OooOoOooo I Can See Your Honolulu

Other than Graceland, Hawaii was the place I was most looking forward to visiting when planning this trip. Aside from New Orleans. And Memphis, of course. But Honolulu was capitalised, italicised, underscored and highlighted in BOLD in both my homemade travel schedule and my whirrly little mind.

It's the sort of place you daydream about while writing completely useless summaries about Anthony Worrall Thompson shoplifting cheese from a Tesco in Henley-on-Thames at 3.18 a.m on a Thursday morning. WHO CARES? It was probably only a cry for attention. He's not so hot these days, is old Ant. Anyway, back to my holiday hard-on.

HAWAII and all her pleasures; palm trees and sunshine-happy ukele music, warm sand and skilled surfers, grass skirts and ham and pineapple pizza. Bloody paradise. I remember doing a 30-second jig after clicking on the confirm button to book my flight and gurning like I was at my first festival for about four hours afterwards. Excited doesn't even cover it. I was champing at the bit to get out there.

It takes six hours to fly to Honolulu on the island of Oahu from LAX and the islands, the most remote chain in the world, is two hours behind Pacific Standard Time - basically making it the end of the world. I would be ten whole hours behind almost everyone I know. After waving goodbye to Leah and whiling away two days in grungy Venice Beach eating 7-Eleven pizza and catching up on the latest series of Dexter, I travelled to LAX at about 11pm the day before my flight to sit out the eight hours before I could board the plane and dream all the way to paradise.


For entertainment, I pretended to be Tom Hanks in Terminal and shuffled around the departures lounge mumbling emotionally in a made up language from a fictional country, before finding the softest piece of marble I could to try and snooze for a few hours before the check-in kiosks opened.
For anyone thinking about ever sleeping at the airport: if you can avoid it, do. If not, purchase an inflatable mattress. It is NOT easy nesting.

I got on the plane and tucked myself into my seat, finally falling asleep before the engines got going. My neighbour very sweetly shoved his soft, fat elbow into my face just as the islands came into view underneath us hours later, allowing me to lean all the way over from the aisle to the window to catch my first glimpse.

It was a photoshopped world I was staring down into, everything popping out in bright technicolour and looking sparkly and fun and happy and Aloha. Absolutely beautiful. 

Hawaii may be a stunner but its also one of the most expensive places I've been to. The starting price for most items seemed to be $10, and that was considered a good deal. With my bank account dwindling, budget was the order of the day. Google pointed me in the direction of Waikiki Backpackers Hostel, which had good reviews, and more importantly, offered travellers two UNLIMITED beer nights a week, for free. I was staying for ten days over Christmas, so this had to be taken strongly into consideration. They also offered a complimentary shuttle service from Honolulu airport if you were staying for four days or more.
Yes please.

bezzie mates

Two blocks from Waikiki Beach, the hostel is a former motel and each room has been converted into dorms that sleep four. You get your own kitchenette and bathroom in the room, which is pretty handy for storing supermarket-bought beer. At its helm is the owner, Charles, a well-built Nigerian man who used to be in the British Army and who reminisced with me extensively about England and J.D Wetherspoons' curry nights. You can't get a decent curry in Hawaii, it seems. Charles seemed pleased to have another British accent knocking about the place and as he left, promised to bring me a can of cider the next night.

I had managed to turn up on Tuesday, one of the free beer nights, so got stuck in chatting with my fellow hostellers and worked on becoming increasingly shit faced before we all piled into the minivan at 10 p,m and were driven to Moose McGillycuddy's, a ridiculously-named rowdy bar in the city where drinks remarkably, only cost $1 that night. NO BLOODY TAX ADDED ON, EITHER.


I waved my $5 bill like I was in Her Maj's inner circle, graciously buying drinks for my new chums and throwing out unique dance moves to the pop music under the strobe lighting. It was just like a school disco, except with lei's, mai tais and lots and lots of military personnel. I chatted with a Marine (there are a ton based on the island) and egged on a German girl looking at a bit of beef that had caught her eye across the crowded bar. A superb night out.

I'd promised myself I'd go surfing the next morning. Obviously I would have been a complete natural. However I failed spectacularly to wake up in time for the Early Bird Special ($30 for an hour's lesson on Waikiki - but only before 8 a.m) so ended up heading to the Dole Pineapple Factory on the local bus system, which took an hour and a half and very nearly robbed me of my will to live.

It took FOREVER going all round the houses and back again to visit the driver's grandma. I sassed quietly in the back, but not too loudly because I'm a scaredy cat and didn't want to get chucked off the bloody thing in the middle of nowhere. Also, I was in Hawaii and had no right to be moody about the slow-pace of everything.

The Dole Factory was horrendous, hugely overpriced ($8 for a packet of dried pineapple. What in holy hell?) and inexplicably, sold pearls in oysters at every corner. What do unshucked oysters have to do with the seeding, harvesting and distribution of pineapples? I may die before I find out.
Seeing as it took so long to get there, the least I could do was treat myself to a ride on the Pineapple Express, a fire-red train that takes visitors around the pineapple fields and explains the history of the factory in a neat twenty minute ride. The pictures would have been nicer if the sun had gotten its act together that day, but it didn't, so here's what I got:

no idea pineapple grew like that

this cockrel was trying to shake off the advances of a LUSTY peacock

I wandered back to the bus stop and waited for my ride home, stopping in a shopping centre to hear Hawaiian Christmas carols before meandering along Waikiki beach to the hostel. The cheapest drinks the local ABC stores (sort of like a Sainsbury's Local) sold was the same brand of Californian champagne I had toasted my 26th birthday to with Leah in Monterey. Seven bucks and it didn't taste like a urinal in a strip club. THAT'LL DO. 

I took my loot back to the hostel's teeny common area and shared it with my new room-mate, Martina from Sweden. Martina was on holiday with her mate Karin, who was fast asleep in our room, exhausted from the trek halfway across the world. She mentioned they'd hired a car for the next three days and would I like to join her and two other Swedes on a road trip to the east coast the next day?

Four Swedes and Abha packed into one rental car?

There is only one appropriate way to end this post, and it is with this video >>>

WE AT THA' SLATS! - Las Vegas

Las Vegas; a theme-park for adults, where the ride is a rollercoaster of your personal finances and thousands of dreams are crushed and reformed from a pile of smouldering betting slips in a heartbeat.

It's not for the faint-hearted, but even those who detest extensive neon lighting and unrelenting garishness will find a soft spot for this city of the perpetual weekend in the Nevadan desert.

Because we had the foresight to book about five months in advance, we were able to secure a room in OAP Central, The Flamingo on Las Vegas strip for about £115 for two of us for a four night epic.

We crawled into the city, our flame red Dodge Avenger inching past landmarks like the MGM Grand, New York New York casino and the legendary fountains of the Bellagio.

The pavements were crammed with all kinds of curious creatures that form the spectrum of humanity; it was like Noah's sodding Ark for delinquents. Tramps and vagabonds battling for supremacy over the bubble-gum stained pavements in front of McDonald's, rich kids sweating the previous night's champagne indulgence into the doorways of Gucci and Prada, studded motorheads chewing on leathery cheeseburgers at the Harley Davidson casino and bumbag-wearing retirees on holiday from their Florida sheltered accomodation, trying their luck at a game of craps and sucking faces after a few hours at Margaritaville. All were there, all were hopeful.

After throwing our stuff in our pink-fluff bedecked room, we headed out to join the masses, clucking in annoyance when small children and pensioners got in our way. Long gone was the slow, easy stride we'd picked up from the desert. We had a session to get on with. Didn't these slow pokes know there was FREE CHAMPERS to be had on the casino floor?

After submitting ourselves to a screening for the pilot of a TV show at the MGM Grand (the show, starring McLovin of SuperBad, was okay, but a little too try-hard with the jokes) we made it to the glitzy, ritzy and snazmattazmic Bellagio and slid onto the faux leather stools in front of the penny slot machines, trying not to flag down the gliding waitresses too enthusiastically.

I fed the machine a $1 note and slowly tapped the 'Place Bet' button, making sure the 1 cent light was lit. Finally, after losing a dismal 43 cents thanks to my paltry bets, my peripherial vision detected a middle-aged blonde woman picking her way towards me, red-lipsticked mouth stretched into a smile that didn't quite meet her eyes and order book at the ready.

'Drink, honey?' she asked.

'Yes please', I showed her my teeth and said in the hesitant Hugh-Grant-in-Four-Weddings-manner that foreigners associate with every Briton that ever lived, 'erm... Would it be alright if I had a glass of champagne please?'

'SURE! 'Course you can hun', she beamed, properly, genuinely now. 'You want the same sweetie?' she looked at Leah, who was aghast at my request for such extravagance. 'No problem, I'll be right back. Love that accent'.

living the high life

And that was how we whiled away the first portion of our evening in Vegas: playing the pennies but only as a front to attract more waitresses and their seemingly endless shipment of alcohol.

When our bums got sore and we tired of winning scraps on the machines, we made our way to Caesar's Palace where a suited and booted man named Jesus stood guard at the gates, armed with nightclub fliers for tipsy girls on a mission to spend as little green as possible. HELLO.

Despite our jeans and jumpers combo, Jesus flagged us down and furnished us with little pieces of card that entitled us to free admission to PURE, Caesar's nightclub, with free drinks until midnight. Now, under normal circumstances, we're not the kind of girls who go and do MTV-dancing in dark, anonymous nightclubs where banter is out of the question and the primary aim for most attendees is to attract a mate. But, open bar. 
A friend from home was also in town and planning to make a beeline for the same club later that night. So it made sense to go, load up and leave like the casual Cinderellas we were when the clock stuck twelve. How bad could it be?

ABSOLUTELY HORRENDOUS.

It was a master remix of a night out in Watford, Chingford, Newcastle and Glasgow rolled into one atrocious bump-and-grind session. The women wore tight bodycons (even those with a few extra lumps and bumps had ill-advisedly managed to winch themselves into one, doing that shallow, quick breathing thing to ensure their lung capacity stayed at a minimum and they didn't tear their side seams) with deep necklines. Ankle-breaker heels on, hairspray threatening to breach health and safety regulations, faces frozen somewhere between trying not to shart and utter disdain for anyone that dared to so much as glance in their direction.

Then there were the men. Oh, the men. Some of their shirts where buttoned lower than the girls' necklines, occasionally revealing a perma-tanned peck, but more often than not, a gristly moob. Their eyes hunted the women, searching, waiting for the first wobble that signalled the free drinks were working on lowering their inhibitions, and hopefully their pants too.

Leah and I commandeered a table at the edge of the dance floor and enjoyed our new powers of invisibility. We tried to get as many drinks to our table as we could, racking them up for when they would no longer be free and doing some fantastic comedy R'n'B dancing to the poorly DJ'd music. I bumped into my chum from home, Jeremy, who was thrashing out some shapes on the dance floor and adding his own rap to the smoke and music that swirled above our heads:

'Yeah we're in Vegas! Whaddya make of us? Yo, don't be hatin' on us! We're just happy to be here, don' want no freakin' fuss!'
(Or something along those lines.)

Leah bowed out at midnight but I stayed on for another hour, bouncing around the rooftop bar, paying a painful $10 per beer and watching Jez chatting up the laydeez, fall over and make me try on his glasses.

Then I headed for home, weaving my way out of the throng, through the casino, onto the road and into the Flamingo where I fully expected to open the door to a slumbering Gassonimator. SHE WAS NOWHERE TO BE SEEN. Awol! How could this be? Perhaps she had been talked into a game of Craps, misunderstood the concept and required assistance and a well-planned exit strategy. Should I contact her relatives? The A-Team? Call a plumber?
No, it transpired that that evening, she was simply more double hard than me and had continued to happily trundle along the Strip, muttering to herself, ordering more complimentary drinks and writing abusive messages on Facebook.
What a trooper.

crab legs, prawns, grilled fish, salad, mexican rice, sausage

nachos, salsa, sesame ball, roast beef, bun

Food was the activity of the day, we decided when we woke up feeling bruised and confused the next morning.

Vegas, the most excessive city in the nation of excess, offers unlimited buffets for every tastebud, every wallet, every fancy.

A welcome pack from The Flamingo in our room contained vouchers for a discounted meal at Flavor's buffet located in Harrah's Casino, so we decided to head over and fill our boots.

sushi, fish, prawns

Snow crab, prawns, sushi, vine leaves, spare ribs dripping in chemically-enriched gloop, fortune cookies, fajitas and thick slices of honey-roast ham, it was all there for the taking. And boy, did I try. After all, there are children starving in Africa. I owed it to them to eat until it started to feel weird around my heart.

I managed three plates and then a dessert plate as well before I admitted defeat. In the battle against Abha and the buffet, this time, the buffet had triumphed.

watermelon adds balance

The next couple of days were lost to Vegas where most buildings have neither a clock or windows, travelling out to Fremont Street on the Deuce, watching free shows outside Caesar's Place and the Bellagio, gawping open-mouthed at cowboys in town for the Rodeo at the Convention Centre and catching Mardi Gras beads at the Rio casino. It was during Rio's Show in the Sky performance that a pudgy, scrunchied she-beast very nearly gouged out my right eyeball, such was her desire to take home some strands of the cheap gold beads herself.

Over the course of our stay, I found myself pushing more and more dollar notes into the slots, placing larger bets each time. There was no point playing a penny a go, you'd never win anything. No, to win big you had to bet big. TWENTY CENTS A BET. That was how I began rolling, Leah clucking in disapproval next to me but egging me on too. My risky stance paid off for a few jubilant minutes, taking my winnings up to a dizzying $15 before the House began to claw back the cash.

Hey ho, that's how Vegas goes. For small fry like us anyway. Leah had somehow managed to transform her 30 cents in credit to $5.45 in real cash and was buzzing with glee that she'd now be able to purchase her dinner as well as a pack of sanitary towels. Some people might have riches, others fame, we're happy with the smaller pleasures in life.

winning

Desert Drive: Kiss My Texas

PHASE ONE: KISS MY TEXAS
We started our Desert Road fairytale in Houston, TX crashing at Friends House Downtown hostel. Run by a couple so sweet you might need an insulin shot after leaving reception, Danny and Leah were sympathetic to our horrendous night's sleep in the dorm and moved us into a spare private room the next night for no extra charge. We had been sharing our dorm with a bunch of hugely irksome manchildren who shot each other over-playful jibes and spent most of the night shouting their heads off to illustrate how amazingly fun and party ready they were. Leah and I were becoming telepathic with our constant shooting of annoyed looks. For the forty-eighth time in my life I cursed the Gods for failing to bless me with Carrie White's telekinetic powers. I could have exacted fiery revenge on these dweebs. It's Sunday night - DIAL IT DOWN.

Thanks to our over-exertions in NOLA, neither of us had the sufficient number of functioning electrodes to operate properly. So we went to Macy*s, where we found the shelves stocked with cowboy boot Christmas stockings and racially segregated Santa Claus's. Then we went to Walmart to balance everything out.

It wasn't until we were leaving the city that we actually got it together enough to see some sights. First stop was the Beer Can House.
Built in 1966 by John Milkovisch, who still lives there, the house looks like the secret den of a bored alcoholic. We stood outside on the pavement marvelling at yet another American roadside oddity, this one  created by approximately ten million cans of Texas Pride.
The Beer Can house sits weirdly among the other suburban homes and even in a gentle breeze sounds like an elephant trampling on a hot tin roof. It's only open on the weekends though, so we loitered outside gawking for ten minutes before heading on out to...

sleeps three. cosy.

The National Museum of Funeral History! You can't spell funeral without a smattering of FUN. We pulled up outside a suitably sombre building on the outskirts of Houston, ready to delve into the macabre world of the Grim Reaper. The museum began predictably with the funeral traditions and corteges of late US presidents and the lives and deaths of various popes (this exhibit's only draw being the actual POPEMOBILE! Duhna duhna duhna duhna POPEMAN!) before dissecting the Mexican's Day of the Dead ritual and the oddball world of Ghanaian fantasy coffins first chiseled by sculpturer Kane Quaye. They know how to go out in style those Ghanaians, commissioning coffins styled as cockrels and rockets and rowing boats to capture the essence of the departed. Why go for boring ash or dry old oak when you can travel to the afterlife in a marfuckin' lobster?! 

There was also a coffin covered in dollar bills and coins, protected from grave robbers' sweaty paws by three inches of impenetrable perspex. For those who believe you can take life's riches with you. It's the Kim Kardashian of deathware - flashy, trashy and without a drop of soul, but super photogenic and strangely desirable. It's really shiny.

There was also a section on celebrity passings, focusing largely on US entertainers and accomplishers but also a death wall dedicated to The 27 Club featuring our very own Amy Winehouse and Kurt Cobain. No idea what Christopher Reeve was doing there though. 

Austin next. We drove west under skies that seemed pregnant with rain but never came good on that threat. We'd been in Texas for three days but as yet had no recorded sighting of that elusive rhinestone cowboy. Or any cowboys at all for that matter. I'd been expecting a line of John Wayne look-a-likes lassoing cacti in perfect synchronicity on the Louisiana/Texas border, but to no avail. Oh well, life can be hard, that's one thing this trip has taught me. That, and that Britain has the best selection of salty snacks in the world. Took me near on two months to find a pack of salt and vinegar crisps, yet pickled pig lips are freely available at farmer's markets across the land. What kind of world is this?

In Austin we met up with a teacher we befriended back in our hostel in Boston, Marcela. She had entertained us the weekend before Halloween with stories of gangland kidnappings in her Mexican homeland. Austin, a tiny drop of blue in an otherwise hardcore Republican state, was now her town and we arranged to liaise at a bar called the Lustre Pearl on Rainey Street  for a few drinks and a chit chat. Rainey is lined with houses renovated into bars, so that the entire street looks like it's in the running to host the world's biggest house party. There was one bar fashioned to look like the White House with an alien landing on its lawn and another that felt like the inside of a gentleman's country cabin. The Lustre Pearl was doing drink combos including a can of beer and measure of whiskey for three bucks (named Long Hair Don't Care. Charmant) and it sounded like Austin was a hip little town too. Marcela told us about the cute boutique stores and shops making me wish we could have stolen another day from our tight travel schedule and stuck around for longer, but the clock was ticking and our desert trek still had a way to go.