To Perth

The flight was uneventful. . . which is the best thing that you can say about any trip in an aeroplane.

We caught the local bus into the city and the lovely lady bus driver said "no charge for you lot on the weekend". She charged some locals but not other obvious tourists. Must be a thing here. 

Our hotel is around the corner from the Law Courts in a quiet corner of downtown. We found a good Japanese restaurant for dinner, Edosei. They were very nice as was the food especially the Japanese rice. 

Now we are in bed at 8:15 local time but 11:15  Sydney time . . . well past our bedtime.

We are off

We lazed away the day in the sunshine to try to store some melatonin. The Super Shuttle was booked to pick us up at 6pm. At 5:50pm they rang to say that they couldn't come until 6:40 because the traffic was so bad. We cancelled them and caught the Long Beach shuttle that had no problems with traffic and we were the only passengers! Now we are safely enconsed in the United lounge for the next hour and a half.

What did I achieve on this trip? Wrist warmers to sell at the Guild 70th anniversary celebration this weekend.

We did get to the Getty Centre which is an impressive set of buildings on a mountain top with a European collection. The Impressionists were nice.

There was a cat.

by Jean-Baptiste Perronneau. Never heard of him.

Down day

Jo's cold has made a come back . . . . those over air conditioned conference rooms. So instead of trekking crosstown to the Getty Centre we relaxed this morning and shopped this afternoon. He did not find any white tennis shoes. He rejected the lack ones. But we did find some stuff at the local outlet mall. I got three organic T shirts for $5 each, some cotton leggings (5% elastic) for $8 and a wind and waterproof but breathable (they say) jacket for $41. 

Jo got a light weight fleece for $8! This is the place for a bargain.

And I found these photos in my camera:

Puffins at the aquarium

According to the cage card, these and other arctic birds were wild captured when young and put in the same enclosure but looking after them was like watching a soap opera and eventually they had to remove some of the more rumbuctious birds to other zoos.

Long Beach is a huge port and it seems cruise ships come here too. . . . probably to let their passengers look at the Queen Mary. We decided not to tour her. They say that she is haunted.

Down day

Jo's cold has made a come back . . . . those over air conditioned conference rooms. So instead of trekking crosstown to the Getty Centre we relaxed this morning and shopped this afternoon. He did not find any white tennis shoes. He rejected the lack ones. But we did find some stuff at the local outlet mall. I got three organic T shirts for $5 each, some cotton leggings (5% elastic) for $8 and a wind and waterproof but breathable (they say) jacket for $41. 

Jo got a light weight fleece for $8! This is the place for a bargain.

And I found these photos in my camera:

Puffins at the aquarium

According to the cage card, these and other arctic birds were wild captured when young and put in the same enclosure but looking after them was like watching a soap opera and eventually they had to remove some of the more rumbuctious birds to other zoos.

Long Beach is a huge port and it seems cruise ships come here too. . . . probably to let their passengers look at the Queen Mary. We decided not to tour her. They say that she is haunted.

Dinner with the Stars

Michael Teh is the only actor we know in LA. So he is the one.

Long Beach

Long Beach should be called Flat Beach. There are no hills but we are on the 12th floor of the hotel so can see a bit of view.

Jo is happily in conference mode that leaves me free to meander.

Yesterday I took four buses and three hours to get to Mood Fabric on the other side of Downtown LA. It was interesting to skirt the VAST dock area here in LB . . . biggest port on the west coast. The bus goes on the freeway with bus stops!

Mood didn't have any pure cotton jersey either. The Fabric Barn here in Long Beach, which I visited on Monday to test the public transport, didn't have any cotton or linen fabric at all. Mood had linen.

They were very generous (a half to 2/3 yard extra on each cut) and pure linen was $14 and $15 per yard. Good thing I had to hurry back home to the conference reception so didn't have time to explore the rest of the shop. Their bolts are on racks 20feet high which is pretty silly if you don't take a ladder with you. They are moving to a bigger warehouse nearby.

 They also, kindly, gave me directions back by train which halved the journey time.

Seattle

Said au revoir to Sally who drove home to Vancouver then Geoff drove us down to Seattle to Sean's. We stopped at an outlet mall en route to get some tennis shoes for Jo. There are no tennis shoes just runners or sneakers which is odd in the week when the French Open is on TV all day long.

Went to Sonomish for dinner. This small town, on a river, was full of folk clutching wine glasses as they moved from antique shop to junk store.