and finally

River otters from Africa, here as part of a re-population program as their natural habitat is being destroyed.

Jellies...

...as they call them here. This exibit was truly cool, dark lighting in the main walkways with plain blue tanks lit to show the jelly fish to their best. I tried to take pictures, but really needed a tripod.

More Sea Otters

And one of the best things was if you looked out of the window of the aquarium you could see these guys in the wild playing in the kelp Forests

Cuteness

Eventually I got to the Aquarium on Cannery Row, and it was pretty impressive, but by far the best bit was the Sea Otters, which are officially my new favourite cutest animals. They have 5 here that cannot be released into the wild, and they are so sweet, if you don't believe me, do a google image search!

and pelicans

this was better than the zoo!

Sleeping in the Sun

These guys were just playing on the deck, whilst their brothers and sisters were keeping warm by raising a flipper into the sun. There were also loads of harbour seals in and around the pier.

Monterey Sea Lions

This morning I decided it was time for another aquarium - should this blog have been called aquariums of the world?- and was walking along the harbour to Cannery Row when I kept hearing this strange noise. I found the culprit, these Sea Lions who winter here in the bay. There where about 150 in total that I could see, but there have been up to 800 causing chaos!

Stock Billy Photography

Bixby Bridge is probably one of the most photographed views along the Big Sur Coast. It was built in 1932 by convicts trying to get off their sentences early. Before this was built there was a 14 mile inland detour, the road is still there now, but I would have needed Daisy the truck from NZ to navigate it.

Partington Cove

A bit further north is Partington Cove, an illegal landing for bootleggers during prohibition. A steep walk down, with a side track through a cool tunnel hewn out of the rock.

McWay Falls

A famous stop on the route is the McWay falls, Californias only coastal waterfall, and very pretty it is too!

Views at Big Sur

There are plenty of Vista points as they are called along the way, the view from them breath-taking. I think I was very lucky though as apparently often this entire coast can be covered in fog.

Waterfall at Limekiln Park

Even more impressive was this 100ft waterfall.

Big Trees in Big Sur

Big Sur is not one specific village, but the whole area of coast from about Cambria up to Monterey in the North. I travelled this great road in one day, stopping at various places along the way. Firstly I called in at LimeKiln Park. Most people stop to see the 4 old limekilns, which in reality are just rusty old stacks. More beautiful are the redwoods.

San Simeon Beach

On the start of my travels up the coast through Big Sur I saw this cormarant. As they don't have any water-proofing on their wings when they get wet they have to dry out by sitting with their wings spread in the sun til they are dry.

Seaweed

The Kelp forests are famous around this coast, a home for cute sea otters. The stuff is massive, but looks beautiful when viewed from above.

Nit Wit Ridge

Leaving Cambria I went to see Nit Wit Ridge a mad house constructed by the town character from junk collected from the beach, the dust bins of the town and the construction site of hearst castle. The pillars you see are constructed from car wheels covered in concreted, a kind of home grown re-inforced concrete.

Moonstone beach

And finally I stopped to watch the sun go down. Good but not as good as Trebarwith

More nature

Driving back I stopped at the san Simeon State park to see the Monarch Butterflies (which weren't there) and went for a short walk. I wasn't even detered by the signs warning about rattle snakes and mountain lion - apparently you're not supposed to walk on your own, a bit screwed there hey! Towards the end of the walk I came across the deer and friends.

Zebras

No I didn't taken a quick detour to Africa, these are the "wild" Zebras, descendants from the zoo created by WR Hearst when he built the Castle

Brown Pelicans

I kept thinking of Finding Nemo when I saw these Brown Pelicans chasing the seals along the beach

Social Gathering

And this was just a small group!

A day of Nature

Today off to see the Elephant Seals at Piedras Blancas. These beasts are Massive, and these are only the juveniles, the adult males start arriving around this time and battle for the ladies!

The Castle

The view as we went back down the hill

The Indoor Pool

So you've seen the Neptune Pool, this is the other indoor pool, and that gold, is REAL!

Location, location, location

What a view. Hearst Castle is perched on top of a rocky outcrop with great views of the mountains and the sea.

The Front

This is all concrete with limestone veneer, oh and a few ancient carvings from French

Catherdrals.

Hearst Castle

Monday and off to Hearst Castle, an amazing pile sat on a hill above San Simeon, this lovely picture was one of those taken against a green back drop and me then super-imposed against an image of the famous Nuptune pool, why they don't actually take you against the real one I'll never know, unless it's to make sure the sun always shines in California! This place is an strange mixture of old artifacts from all over the world - some of the decorations on this pool are actual roman sculptures! Couldn't decide whether is was fantastic or disgusting....

The Butterflies at Pismo beach

Making my way back to the coast and up to towards San Luis Obispo, I stoppped by the road as there were a group of people looking up into the eucalyptus trees. This turned out to be one of the biggest over-wintering areas for the Monarch Butterfly. This was a cold day and as they only fly at temperatures above 52degrees they were all resting on the branches. There were 10,000 of them. Also was just in time for a talk by a sweet old man who with along his wife are volunteers giving info to us tourists.

Just don't look down!

Travelling from SLO to Cambria a quick stop at Morro Bay to watch the surfers. Avian, this ones for you - he's a fine figure of a man!

A date with the Danish

From Santa Barbara I drove into the Wine Country - otherwise known as "Sideways Country". Bit of a shame as I haven't been drinking since I left NZ, so missed out on that, but Solvang was a good place to spend a few hours - the Americans like tat giftshops too! Solvang is a little town established by the Danish, and still has a kind of feel too it. Also has a Sunglasses Hut where I had an encounter with a shop assistant who talked me into buying two pairs! Note to self - do not be TOO eager to talk to people who work in shops!

The Cultural Home of TS

Santa Barbara. The weather was hot and sunny and it was good to get out of LA. This was a funny mixture of LA and Spain, a bit like Disney had been let loose in Marbella - with Nordstrom!

Hollywood Boulevard

Loved this new statue at the entrance to the road. It is gold in the sun, but cought here as the sun was setting

Welcome to Hollywood

Guess where I am, OK not the BEST picture - how I managed to still have that many chins after my loverly dose of Valdisease before I left NZ, I felt like a size zero! But credit for this picture goes to TS who gave me the top tip to go to this spot for the photo opportunity.

If the show fits!

Funny, my trainers didn't seem to fit in these foot prints!

Grauman's Chinese Theatre

Ok, so I'm a billy, but I was only here for 2 days and wanted to do all the sights! The Chinese Theatre was cool, I wish I'd had more time to tour inside. Not really dressed as I should be, but come on it wasn't a premiere!

Sightseeing on Thanksgiving

Probabaly VERY bad planning on my behalf, but how was I to know the 22nd Nov was Thanksgiving. The americans were pretty surprised that they were the only ones to celebrate this fact, and wouldn't believe me when I told them this fact, so much so that one shop keeper got fairly irate and was insistant that is WAS celbrated in the UK! Anyway, another iconic shot...but this was all I got to see and closed for the holiday!

Street Lights

Even the lights were by Baccarat

Rodeo Drive

My Hotel for the first night was a bit of a luxary, but well worth it, The Cresent was in Beverley Hills and only 2 blocks from this small row of shops!

Castle Rocks

One of my last days in New Zealand and I went out to Castle Hill Rocks, not far from Porters, where I'd been working all winter. It was a bit different as it was a VERY warm days and a great place to chill and prepare for my journey to the US. A great place to contemplete life as the Dalai Lama has called this place the spiritual centre of the universe. I didn't get much of that, but the view was nice.

4x4 with Dougal

After the trip to the West Coast I came back to ChCh for an early evening trip onto the Waimak for a bit of driving. Dougal did his VERY best to get me stuck, but couldn't quite manage it!

The Hydro Slide!

To finish the day we decided to slide down a wet rock on a piece of foam - Genius!

Relaxing after our ordeal

We all look happy - we didn't know we had to tackle the Hydroslide before we could get in the hot tub back at the base

Escaping from the cave

Phew, I look like I am actually trying to sneak out!

.......there!

nearly.........

Very

And this is the exit to the Dragons Cave

Otherwise known as the "Re-birth"........... What made it more difficult was Seb and Andrew were making me laugh and everytime they did I got stuck!

Into the dragons Mouth

For the way back me and Andrew decided to take the alternative route through a small tunnel surrounded by rock formations. This is the entrance to the cave, Seb was to meet us at the other end

Glow worms at last

The best bit. When we had got as far into the cave as possible we reached an underground lake. From here we got into our inner tubes and floated across looking at the ceiling which was lit by hundreds of tiny green dots of light. We all switched off our head torches and it was amazing. Well worth the effort.

Waterfall

At one point there is a drop in the level of the cave so you have to jump about 1 metre down a waterfall into a pool of icy water - thank god for the wet suit, hat, thermals, shoes and gloves. This is me just before the jump, I look happy, yes? If you want to see what I looked like just after you will have to check out facebook (ps thanks Seb for holding my head under the water!!

Inside the cave