The Sabbatical

So the bar scene in Santa Barabara to be kind, is I think designed for the surfer dude and the kind of young, spoilt twats who drive mummy and daddy's BMW's at the weekend....but having checked out the internet we found a "Special" place for "special people" like us - on Sunday - i.e. last night...it was called Wildcats formerly the Red Lounge...one bar and one night only - so how could we miss it?!!!

So... we took a deep breath, chuckled to ourselves and walked in.....it's odd I'm 37 and I still don't really like going into unfamiliar bars...weird...but.OH GOD! - it was exactly what I had expected or rather feared...it was DEAD....but a lovely sweet girl behind the bar welcomed us into this "Red" themed bar..I know why it was called the Red Lounge because EVERYTHING was RED.....and I mean everythng - including me - who was starting to look like an Entree on a Red Lobster menu - the sun had killed me today - and my skin didn't like it! - so the human Tomato was sat at the bar with Alex slurping my ice cold J.D and Coke - Alex had a beer as we looked around,or rather surveyed our new bar..... it didn't take long.

We noticed a pool table which unusually was not dominated by the hurley burly "men women" who like to wear Dr Martins. - you know the sort....short hair, hormone therapy victims, ......well I checked out the table - it was old and battered - but the choices were bleak - it was either try and play pool on a decrepid table or watch a crap programme about making a skateboard rink in you back yard on the plasma straddling the bar .....so we decided on pool - but then just as we were getting our hopes up, we discovered that 2 balls were missing...?!! Who the hell would steal a billiard ball? - I had thought for a moment that if you paid the bartender then you got the two balls and the cue - but after a gentle inquiry - I got a "No, sorry, some bastard must have taken them"........."but there is some Pizza behind you".....Sorry?? How is that going to help my missing balls predicament?....it was a rhetorical question to myself - but like a sheep I turned and looked over to the boxes of pizza lined up - it was like "Deal Or No Deal" - but WHERE THE HELL WAS NOEL?

The boxes of Pizza was obviously some kind of ploy to drag cutomers in....Mmmmmm come on in to an EMPTY bar and eat shitty cold pizza that I swear must have been bought 3 days ago -....yes- I checked out a slice, and after almost choking on a mouthful of jalpeno's (I thought the green blotches were green peppers) -I discreetly rolled up the slice in a white napkin and stuck it behind a pizza box....Christ I felt like going for a stomach pump - but I would have missed all the fun - so the JD will have to do.

Shortly after almost killing myelf on cold pizza, two holiday makers arrived - Darryl & Tim - a couple from Southern California - they were obviously cheesed off as we were - and asked if it got busier later on - "Christ, I hope so" I replied...and that's when the "sooo your'e not from around these, there, them, parts are yah?"....."Actually no. We are from London"..(in the Queens best english)..and after that, the drinks flowed and so did the conversation which we really enjoyed... Daryll was a School Principal and my age too! Quite an achivement I thought to be running an 800 kid school at his age, and his partner worked in logistics..(Fedex)..

As our conversation blossomed so did the bar I'm pleased to say - it soon filled up with attitude; Abercrombie wanna be's and mingers... it was pretty clicky but we had a laugh - laughing at some of the mind bogglingly ugly retards that crawled out from under their stones the moment it got dark...God there were some sights,...I have no idea why the doorman was not issuing Michael Jackson style masks at the door....I would have had Gran from Catherine Tate on the Door in charge of the admission policy.....I can just imagine it..."oh no...not you sweetheart...I don't fucking think so..ohhh no...look at the fucking state of you...you've got one eye looking at me and one eye looking for me......too fucking ugly love you see...now piss off...go on sling your fucking ugly hook"..cackling as she said it...God bless her....

I saw some sights.. but I drew the line at the 70 year old Drag Queen who thought he was Marilyn Monroe or the ugly barmaid out of Shrek.... with a really deep voice - picture it? Yeah it wasn't pretty...He could have at least had a fucking shave and made an effort to do Drag properly....lazy mare!

The music was also horrendous - and in London the DJ would have been hanged - he certainly would not have been invited back - it was black street rap? You diggin me bro?....yes - not really my thing - and I was very gracious about it all - until I had had a few more JD's and ther was no improvement...so I was forced to say something impolite to the DJ and demanded that "it" played a bit of Madge or Babs....anything except this eardrum melting shite he had been smashing out all night..........suffice it to say - my request fell on deaf ears and the head thrashing crap continued. .....

Well 1 am rolled around and we made our farewells to our new friends from San Diego...we then realised we could eat cardboard we were so hungry and Santa Barbara is NOT New York - we crawled around for ages and found some local store "for local people" - and yes the people in there were like something out of the "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen"...so in the end we did eat cardboard but it was disguised as a chicken sandwich and a tuna sandwich...YUK.....

...and now? I'm sat by the pool in full shade writing this blog nursing a horrendous hang over thinking "never again" (as you often do the next day!)...well I'm not having another drink...until we get to LA tomorrow - we are going to meet up with Sinead in LA and some other friends of ours - so our 5 days stay there should be fantastic....we will set off early tomorrow and drive down the Pacific Highway - YIPPEE!

Oh and as for meeting up with dear Sinead (a work colleague of mine), I have played safe and have just won an ebay action for a new liver...which I will definitely need after I have seen her!

More from LA soon.

a

Well I couldn't do Yosemite and not go to Sequioa and the King Canyon Parks - so having done a little research on the little Pamphlets our friends at the Sheraton provided, we tapped in the co-ordinates on the Sat Nav and set off...

I drove - I love driving in the US - it is effortless - the cars all automatic just glide down the wide, smoothe, roadwork free carriage ways - even the traffic lights seem friendly - unlike "Red Kens" who are deliberately timed to cause maximum inconvenience to drivers. The gasoline is also SOOO cheap (even though Americans are outraged at the "high" price) - we are driving a big old jeep and it cost only $18 to fill up! I could lose it when I think it costs £48 to fill my car back at home or rather $60!! We are so utterly screwed in the UK.

I was musing about this (spitting chips with indignation) as we crossed the sun scorched landscape tuning into out favourite radio stations as we went, although annoyingly, we had to keep re-tuning because it seems you can't go 5km without losing the signal!

We soon started to climb higher and reached Sequioa national park - it wan't long before we came across the loffy gigantic Sequioa trees and red woods that attract millions of tourists a year..the sunny road was suddenly dark ...the light blotted out by these huge trees...and we spotted lots of other cars just stop before us - so we jumped out too and couldn't believe the size of these trees - they are incredible - we went to see General Sherman which is the largest living tree on the Planet - and all I can say is that you have to see it to beleive it - I have posted some photos but they do not give you a sense of the scale of the tree - It was massive and to think that when it was sappling - the Greeks were holding the first olympics - some 2,300 years ago....its mind boggling....After paying our respects to General Sherman, we drove up to Hume Lake with the idea that we would have lunch and take 5 - the lake looked beautiful resting some 8,000ft above sea level - that was the good news - the bad news was that it had been taken over by a Christian Camp Site! Crap - a Happy Clappy convention...

Everyone was welcome (....oh yeaah...to convert that is) ...Sir Steve was all up for reading his book (not the bible!) and chilling out but I had other ideas ...."God loves you" signs made me wince and although I have nothing against people (aka sheep) who find solace in faith (however pointless to me it may be) I didn't feel like talking about God especially not to some prick of a god fearing do gooder...so we got back in the car and accidentally wheel spinned off (Jeremy Clarkson style). I know I will burn in hell for that - but according to those "good christians" I'm off to hell anyway- so who gives a crap!

We left "Jesus R Us" and headed up to Cedar Grove to see the rapids and again they were beautiful - that's when the sky went black and I started to get worried. The clouds rolled in at the speed of light and unleashed a down pour - I now understand how a "Flash Flood" could occur around there and started to feel grateful I was driving a 4X4 - we might need that after all! You don't want to get caught in a flood or rock fall in that Park - being positive for a second - if your car went over the edge and that could happen easily because there are few safety railings - just sheer drops of 500ft - then a Grizzly bear would find you before search and rescue..!

Luckily the rain stopped and we headed out of the glorious park and headed back to Fresno before heading off to Santa Barbara.

After watching Transformers at the cinema (which I loved!)We couldn't be bothered to go to a restuarant so we went to Subway instead and had the pure delight to be served by 2 middle aged toothless crack heads who were in the middle of an agument because "Laurel" had been mopping the floor in front of the counter even though they were still open and "Hardy" didn't appreciate it ....they looked like something out of Lord of the Rings..each had nervous ticks..and both obvious victims of drug abuse...but they loved the fact that we came from London - which was really nice.....but I quietly wished they would focus on the job in hand - My Italian BLT - and not spit over my lettuce...YUK!

Despite the Sub-way sandwiches, we didn't die of poisoning in our sleep and woke up with another trip ahead of us..This time we had to drive to Santa Barbara..and god it was hot... "REAL HOT"..As we left Fresno with the temperature gauge showing it was 108 degrees outside and unbearable!

The A/C worked hard on our way to Santa barbara which was a 4.5 hour drive - Sir Steve drove as I uploaded photos onto my lap top from my camera. At last we were going to see the sea...but what I didn't get - was why do you have to turn on your headlgihts in the middle of the day? Sign posts instuct you to turn on our lights for the next 33 miles? Wierd!

As we got closer it definately got cooler and we started to frown - bugger! We had planned 3 days by the sun on the beach - clouds were not on the agenda - but sure enough it wasn't the weather we had left in Fresno. There was plenty of cloud cover..We also saw some of the landscape scarring caused by the recent rampant forest fires on the hillsides coming into Santa Barbara - We noticed a few very lucky houses - who must have been shitting bricks when the fires were roaring....they were VERY lucky to have escaped....whole hillsides were wiped out....

We quickly found our hotel and checked in...it was just off the beach - Hotel Mar Monte. I was getting tired and it wasn't exactly what we had expected so Sir Steve handled the check in procedure whilst I watched a the skinniest women alive on this planet...(hello California) a Japanese tourist... take photos of some poor bride "to-be" and her mother..who were incredibly patient and polite with the tourist but I sat there fuming for them...thinking "Why can't you just leave them alone - it's their day and they are not a circus act"......

Anyway with check in sorted I contineud to inspect the hotel about me......don't get me wrong - the hotel is in a perfect location, 20 seoconds off East Beach - clean, tidy rooms - great gym and helpful staff - but it just looked tired and needed a refurb. I can't be the only one to notice this can I?...and at $250 a night it aint' cheap!

In fact Sir Steve who lived in Santa Barbara as a kid for a short period was slightly disappointed too - and we were going to be stuck here for 3 days!!!....Immediately we were planning plan B - and were thinking about phoning the W Hotel in LA to have a longer stay there...but we decided to see what happened and give it a go... we actually expected something a bit more glitzy or rather cosmopolitian (aka a pulse) - for christ sake I have seen the soap opera Santa Barbera - so where is that Santa Barbera?!!!!

After we dumped our bags and headed off to explore, the first thing we noticed was the amount of homeless people - YES there is plenty of money here - but there is a lot of homelessness too... they are everywhere...given that there are public showers/ bath houses off the beach and they can sleep comfortably on the beach at night then I guess it should be no surprise to see so many....but it was an eye opener....mm it just gets better

The main drag is State St - and this is a gorgeous long street, lined with pretty and expensive boutique stores, loads of Starbucks (so I am happy!); bars and restaurants - and today the sun came out so Santa Barbara is rising up on the "agreeable scale"...

Today we have lounged on the beach all day, behind us was the palm tree lined main st of Cabrillo Avenue and before us the Pacific ocean...I had sun stroke within 30 seconds - and played chess...the sea was not hot enough for me and I didn't fancy playing "patter cake" with Jaws so I was content listening to my ipod slowly being baked to death by the sun...listening to the hum of people as they laugh and shout and enjoy their holidays..meanwhile I fall in and out of a comfortable slumber...with the sea lapping the shores 30 feet away - "perfick".

Tonight we hit State Street....

A