Cierra R.I.P

That's it, rotdrip is over.

We had the starter engine changed yesterday, but now the radiator broke. Fixing that would be upwards from 500 bucks, so we won't do it. We'll just take a train to San Francisco, and that's it then. Well, we got quite close to the finish line after all :)

Ode to Cierra

Oh Cierra, you minx
Our love was yours
For thru many a hangover
You carried us stolidly
With nary a word against
But now the evening descends
And your liquid so fluorescent
Gaily flow along the rents
Of this country of potholes.
I blame the roads.

Isn't there a saying like that too? Don't hate the driver, hate the road?

The Simpsons

Forgot the pic from our ride of the Simpsons in the Universal Studios. Here it is. Fancy.

East -> West

Greetings dears. We have more than enough material to make another monster update. Yay, goes the crowd. Anyhoo, Juval's laptop really broke down for reasons obscure and non-apparent, so we are using the hand-me-down laptop of Sten, this awesome guy we met in New Orleans. This particular iBook is a bit older, and it lacks bluetooth, so we still have some problems with images.. Addendum: bought a netbook.

However, to the meat!

Wed 24.6.

Easy wednesday to blog - we drove the whole night, had naps at some rest stops along the highways and ended up at Robin's (our hostess for New Orleans) somewhen during the morning. Robin gives us free reign over her absent roommate John's room and bathroom, and goes back to bed. We immediately follow her example, and take a strong nap after the harrowing drive.

We try to shop a bit.

Ooh aah goes the crowd, the sophistication! Even the food carriages ride at Target (or is this Home Depot?)

Helmet is always useful.

Later we check out the in/famous Bourbon St in the heart of the New Orleans french quarter, and find it populated by professional ladies, non-locals, shady characters and clubs with bad music. Disappointment is palpable. Still reeling from the previous days, we retire early.

Thu 25.6.

Thursday begins with traditional large po' boy sandwiches from a nearby bakery (alligator sausage link and chicken) and while Sakari is fetching those with Robin, Juval is finishing up the last blog post. Robin! (her name includes the exclamation mark) helpfully tells us that even though Bourbon St is the famous one, you won't meet any locals there. However, there is another strip in the french quarter, called Frenchmen St, and that is where all the good music and people are situated.

While Juval continues to work on the blog, Sakari takes the car and roams around New Orleans, happily finding a book store. Later that evening the duo heads up to the Frenchmen St, where they visit DBA and Dragon's Den and some other places, and make some new friends in the Mohawk Man and Janice. At some point of the night Sakari loses Juval and starts looking for him. Plenty of strolling, head-swiveling and hollering later Juval's voice drifts down from above. Man has climbed a tree. Again.

Mohawk Man

Janice

Regular size tire

Fri 26.6.

Robin! shows us Little Tokyo, this amazing sushi-restaurant, where some of us get hot sake. From there Juval and Sakari ride the street car all across the city, seeing old mansions and nice streets, but also spending 1,5h of time doing that. Boys end up at the Columns Hotel.

Columns Hotel is this old style mansion now turned hotel / bar filled with the old southern genteel "upper class" people. It so happens that they are also filming a Hollywood-movie at the Columns Hotel, so there are interesting people to talk to. After some time the Finns get tired of the place however and take a taxi to the university district, where there's a promise of more laid back bars.

Boys and the Columns Hotel

Janice from the day before joins us at the Boot, where the boys already got an invitation to a genuine high school house party.. After a quick visit to another bar (called Palms) where one pays for the drinks if the coin toss goes wrong, otherwise it is free. Sadly Juval calls it wrong :( It is okay though, for we still got the drinks. After Palms the boys and Janice find a friendly guy from the street who drives them to the home party, where there should be a keg. What we find is quite young people a bit inebriated, but fun was had by all.

Sat 27.6.

Robin!'s sister, now returned from Mongolia, and whom we briefly met when we came home Fri-Sat night, Robin! herself and the boys all get some po' boys from the by now familiar bakery. Alligator sausage still going strong. Juval's laptop breaks down somewhere here, for no apparent reason. We find an apple store, but the geniuses there cannot do anything, even though they call Steve himself. We also find a book store real fast :)

We go home after many an almost-fruitless hour, visit a food market on the way, and then one Matt comes over, after which we start to prepare for a night out. Frenchmen St it is! Janice and her friend join us, which of course makes the night all the more merrier. After Russian, Japanese, and plain decrepit, bars visited, drinks to bartenders bought, mock wrestling and tree or Sakari climbing done, bayou swimming and napping by the water accomplished the party winds down. None too early, one might add.

Sun 28.6.

Last night's excesses manifest themselves mostly as scrapes and bruises, but we did manage to lose some glasses, not the Finns' though. Sadly the Finns are preparing to leave, as per plan (what plan, huh?), and after lots of goodbyes, breaks and a long dinner, the guys are ready to drive through the night to get to Austin, TX.

Cierra however disagrees. The battery has died, utterly.

"Do you guys have a problem?", shouts someone unknown from the other side of the street, and we have to admit we do. It turns out to be a neighbor couple of houses down ("the skinny house"), Sten, who works at a local broadcasting company, but who apparently builds cars on his down time, for while Juval gets a new battery from Wal-Mart (we know, we had the nice record of 0 Wal-Marts visited, but it was the only place open that late), Sten gets his nice jack and err all kinds of other tools Sakari is hard pressed to recognize from his house, and when the battery gets to the scene, he does most of the work changing it, while Juval and Sakari either tell stupid jokes or point the light at wrong locations.

Sten the man fixing our car while we uselessly point the light in every direction

Sten in action again

Cierra's battery is smartly located behind the rear fender, so taking off the front tire is close to mandatory. While we are doing that, one of the studs breaks in half. Sten tries to hammer it in so it would come out from the backside, and we could get a new stud, but the axle plate is on the way. Ingenious design. Boys have to stay in New Orleans for one more night to show the car to a proper mechanic the next morning. Robin! makes an omelette, and 'tis delicious too. w00t!

Robin, the omelette guru and mistress of the house

Sten calls Sakari after a while and asks the boys to come out, for "I have something for you guys." We go out and there he is, with a bag, from which he pulls the iBook I'm currently writing this post from. Who gives out laptops? Apparently someone who has plenty of them from the schools that abandoned old laptops after Katrina, but, still, Insane. :) We are mighty grateful, guess the southern hospitality is not just a myth.

Mon 29.6.

Next morning Robin! and Lisa go to work (girls have a gig as twins, which they are not, but look similar enough to fit the bill, as the pretty ladies you sometimes meet around the tables in different kind of expos or shows) while we go to R&S Auto Service. Guys at R&S Auto Service cannot remove the stud either, but they can tighten it against the tire so it does not scrape against the back plate, and thus it is possible for the Finns to continue on their way. To Austin! After one more set of po' boys, where Sakari goes for the authentic shrimp experience, as per Janice's recommendation, and Juval for the roast beef as per Sten's we leave. Both are delicious.

At R&S Auto Services

10 hours later - Austin, TX. We meet up Emily and Jodie, who are friends of Erica from Chicago, at their house, plus their four-legged friends, of which one we nickname as East-West. Smart dog though, just looks dumb :) Funny girls too. Anyhoo, after some tacos the girls whip up, we check out their local haunt, where friends are easy to make and pitchers cheap, and where the DJ knows Hanoi Rocks (finnish band). Awesome. When the place closes up we end up at some Japanese-style Karaoke bar that is still illegally open, with some 20 other people. Some fun was had.

East-West, check out the eyes

Karaoke after party

Karaoke after party and a man dancing on a table

Not being careful can lead to one stepping into a cactus

Tue 30.6.

We wake up early with Juval, and head to San Antonio, to see the infamous Alamo, the site of massacre between the Mexican army and a Texan (or Texian, as they were called then) fortress, called, surprisingly, the Alamo. We take the water walk around the town, which is a sight to see.

The Alamo

The Alamo long barracks

San Antonio water walk entrance and the shady character

San Antonio water walk and Sakari

Back to Austin, we need some Finnish rock to keep Juval awake, but all goes well and we end up having a hefty nap at Emily's at the end. After that we hit Austin's answer to New Orleans' Bourbon St, the 6th St. There specifically we go to Shangri-La, to see Joe, the bartender at the place, and also the guy we met at the Karaoke bar last night. Joe regales us with his stories, and gives us advice of different good places in Austin. Man has also been to London many a time, and is European minded, so we get along well. Not that we haven't done that with others, but.

We walk along the 6th St, see Emily and Jodi and some others, visit Coyote Ugly and the bar of the flaming drinks and Side Bar after which we end up in a pool party somewhere in the suburbs with Bill and Shannon and Jocelyn and perhaps some others.

Wed 1.7.

Breakfast is Mexican, after which the boys try to find a T-Mobile, for Juval has run out of credit for his phone, but we find none. When we get home there's Emily, Jodi and Shasta ready for a trip to the Krause Springs, about 45min drive outside from Austin. We drive there with the roof down, and have a relaxing swim. Or float.

He so dextrous

Krause Springs


Swinger

Drive back from the Springs

Back in Austin we get burgers before Juval and Sakari decide it is time to start moving towards Dallas. Plan is to drive there and go to sleep at Katie's place, a girl we met in Chicago. We drive Austin-Dallas interval for twice as long as we should, and end up in Dallas at 5 am. Sleepy Katie opens the door for us, and we collapse on living room futon. Thanks a fu-ton Katie, deeply appreciated!

Thu 2.7.

Next morning Katie leaves early to San Diego for couple of weeks, so we wake up alone in her apartment. It is okay, we leave her a note and get to hunting T-Mobile for Juval again. We find one, and get some Domino's as well, and then starts the drive of some 2200 km.

Katie

550 km later we are in Lubbock, it is about 11pm, and we meet up with Juval's friend from Brussels airport, Eric, for some Buffalo wings. Juval gets Blazin' sauce (the hottest they have, of, like, 15 different variations so..). Sakari tries one of the second hottest from Juval's plate, and loses his voice for a while.

Somewhere along this route we got a bit bored and had to do some recreation.

First pass at 1:50, 2nd at 4:15

Hello, sir.

Then it is through Clovis to Flagstaff and north to Grand Canyon. In Flagstaff when we are having a nap Sakari forgets the head lights on, and the battery is again empty. We find a guy who gives us a jump start, and the whole process takes maybe 5 minutes. Getting professional.

Fri 3.7.

Grand Canyon! Fucking Yeah Canyon more like!

No jumping

Wish I had camera-eyes

Juval

Sakari

Rabid killer-beast at the front

We arrive in Las Vegas late, get some chinese grub, and head to Encore Casino's club XS, which is the newest and hippest and coolest club in Vegas at the moment. Which we immediately notice, "You guys might be too casual for here", says the bouncer, seeing our t-shirts. T-shirts are not cool. After some wheedling the bouncer asks the foreman who goes "They'll blend right in", and lets us in. Thank you, sir.

In XS we run into Janna (Juval's beautiful GF for the unknowing), Sanna (twin sister) and Heidi (friend), and their entourage of approximately 234 guys willing to buy drinks. About XS - any drink 15 bucks, + tip, makes it closer to 20, and 30 bucks in. About XS #2 - at some point of the night someone dancing on the floor starts throwing money in the air.

Taste of XS, and this was only the back porch

Sat 4.7.

Saturday morning after some slot playing and breakfast we find a mall where we buy ourselves some collared dress shirts, and Sakari finds a book store and new flip flops. Janna and Juval get foxy and take a great picture, after which Juval finds a new camera to replace the broken one. After shopping we need some down-time, Janna goes to her place to put some make-up on while the guys take a short rest.

Sakari buys flip flops, but first needs to wear manly see-thru socks

Foxy Ladies! Bestest picture everest.

Bell-boy comes bearing gifts

After ironing the shirts and a quick visit to casino's gambling area, the boys head out and buy two 67 oz (2 litres) plastic beer bottles of Miller Lite (12 bucks each) from the street. In Vegas public consumption is okay, so while strolling with the huge ass beers, boys make friends with a 50 year old contractor and his 37 year old girlfriend from Pittsburgh, with whom they have a long chat about today's world, politics and computers.

Vegas / 4th of July

The Strip

Quite large beers

After that it is time for the water show at Bellagio, where guys run into Johnny Depp, and then to some other like-minded people. We make friends with this group of really very stupid guys, one Alaskan Gandhi (also known as atai), Italian Fabio, Salty from New Zealand and The Turk (he has no other name, and if he did, I wouldn't tell, in fear of retaliation [it is Kemal though]). Guys are all military, in the states for some Nato exercise. So we get along well with them, as old military men ourselves ;)

Bellagio water show smudgily

With these peeps the night spirals down into chaos. We get some free drinks at Bellagio's, meet some angry non-straight women, visit Pure-club at Caesar's Palace, then to Body English in Hard Rock, where we for some weird reason get the best table of the club, in the middle and front of the dance floor.. Janna and Heidi join us there, and some dude who at first seems angry but then Sakari talks him out of it, while the bouncer does not know whether to join these guys or throw them out, and both are suggested from the nearby tables. Some fences are also erected, but they work not.

Body English

Gandhi (atai:)

Heidi, Salty at his element, Janna

Some things are too beautiful to not to publish

The Turk, Gandhi, random guy, Salty, bit of Sakke

Man of Iron Will, He of Self-Control, the Grand General of Turkish Legions, and also a nice drinking buddy Kemal

<3>

Sun 5.7.

We sleep. Until the guys from yesterday, who checked out this morning, come to our hotel room to chill out. We get some chinese all you can eat from across the street, and go check out the light show at Fremont downtown. It is quite late by then already, so the whole crew gets to Luxor Casino where guys have their stuff, and as a last gift before leaving those bros give us their VIP passes and drink tickets to a bunch of clubs.

Really? Deep-fried Twinkies and Oreo's (Domino's)? Face describes the taste.

Fremont, Las Vegas Phoon

See? A lightshow.

Headsplosion

Juval, Fabio, Kemal, Salty, Gandhi, Sakke, and the random guy who is cooler than we all together :(

Cowboy

Juval and Sakari feel the need for sleep after the guys leave, but before that we have to see an authentic Vegas show, and that happens in the form of Jubilee! at Bally's. The sets on the stage are insane, water pouring in, flames spewing, ships sinking and temples breaking apart, girls dancing, someone playing piano by throwing balls at it, couple of guys whirling bolero balls, shows of strength, acrobatics and singing, and, and, too much of everything.

We sleep after.

Mon 6.7.

We sleep long.

And then some chinese again, now just the duo, the two of us, the sloggers, bloggers 1 and 2.

Tee hee. I don't know.

Well, what to do? Boys deck out and head towards the Treasure Island -casino, where we get to see the Sirens of T.I. show.

The Sirens kidnapped one pirate

Boys come to challenge the Sirens..

..and down they go. (that ship sunk all the way in that pond..)

After the Sirens is over we go to the Mist, a bar in the TI-casino. The Finns run into Jessie and Perry from Wisconsin there, and get to know them, and decide to head to Rio-casino together, for it is Jessie's 21st birthday, and they've heard there is a nice place called Voodoo Lounge there. And there certainly is, and it has an open bar too, even if the cover is not cheap. And we meet this one guy who plays at the main event (poker) and his girl friend too. And night is fine.

Perry and Jessie

Sakari, Jessie and Perry and a really large head behind

Las Vegas from Voodoo Lounge

I do not know.

Tue 7.7.

We get back to the Bally's casino during the early hours of the day, or not so early, and decide to stay one more day in the room, for the room itself is not expensive.. Just everything else that comes with it. We sleep till 7 pm, and check out then, of a mind that Vegas has been seen and San Diego awaits :)

Leaving Vegas

Newest Casinos in Vegas, Wynn and Encore (XS was in Encore)

Fast sushi buffet and a visit to a book store later we start the 550km or so drive to San Diego, stopping at 03:30 am for a nap at a rest stop some 35mins from San Diego.

Wed 8.7.

Boys roll into Hostelling International of San Diego at 10 or so, do laundry, take showers, eat, Juval gets to explore the city and sees the famous Hotel Del Coronado while Sakari writes some more of this blog post.

Afterward we head to a San Diego Gaslamp district bar crawl.

David, Aron, Rob, Krysten, John @ bar crawl

And this is where I got with the first try. It is now Monday 13.7, and it is sunny in LA-area. Chilling at Jito's place, Juval and I, plus the Finnish girls Janna, Sanna, Sara and Heidi. About to head to Universal Studios soon, but I'll write as much as I can before that. This note ends here.

The bar crawl is led by a hostel's volunteer worker, Krysten, and the group consists of two grand English fellas, John and Rob, as well as Austrian Matthias, Australian Aron, German Malta and some others, in addition to us. We see a hip bar, an Irish pub (where the Finnish driver's license does not function as an I.D. for the first time in US soil), a bar where local people go and lastly a dancing bar called Whiskey Girl. Juval is on phone outside for too long and cannot get in, while Sakari and Rob play minesweeper.

Rob the Mighty

Thu 9.7.

Boys get to see Katie from Dallas/Chicago, and we have some good times at Pacific Beach eating fruits and La Jolla, spotting seals, and then later having Thai. Katie leaves to get Tristan out of work, and we have to check-in to the hostel again, and then it is nap-time. The Finns take a taxi to Tristan's, who works as a graphic designer and 3D artist and lives with two other guys in this nicely sized crib filled with gaming consoles, a pool table and a foosball table and all the stuff single-ish guys need. Some chilling ensues, after which we head to Ocean Beach.

Uuu fruity

Convertible baby!

Pacific Beach, Juval, Sakke, Katie

Pacific Beach phoon

La Jolla

La Jolla phoon

Katie, Juval, Sakke, Tristan

Chris. We met him in the bar.

Ocean Beach Bar, Chris, Tristan, Katie and Sakke

Tristan giving Katie her due :)

Ocean Beach is the most laid back area around here, we are told, and it sure seems so. We meet Chris and his chick, and maybe take some shots. Bars close up early here, so we leave, but then meet this Muay Thai boxer who lives nearby, with whom and some others we decide to have an after party. Party kind of dies down quickly, so we four (Katie, Tristan, Juval and Sakari) head back to Tristan's for some chilling.

Sakari needs to upload pictures and videos to the blog while Juval chews fat.

Fri 10.7.

Next morning we hurry to the hostel for check out, do some more laundry, organize pictures in the blog, and then head out to Santa Monica. On the way we stop at Office Depot and buy an Acer Aspire One netbook, because it got so difficult to update the blog with Sten's iBook since it does not have bluetooth and it did not cooperate with USB-cabled cameras :( still a useful gift, and Sakari wanted a netbook anyway, so all ended well.

LA traffic

We go to a hostel in Venice Beach, get some Chinese from Mao's Kitchen from across the road (recommending!), and then walk west on Main St until we find the night life-part, where we also find John and Rob, our Englishmen friends from San Diego. At some point of the night a crazy fight occurs (we are not part of it) directly in front of our bar's bouncers, and what do they do? Nothing. Police comes and ends it after some minutes.

Sat 11.7.

Venice Beach! Breakfast with Janna, Sanna, Sara and Heidi, John and Rob also join us later. Man who claims he sees aliens every day, and could go with them to a different planet, just like Michael Jackson went, but says that he will stay here and help the human kind instead, like an ambassador. Nice guy though.

Reunited with Finnish girls, Sanna and Heidi here

Janna and Sara

Venice Beach :)

The Englishmen, those savage warriors of sea


Venice Beach dance

Venice Beach! Some sun and swimming and boogie boarding, and Ben joins us. Ben is the guy at whose place the girls stay, really cool fella, law student and working summer at some law firm downtown. Anyhoo, we go to Mao's Kitchen again, all 9 of us, and decide that we'll all see later at Ben's place.

Mao's Kitchen! Back left Ben, Sara, Juval, Janna, Sanna / Back right Heidi, Sakari, John, Rob

"I'm cold", "I'm sweaty", "Close the windows", "Wind in my eye", "Open the windows" - about what it sounded like to have 4 girls in the back seat :)

Ben

Ben's Place

Ben takes us to a house-warming party in Santa Monica/Beverly Hills/I'm all hazy about LA-districts but the place is awesome and the view is awesomer. These three guys who live at the house are really nice and laid back about us joining the party. Sakari does a keg-stand (with push-ups for cool points!). Thanks guys, sure was an experience! :)

John & Zach

The Keg


The Keg Stand

The Mighty Rob

Juval and Heidi

Sanna and Jito

Pool (Carl at right is one of the residents)

Balcony

View of LA from aforementioned

On the way to the party Jito joined us, he is one of the guys girls got to know before we got to town. Jito's this half-pro surfer and all-pro scientist-kind of dude, a genuine good guy. We continue the party at his place, and actually end up sleeping at his mansion-like home in Santa Monica.

Sun 12.7.

Check-out from the now useless hostel, and then it is surfing time at Venice Beach! We get there first, then Jito and Nick and Sarah and Tommy and Zach and err a whole group of people join us, and they bring a surplus surf-board. Which we get to try out with Juval. Catching the wave is farking AWESOME! :D We both stood up too. For, like, two seconds.

Afterward it is Ben's, and then to movie theater with Ben's roommate Yung. We get some pink tacos before going to see Brüno. Crazy movie, laughed lots. Night ends chilling at Jito's parent's jacuzzi.

Yung

Jacuzzi

Doves

Mon 13.7.

Jito has to work, so it is the Finnish group of us guys and the four girls. We take Cierra and get some Mahi-Mahi and Huli-Huli sandwiches from Duke's down at the Malibu beach, and then head to the Universal Studios theme park. We get VIP Pass tickets so that we don't have to wait in lines, and they were comparably cheap, and get to the Simpsons, Jurassic Park, The Mummy, Backdraft, and again Simpsons rides. The Simpsons is a crazy good ride by the way :)

Universal Studios


Marge in Charge

Eat My Shorts

Jurassic Park

Needs head

Rowr!

Sad for Juval ;..( (except Sanna)

Legs

Juval and Hulk in front of him

After Waterworld show

Cool cats

We also see the Water World show, which, once again, is unbelievable. Actors throwing bucketfuls of water into the audience (really, soaking wet, really), wave runners jumping over burning debris, acrobatics, a burning man, and at some point a real burning airplane crashes from over the wall to the pond in front of us. Like, WTF-moment.

We get girls' gear from Ben's and move to Jito's, so Ben and Yung can work in peace, and Jito has a bigger apartment. Everyone's a bit tired so all end up sleeping while watching Superbad.

Tue 14.7.

The Finnish group goes to see the Hollywood Sign, the Walk of Fame, and the Rodeo Dr in the heart of Beverly Hills, apparently the place where all the expensive stores are located. And they are. On the way back to Jito's we stop at Vicente's Foods to get ingredients for the Finnish night of mashed potatoes, salad and meat balls, and some drinks.

HOLLYWOOD

Us beneath the sign (the man taking the picture did not realize we wanted it in too.. tard?)



Hollywood sign was surprisingly small :(

Boo-yah!

Receipt is manly


Michael Jackson's star on Walk of Fame

Then Cierra dies :( It is the starter engine this time, battery is fine. Luckily, once again, there is a workshop across from us, and we just leave the car to their capable hands, and take a taxi.

Back at Jito's Juval and Sakari make the meat balls, the girls the rest of the dishes, and then we all eat when Jito comes home. Boys present him with a bottle of Balvenie as thanks. Jito's sister and her man join us, and also one other guy Alex. Night degenerates into a party.

Foodzzz

Jito and a fire (in case you didn't know)

Heidi spaced out, Janna having fun, Alex, Sara

Sarah (Jito's sister), her man Zach, and the Finnish Zach

Wed 15.7.

We simply have to get this blog post done. Girls go shopping, boys stay at home nerding away.

Pacific Palisades phoon (Jito's place)

Bit more of Jito's and his sister's place, and Sakari

Juval and Janna have their first year anniversary (Congratulations!), Jito, Sakari, Sanna, Sara and Heidi go to a bar. Fun. The End.

Booyah! Blog post done. So happy now.