What a Bloody Adventure!

Well, this weekend was an adventure to say the least, more so for Ian and Brian. Its hard to know where to begin the story.

Tuesday morning Ian and Brian left Erie for Canada and were scheduled to return to Erie at 3pm Thursday afternoon to return the hire car and come with us to Washington DC. Ryan rang them at 8am to make sure they were on their way to meet us (as they had an 8hr drive ahead of them). Turns out Ryan had actually woken them up and were no where near ready to leave. So we changed the plans to meet them in Washington (and leave the rental car there), however this didn't work out either as the rental company wouldn't allow this. Turns out they had to hire the car for the entire weekend.

So we got that little debacle sorted and we headed to Washington. We rang Ian and Brian when we got there at about 10pm. We googled their location and worked out they were 3 hours away. So we headed off to a bar. We got back and went to bed at about 1am, just before Ian and Brian were due to arrive. At 4am we woke up panicking because they hadn't arrived as of yet, and we couldn't call them as their phone was flat. At 715am Ryan had to get ready for work (yes wasn't purely a vacation - there was work involved) when the phone rang. Ian and Brian had (finally) arrived at our hotel 16 hours later!! They got lost for 8 hours, driving around about a 2 hour radius of where we were - funny thing is they had a map in the car the entire time!

The plan was for Kristy to take Ian and Brian to Washington while Ryan was at work and meet up with Ryan after lunch to head to New York City. Instead, Ian and Brian slept, Ryan worked, and Kristy read the newspaper. When the 2 stooges (as Ryan has appropriately nick named them) awoke, we searched for a laundry, got some lunch and met up with Ryan.

We then distinctly told Ian and Brian to follow closely behind us as we drove to Washington for some sight seeing. They were doing well for a while and kept up with us through the traffic. Until we hit the city. They took some random turn (god knows why??) and were lost. So, we went to the pub waiting for them to call us, however the phone didn't ring. Instead, they got more lost, we rang them and found them. Finally we got to do some sight seeing in Washington DC!

Ryan, Brian and Ian with the Washington Monument in the background

Finally - there was water in the reflecting pool this time!

The boys in front of the White House

We didn't leave DC until 7pm and had a 5 hour drive ahead of us into NYC. And so the next adventure begun. After a shit dinner at a chain restaurant, we made it to our conveniently located, but basic hotel at about 115am. Check-in took over 20 minutes due to a whole stack of Vietnamese people checking in at the same time (they had a parade on in the city). Finally Kristy got served and handed her room key. The four of us made our way up to the 16Th floor and Kristy opened the door to the room. There was a young boy in there brushing his teeth and his mum was in the room somewhere. We all just stood there staring, not expecting or believing what had just happened, until Ryan suggested we shut the door. We all went back downstairs, Ryan explained the situation and received another key (with no apologies) to another room. We all go back up to the 14Th floor and this time it was Ryan's job to open the door. He stood there trying for about 30 seconds, when a lady came up and said 'excuse me - this is my room'! They had given us a key to someone else's room again! So back down we go again (still with no apology) and got another key to another room - 3rd time lucky! This time, the room was empty. HOWEVER... The light bulb in the bathroom had blown, which meant another trip downstairs, the room was dusty and dirty, there were stains on the linen and the shower curtain was mouldy and the drain still had a chunk of soap in it. If you closed you eyes while showering, it felt like you were in a Stephen King movie and you were just waiting to see something gruesome come out of the drain. Lucky we didn't spend much time in our room at all. To top it all off, 2 of the 3 elevators servicing 24 floors were out of service because the Vietnamese people were squashing up to 25 people in an elevator at a time. We all got to bed after 3am.

Ian in the shonky room

Gentlemen, Start Your Engines!

Sunday was the day of the big race - NASCAR Nextel Cup 400! Although the race was great and we enjoyed it, there were a few things that let the day down.

We arrived about midday and it was really really hot. The rednecks and hillbilly's were out in force! Before any major sporting event, the popular thing to do is set up a tent out in the car park, cook a BBQ (or grill as they call it here) and get pissed. In fact, some of the people doing this at the NASCAR went for this reason only and didn't even attend the race!

When we finally arrived at the entry gates (2 shuttle trips later), we were told we couldn't enter with a backpack. The man on the gate suggested we either took the bag back to our car or threw it out! We weren't prepared to do either, so we emptied the contents into a plastic bag, rolled up the backpack like a jacket and threw a shirt over it and walked through the gates!

The seating arrangements were a series of massive grandstands full of bench seats (no chairs). Over 100,000 people then had to squash onto the bench seats like sardines, with a lot of overweight people, in the heat with no shelter covering anyone. There was also no pre-race entertainment what so ever. That was the crap part of the day.

This is a shot of the grounds and our view for the day

There were just so many people there, and everyone was squashed and hot

The 4 of us packed in like sardines

And racing!

The race took about 3 hours, with the drivers completing 200 x 2 mile laps. There were drivers named Ward (he didn't place at all), Kurt (i think he won or came second), Dale Jnr (the crowd favourite), and Ryan (he didn't place either). There were a few crashes, 2 of which happened right in front of us.

The centre of the track was crammed with RV's, caravans and old school buses, where people camped out, then watched the race from the roof of their vehicle

Clean up's - after a crash

Overall, we had a great time. We stopped at a restaurant on the way home called Frickers, where they boys all enjoyed some 'big fricken beers' and 'big fricken burgers'.

City of Cars

An exciting rushed trip through Hollywood and a bomb scare later, Ian and Brian finally arrived in good old Erie, PA. They had a nap, then it was time to hit the street for our Michigan weekend, starting in downtown Detroit.

You know your in for an interesting night when the Lonely Planet book says 'quite frankly, Detroit looks like its had the shit kicked out of it!'

It took about 4 hours to get there, arriving at about 9pm. We checked in to our hotel, then hit the streets to find some dinner. We found a nice Mexican restaurant and ate there, before proceeding to Greek Town for some drinks in a bar. We had a window seat. There were some interesting characters walking past and some pimped out cars driving past.

Ryan, Bryan and Ian in Greek Town

A pimped out car

On the walk home there were 4 un-marked police cars pulled over on the side of the road. They had 4 guys in handcuffs sitting on the sidewalk. Of course the police were expressing their 'authoritire' as they all love to over here.

No, this isnt a cheap porn shot! The hotel room was very cozy, which meant Ian and Brian had to share a double bed!

The next morning, we headed for the Detroit riverfront (halfway across the river is Canada. Detroit is the only US city to look south on Canada). It was nice down there, and the boys got to check out all the boats cruising past. We went to the head office of General Motors, which is actually an awesome building, and housed a small GM museum (big big big mistake Kristy - taking the boys to a car museum!)

GM Head Office stands out in Detroit

The park near the waterfront - from this angle Detroit looks quite nice

Ryan and Kristy with an old GM vehicle


Ian and Brian with the latest Corvette from GM

The real Detroit - downtown buildings are vacant, boarded up and run down. I guess that's what makes the city so unique

After walking through a funky park, we jumped on the people mover, an elevated transport system. We done 1.5 laps and hopped off at a downtown bar, before walking to the home of the Detroit Tigers stadium (baseball) who were actually practising while we were there.

Kristy at the Tigers home ground

After a brief stroll through town, we went to the Walter P Chrysler Museum (much to Kristy's delight!), where we saw about 70 Chrysler cars, including the very first prototype ever made. There were some really nice cars there too (Tony - you would have loved it!)

Ryan with a Chrysler muscle car

Kristy taking one of the Chryslers for a spin!

On the way to our next hotel in Canton, we cruised down 8 mile made famous by Eminem. After dinner, we drove about 25 minutes to a small university town called Ann Arbor. It reminded us of Beaumont Street and had the best looking range of people we have seen to date in the USA. We stopped in for a few drinks and ice cream.

The Naughty List

We thought we would start a 'Naughty List' of all the people who cant seem to calculate time differences and love to call us all hours of the morning.

1. The winner has to be Deano. He doesn't care what time it is when he is drunk, and that means any time is a good time to call us, even if it is 330 in the morning!

2. A close second would have to be Walds. Al, you have called us a few times at god knows what time. Don't worry - we know that Phil was in on it too!

3. Charles. What can we say? He thought it was 5pm our time when it was 4am! And everyone at the party that night, you make this list too!

4. The latest culprit was Diane and Kim. Kim thought it was 6am and that we would be on our way to collect Ian and Brian from the airport - it was 3am. Yes Kim, we heard you giggling in the background!

Bloody Americans

We don't know what it is, but for some reason Americans just cant understand us, even though we can understand them perfectly well. Here are some examples of words they just don't get:

1. Ryan. Yep. Every time Ryan says his name, they think he says Ron, Roy and has even had Lynn once!

2. Meatball Subway. They thought we wanted a maple flavoured sub. Yuk!

3. Beer. Every time Kristy asks for a beer, they think she is asking for a 'B'.

4. Salmon. We ordered salmon for dinner, and they though we were ordering a samii!

5. Mobile Phone. We had to do full on hand signals for them to finally understand we were asking for a cell phone.

6. Note (as in $10 note). Unless you say bill (as in $10 bill) they just don't get it.

We also had one lady ask us that apart from Sydney, does Australia have any major cities, or is it all just desolate? We had to hold back from laughing at that one, considering Newcastle is bigger than Erie!

Indy

Our weather is warming up, and that seems to mean dead skunks everywhere. They absolutely reek and totally infest your car when you drive past one. If you can imagine that strong rainforest smell (smells a bit like someone smoking), well times that by about 20 - literally! It is the most pungent smell ever!

Speaking of weather, we hear/saw that things have been pretty bad back at home. Hope everyone is doing OK. It even made our CNN news over here!

This weekend we drove to Indianapolis, Indiana, about 6 hours away from Erie. There were begger's on every corner of the main road, who all rattled the cups of money at you as you walked past - i guess the camera was a dead giveaway that we were tourists!

First up, we went to Monument Circle - a giant round-a-bout with a 284 ft Soldiers and Sailors monument in the centre. All the buildings lining the round-a-bout were curved, which looked pretty cool. The State House looked nice as well.

Kristy in front of Monument Circle

Ryan with the Monument

Our hotel was actually built in to a train station that was still active!


In the morning we drove to the Worlds most famous race track - the Indianapolis Speedway which plays host to the Indy500 (which is on next week, but we are going to the NASCAR race in Michigan).

The track

Ryan in front of the Pagoda on the track.

Ryan with an Indy car in the museum

We got to do a lap around the track doing about 37mph in a bus, and then went through the museum dedicated to the Indy500.

Next up was Columbus, Indiana. Columbus is famous for its architecture, and apparently gives the likes of NY and Chicago a run for their money. Well, lets make it clear right now that the tour (you buy a map and drive yourself around the sites) was crap. There were 3 or 4 interesting buildings, and the rest were just like your everyday buildings and definitely nothing out of the ordinary. The tour had us going past schools, golf courses and even a retirement home! We quit halfway through and headed for our destination for the evening (and second visit) to Louisville, Kentucky. We love Louisville. We spent the evening drinking and eating.

One of the few interesting bits of architecture

Doing what we do best!

This man was a host at one of the Louisville restaurants - look familiar???

Yep - knew we had seen him somewhere before! Kentucky is the home of KFC!

The next morning we drove west of Louisville, back to Indiana to a small town to canoe along the Ohio river. This is where Ryan sent Kristy in to the Male toilets, where the lock didn't work and a man walked in (lucky she was finished!) Along the way we saw heaps of turtles, and the forest was nice. We completed the 7 mile paddle in just under 2 hours. At the end of the trip, these 2 guys we passed tried to keep up with us, but had nothing on us!!!

Ryan by the Ohio River at the end of our canoe trip

We grabbed a pizza and hit the road, and drove another 40min west to the Lincoln Boyhood Memorial - this is where Lincoln lived from ages 4-21years. The remains of his family's cabin is still present along with a replica pioneer farm.

We then had an 8 hour drive home. We stopped at a restaurant called Hoggy's on the way home for some good 'ol Southern food - Ryan literally ordered half a chicken! Lucky doggy bags are all the rage over here!

Ribs

Not a very eventful weekend this weekend. It was nice to finally have a relaxing weekend of not doing much at all.
The weather is warming up over here and it seems to bring all sorts of people out with it. This week has been the week of the Rib Cook Off in Erie, where the people of Erie get to vote for the best tasting ribs. This is where we spent Friday night, and it seemed like all the 'cool' people of Erie were out to get some ribs too!

One of the stalls at the Rib Cook Off

A BBQ, sorry grill they cook with

Yep, love their sauce over here. This is the sauce for the ribs. You have a choice of sweet, mild, hot or killer.

We had some ribs for dinner, then moved on to a bar down town, where we proceeded to have a few more drinks. We were both pretty tipsy by the end of the night and crashed when we got home, about 1am (after a Maccas run of course!). We were in a very deep sleep, when the phone rings at 4am!! We thought, who the hello would ring at this time? Sure enough it was Dynee's birthday party and everyone thought they would ring to say hello, cause they thought it was about 5pm our time (not sure what time calculator Ian was using???)!!! It was good to hear from everyone though.

After a big night and not the best nights sleep, we had a pretty lazy morning, laying around and sleeping in until about midday. We had a BBQ for lunch and went for a swim in the pool in our estate.

Saturday night we headed over to Luis' house for a BBQ and drinks, but had a fairly early night.

Sunday, Ryan played golf with Dylan and Rod (the other Aussie family down the road), while Kristy went shopping (and found some good bargains - Ralph Lauren Jeans - $12!) with Cheryl and Casey. We had a BBQ for dinner along with a few games of cards at Cheryl and Rod's house.