thursday morning - that way we'd get 1.5 solid days of poking around the Los Angeles area. Unfortunately, I suck at scheduling and it just so happened that I had an all day training that I couldn't miss on Thursday. So we got dinged $25 bucks each to change our tickets to the evening. I was bummed that we'd get there Thursday night, but we really didn't have a choice.

So on starts the recap...

Thursday night I left work around 4 to go home, eat a light dinner, change, and get my luggage. The weather was totally clear and nice until I got home.

And then the snow came.

And the traffic.

I knew I had plenty of time, but I was stressed because I was hoping to drive to the airport with nice weather conditions.

The drive took about 30 mins more than usual, but all was good. Drew showed up a little while later and we were on our way.

Our seats were listed as "exit row" - and they weren't kidding. Drew's seat was pretty much right by the big metal lever to open the door. Kind of wacky. We were sitting towards the front of the plane (right behind first class) so it was kind of an odd config there - Our row just had 2 seats -we were fairly close to the bathroom too. Oh yeah, our "window" was this wide angle lens thing that was about 3 inches in diameter about a foot or so above our heads.

Waiting for the bathroom was easy. Just had to look over and see if the "occupied" light was on. But listening to the door open and close all throughout the flight kind of sucked. Luckily it didn't stink though.

So the flght was ok - I don't know if it was due to the length of the flight, but I just couldn't get comfortable. I kept on fidgeting and moving around in my seat. I tried to sleep but but my efforts were not successful.

One thing of note - Before I left, I picked up a pair of Sony MDR-NC6 Noise Canceling headphones. They are definitely a thumbs up - My only complaint was that after a few hours, it felt like they were mashing my ears into my head. I think they're just that way cause they're new. But now that I've experienced the joys of noise canceling, I'd be curious to know how those Bose ones work. :)

Anyway, so where was I?

Oh yeah, so we finally get to LAX and find our way to the ground transportation shuttle thing to get to our rental car place.

And our rental car was (drumroll)...

A Hyundai Sonata in metallic blue. Complete with the life saving (most of the time) Hertz NeverLost system. This gps system was da bomb (most of the time). I had almost a whole month to plan for this trip. What did we do? We just mapquested one set of directions: From the airport to our hotel.

Which turned out to be stupid, because the Hertz rental car place was actually almost 10 minutes away from the airport. So our directions would have been sucky anyway.

We put our fate into the hands of the little black box pretty much throughout the entire trip. Seriously. We could type in the address of our destination, or look it up through other ways. And the system would tell us exactly where to go. We didn't use a paper map at all this trip. And I'd say 85% of the time, it was always pretty dead on.

I think if it had told us to make a right turn into the ocean, we would have.

(Drew drove the entire time so I'm sure that wouldn't have happened :)

OK ok, so if I love this thing so much, why don't I marry it, right? It made me want one for my own car. Cause that would be dope.

So where was I? right. So we sat in the parking lot for a few minutes, setting up the NeverLost thing, and we were on our way.

We got our first does of Los Angeles traffic. Lovely.

Anyway, the soothing woman's voice of the nav system pretty much took us to our destination with no problems. She even told us when we were there and what side of the street it was on :)

Santa Monica at night was beautiful ;)

Oh yeah, talking about the nav system has made me forget about the Cali weather. When we got to the airport, I think it was about 10:00 p.m. The weather was around 40s or 50s I'd guess. I was rather comfortable in my long sleeve tshirt and fleece. It was nice to not wear a winter jacket.

In Santa Monica, we stayed at the Holiday Inn Santa Monica Beach at the Pier. the hotel was pretty nice. We got a free room upgrade (because the reservation dude that I called spelled my name wrong) so we were on the 6th floor (of 7). Not too shabby.

By the time we had checked and settled in, it was already pretty late - 11 p.m. local time (2 a.m. EST) so we were pretty tired. I kinda wanted to get out and explore some, but we were pretty beat from working all day and travelling.

The next morning, we got up at 8:00 a.m. Cali time - Which kicked ass because it was sleeping in for us :) We did our morning routines and we checked out of the hotel. Everyone was super nice. We then enjoyed the best part of the hotel - the location. We were pretty much just across the street from the beach and pier. We walked down the pier and I got to snap some pictures along the way. I was totally loving it. The entire time we were in Cali we had mild weather and never saw a drop of rain.

The pier was pretty neat. On one side, there was a clear view of the ocean. On the other, there were little touristy shops, and a small amusement park! Complete with roller coaster and ferris wheel.

After walking up and down the pier, we had to forage for food. We walked around to the "promenade" which was also close by. Hit up the visitor's center to see if we could get some good suggestions on grub.

They had internet access at the center, so that's how I got a chance to drop a line in the good old blog.

Anyway, so we explored the promenade, which had an outdoorsy main street mall vibe going. Maybe a tad artificial, but I liked how cars weren't allowed on the main drag. So we were free to roam around and see the random statues and whatnot that were in the street.

We finally made our way to Jinky's Cafe (the one in Santa monica) for a very good "eclectic" breakfast. I had the Santa Fe omelet with tortillas - which was really good and huge. I forget what Drew had. But the meal was hearty and good. Of course, we sat outside, basking in the glow of the weather.

My only complaint about the cafe was that the service sucked. I'm guessing they were short staffed. We were visited by the waitstaff the minimal amount of times. And scarily enough, it was a different lady each time. The lady that seated us was different than the one who took our order. The person who gave us our food was different too. I think we saw our order taker twice. But everyone else was different.

Anyway, after lunch (and after snapping a picture of the Mercedes parked outside) we made our way back to the pier. Taking to some native Californians back at home, it was recommended that I go see Venice Beach. While exploring the Santa Monica pier, we had spotted a few bicycle rental places where we could rent a mountain bike for like 13 bucks for two hours. (The rental place was called Blazing Saddles if you're interested)

Now keep in mind I haven't ridden a bike since undergrad, which was about 6 years ago - So I was a little hesitant. I wasn't very stable, nor could I ride really slow without feeling like I was going to fall over. But as the saying goes, it's true - you never forget how to ride a bicycle :)

So we rode on this swanky snaky bike trail all the way down to Venice beach (I have no idea how far it was), but it wasn't too difficult, and I was just glad I didn't dump the bike anywhere. The ocean was beautiful. The sun was out, the tide was at full volume - Unfortunately there weren't a ton of people (it was Friday) for people watching, but it was still nice.

My butt started to hurt about 1/4 of the way through the ride. The seat on the bike was not very forgiving. It was almost as if I was being punished for not riding a bicycle in 6 years.

When we got to Venice Beach, it was as advertised. A little odd and a little new agey - One section reminded me of (and smelled like) the corner of State and North University in Ann Arbor. Complete with the incense-like scents and everything.

On the ride back, we strayed from the trail and walked our bikes along the many shops and stands that lined the rear of the beach. I've never seen so many shops that sold equipment for uhhh, "smoking tobacco", if you will.

I was totally amazed at the handiwork of the people that made these bongs. The glassblowing skills made me want to buy one :) Just to have as a conversation piece, of course.

I just wouldn't know how to bring it back home on the plane. Is that something you check in or carry on?

Anyway, so yeah, the shops and little stands - I didn't really buy anything. People were selling food, items made from hemp, items made with a familiar red, yellow and green motif, and lots of fortune tellers. A must see if you're in the area :)

The ride back was fun and sad at the same time. I was sad to be leaving. But there was much more to do...

We got back around 2:00 p.m. Which left us with 3 hours to do Kirk's driving tour of the LA area.

Here's what I wanted to see while I was out there:

• West Coast Customs
• Beverly Hills
• Hollywood

Everything except WCC was in the same general area, so we ruled it out - There just wasn't enough time.

Armed with nothing but our dreams and navigation system, we headed out to Beverly Hills. You guessed it, Rodeo Drive. I had no idea where to go on the drive, so I just punched in 5555 Rodeo Drive. Seems like a good address right?

Well, it got us there. And we had to swim through plenty of traffic too.

Rodeo Drive was amazing. It didn't have streetlamps - They were more street chandeliers. Seriuosly. Like what you'd see in a foyer or a dining room. With crytals and stuff. I was more enamored with the shops and ambience that I didn't really pay attention to the clientele that was walking or diriving around. We drove a fair amount of the main drag. Which I didn't realize that people actually lived on Rodeo Drive. We ended up in a residential area before we turned back.

Next stop: Sunset Strip.

The Sunset Strip voyage was a disaster. We got to 5555 Sunset, but I don't think it was the "strip" per se. We must have been in the wriong section I guess. Sunset just turned out to be a pretty busy street with huge ads on both sides. So we bailed pretty quickly.

Onto Hollywood Blvd!

Hollywood Boulevard was pretty close. By this time, we were ready to ditch the car and just walk around to get out of the traffic. So we chose a small sidestreet to park on and start warlking around (don't remember the name, just remembered that we parked across the street from a dumpster)...

Anyway, I think we had taken a wrong turn again (we made a right from the sidestreet, should have made a left) so we headed in our random direction. Not much to see actually, lots of wig shops though :) And of course, some shops that sold "tobacco smoking" products.

Looking at the stars on the ground was nice though. Although I didn't really recognize that many names...

We walked along random clothing shops, wig shops, and smoke shops. There was the occasional closed store front, shady area, etc., but nothing of note. But then there was a landmark.

Hollywood and Vine.

It wasn't a landmark per se - I just knew it because Kid Rock sang about it in one of his songs (I think it's the Cowboy song).

Not much to see (and time was a tickin'), so we turned back to go the other way. Once we passed the street where the car was parked, that's where all the touristy attractions were. For instance, the El Capitan Theatere, the Grauman's Chinese Theatre, the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, and of course, the Gap.

Never a dull moment.

It's been a while since I've been to the Chinese theatre that I'd forgotten that they had people dressed in costumes roaming around the street. We managed to avoid all but one. I think he was supposed to be a pirate (he had the two swords) and I think I threw him for a loop when he asked me where I was from. He thought that I was from Hong Kong or something - I told him I was from Michigan.

Anyway, so that was the extent of the Hollywood experience :)

We were planning to leave around 5 because we had to meet up with Y for dinner. She was on the way to the racetrack so we thought we'd meet up for dinner.

Again, relying on the nav system, we punched in the address and we were on our way. It wasn't until this trip where we started to notice the "carpool lane" on some of the highways. Apparently if you have 2 or more people in your car, you can use this lane :)

So we used it whenever we could - and I think it did shorten our travel up quite a bit.

We ended up having dinner in Arcadia at a restaurant called Todai. It's this all you can eat Japanese and Chinese food buffet - Complete with all you can eat sushi (and handrolls!). So I was sold the minute I walked in. We stuffed ourselves silly, and we ended up walking around the mall afterwards to help digest.

I thought it was funny that I had come almost 2000 miles to visit a shopping mall. But oddly enough we visited 2 the entire time in Cali. The Santa Monica visitor's center was in an mall too.

After we dropped Y off, we set our course for our hotel in Onario, CA. We made much better time. I think it was a mix of the carpool lanes and the distance away from Lost Angeles. We almost missed our hotel - Apparently it had changed names the week before. When we made the reservations, it was called Baymont Inns - Ontario at Ontario Mills. By the time we got there, it was now called Ayres Suites - Ontario at the Mills Mall. It would have been nice if someone had contacted us, but whatever. The entire time, it was like the hotel was having an identiy crisis. They keys and receipts had the new name, but the complimentary toiletries, elevator signage, and other stuff still had the old name.

Actually the old sign was still on the outside too - It just wasn't lit up. I'm glad it was there, because otherwise we would have missed it, or we would have been thoroughly confused.

This hotel was nice as well. It was only a few minutes drive from the track, and it was in the middle of a mall-type area, so finding food was not a problem at all.

Well I guess you could say I was close to 3 malls then - but we didn't go into the Ontario Mills one. :)

So that was the end of our Friday...

Saturday morning we got up our usual 8:00 a.m. wake-up time and went downstairs. I wasn't sure if they had told me and I had forgotten, but we got free breakfast :)

So I went carb crazy. I had Belgian waffles and French toast, with sides of cottage cheese, a hardboiled egg, fruit, and orange juice.

Tasty.

The only thing was, that in my excitement I had forgotten to toast the waffles and the french toast...

Anyway, after breakfast we headed out to the California Speedway. Fontana, CA is pretty industrial. Lots of factory-looking buildings and whatnot. Getting there was mildly painful traffic wise - our nav system told us to take the highway which would have been faster say, at 3:00 in the morning, but not at 10:00.

The speedway was huge. But we were like high school kids renting out Michigan stadium for a homecoming game. We were really far away from filling the entire raceway. Which was nice, actually.

When we got out of the car, we were literally blown away. It was as if we had stepped into a wind tunnel. Drew lost his hat due to the wind. and at the end of the day, our eyes were pretty dry and irritated.

GT Live was pretty much as advertised. An amusement park for car nuts. There was the racetrack, and all of the events going on throughout the day in the infield. Car clubs were in full effect - I'd never seen so many import cars of the same type in one place at one time. There was a whole area just dedicated to vendors that sold aftermarket parts. It was like a supermarket for tuners. Lowering kits, suspension, air intakes, turbos, you name it, it was there.

Tons of cars were all over the place, ranging from fully stock looking to totally pimped, complete with custom graphics and sponsor stickers. And of course, the bass was thumping.

Where would we be without subwoofer bass?

We even got to walk by the paddocks (where they store and work on the racecars) - It was pretty amazing to see the cars up close and see the sheer amount of people that work together in order to make the cars run.

And then there were the "race queens." :) These scantily clad ladies follwed the racecar drivers around, holding up umbrellas (to shade from the sun or draw attention I guess). And people would fight over each other to have pictures taken with them. It was rather funny.

Anyway, I think it was a mixture of the wind and hunger, but we decided around 1 or 2 o'clock that we'd take a break for lunch and then go back to the track - The official race was going to start at like 5 or something.

So Drew had to take care of his In-N-Out Burger craving. He had been talking about the I-N-O Burger place even since we started our trip. And I have to admit, it was really really good. You can't go wrong with fresh cut-in-the-store French fries :)

After lunch we were feeling pretty lame, so we headed back to the hotel for some lounging. Besides, we figured we had the whole rest of the day and Sunday to catch anything that we had missed.

Well, lounging turned into napping.

We got up around 4ish and headed back to the track. Just in time for the race :) The race was pretty kickass. We sat down in our special "VIP" grandstands and walked around the track to get some better views.

Nerdiness Alert:
(Skip this if you could give a rat's ass about turbos and glowing brakes)
So on certain parts of the track, where the drivers had to slow down, you could hear the blow-off valves of the turboed cars. Which sounded so sweet it brought a tear to my eye. At least it would of if it hadn't been so damned windy). Plus, on the section right before the hairpin turns, the cars were slow enough where you could take a good look at the brake discs glowing a warm red from all of the heat buildup. Way cool.

Anyway, so where was I? Oh yeah, so the race was cool. I had no idea who the drivers were, just knew of the cars from various magazines and video games.

The track was pretty much open - Nothing was really off limits - So Drew and I walked all around, even into the reserved areas where the private suites were. The suites were located right behind the pits. So we sat at the reserved seats above the suites and were able to look at what goes in during a pit stop, and see what goes on in between stops.

Once the race ended, we walked around a little more - I wanted to take a look at people's cars - I wanted to see who had the full neon kits inside and underneath their cars. But we got sidetracked by more vrooming engines and crowds congregating around another set of garages.

Enter the drifters.

More than anything else, I wanted to see the drift demonstrations and events that were going to be held at GT Live.

There was a drifting even held earlier in the day, but we had missed it - cause we hadn't gotten our VIP wrist bands yet. So we were anxiously awaiting the event that was going to occur the next day.

But we didn't have to wait - The rumor was that there was going to be a practice session in a few minutes. That's why everyone was getting the cars ready again.

So drew and I hauled ass to the grandstands to wait. And it was definitely worth the wait. We got about an hour of pure drifting enjoyment.

What is drifting? Words don't do it justice, but you can read about it in the FAQ section of the D1 site.

So we watched all the contestants drift and got to experience the kickass smell of exhaust and burnt rubber all mixed together like a designer fragrance.

Loved it.

But 9:00 p.m. quickly approached and we were all kicked out :)

For dinner, we found this little mexican grill place called Rubio's (I know, I know, it's a chain, but still). It was really close by to our hotel, so it was perfect. And I had my first ever lobster burrito. I was in heaven. And with a name like Rubio's I knew I couldn't have gone wrong (rubio is spanish for blonde)

And that was that.

(tired of reading yet?)

Sunday morning was kind of sad because it was the last day we were in Cali before going back to really really cold Michigan :)

We woke up around 8 ish again, did our morning routine and had our breakfast. This time, I toasted - And everything tasted 10x better :)

We checked out of the hotel and we were off again to the track. Drew wanted to find some event merchandise, so we walked around the vendor area again. There were some new cars displayed, but for the most part, everything had been the same as the day before.

We watched a few more races and saw another drift event - This time from a different perspective - towards the end of the drift course (the day before we were in the middle).

I think I got some good pictures, but we'll see.

We had to leave for the airport around 5:30, so we were going to miss the final big US vs. Japan drift event - Which was a real bummer, but now we know how to better schedule for next year :)

We left a few hours to get to the airport - The traffic was too unpredictable. We still had to get dinner and whatnot, so we wanted to be on the safe side.

For dinner, we went back to In-N-Out :)

The drive to the airport was ok. We bailed from the highway during the last 10 minutes and took the local roads back to the rental car place. Even with the frequent use of the carpool lane, it felt like we were crawling.

The rental car return was painless - So was the shuttle ride to the airport all the way to the gate. Our flight left at 10:30 p.m. and would get into Detroit Metro at 6:00 a.m. I was a wuss and took Monday off cause I knew I'd be trashed. Drew was scheduled to work - I'm not sure if he called in or not :)

The flight back was ok - Again, I wasn't able to sleep the entire time. So I was pretty wasted by the end of the trip. I really really wanted to sleep, but I couldn't. Plus I had to drive home.

Like the Florida trip, the minute we got off the airplane, we were slapped in the face by the bitter Michigan weather. You should have heard the groans that everyone made when the pilot told us that we were going from 70 degree weather to single digits :)

Before parting our separate ways, Drew suggested that we have breakfast. Which was an excellent idea. You can't go wrong with a hearty ham and cheese omelet from National Coney Island. The waitperson was so cheery and the service was supafast. It was nice to be almost home too :)

the price of one omelet was 2 dollars cheaper than a Burger King burger meal at LAX :)

After breakfast Drew went to his parking area and I went to mine - It was so cold that we were afraid our cars wouldn't start. Luckily everything was ok and I was on my way home :)

After pulling the car into the garage, I unloaded all of my stuff and just left it by the door. The minute after I closed the garage door, I immediately went to the couch, pulled over a blanket, and I was out.

And that's my trip :)

I hope you enjoyed reading about it and I didn't bore you.

-Kirk