Hippie Edition

A few weeks ago the annual Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival came to San Francisco. A free, three day music festival in Golden Gate Park, with six stages of the biggest and best bluegrass bands and associated styles.

A quick maths exercise (or math, for those soon to be conquered), what do you get when you combine a park, bluegrass music, and the word ‘free’.

Hippies, thousands and thousands of hippies.

After spending some time with these people, allowing them to draw on my face, enlighten me with their world views, and dance in the street to drunken fiddle playing, I feel that the hippie is often misunderstood. And as the hippie species supposedly originated right here in San Francisco back in the sixties, I will therefore dedicate this entry to hippies everywhere.

Also, I see some parallels with the sixties hippie movement and the current Occupy Wall Street / Occupy Everything movements that are taking place. Both the sixties hippies and the current Occupiers are huge international counter-culture, grass roots movements that are shouting that they want things to be better, and that the people in power do not represent their philosophies. As such, I thought it would be interesting to explore the historical mirror to the Occupy movement.

When the word hippie is used, it conjures up many different ideas. Drugs, politics, drugs, sex, drugs, spirituality, drugs. It is a way of life. So firstly let’s take a look at some of the events that shaped the movement.

Climb aboard the hippie roller-coaster, friends!

The Vietnam War

One of the most notable aspects of the sixties was the USA’s involvement with the Vietnam war. Vietnam’s history is very complicated, but basically in 1945 Vietnam was owned by France, France and Japan, Japan, the Vietnamese, England (we always needs to get a piece), China, France and Japan, then France. All in less than a year.

As a result of all this nonsense, North and South Vietnam had serious issues for the next twenty years, and eventually everything became about who wanted to be communist or not. Communism tends to make all problems worse for some reason.

Pictured: The Communist Party

So naturally in the sixties with the whole Cold War situation, America was supporting the Vietnamese who didn’t want to be communists, you know, by sending them cake and such.

The decision to actually go to full blown war with North Vietnam was made in response to the North Vietnam navy firing on the USS Maddox warship in 1964, which happened to be hanging around the Gulf of Tonkin for some reason, (the Gulf of Tonkin is so deep in North Vietnam that the USS Maddox probably could have waved to the sunbathers on the beach there). This incident meant that regular Americans suddenly cared about what happened in Vietnam, and the American government got enough public support to send troops in.

However in 2005, an internal National Security Agency historical study was declassified, and said that the North Vietnam attack on the USS Maddox never happened. Here is a link to the report if you are interested...

http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/_files/gulf_of_tonkin/articles/rel1_skunks_bogies.pdf

So basically America sent over two million soldiers to Vietnam for no reason. But look on the bright side, America and France were at one point even discussing the possibilities of using nuclear weapons in Vietnam, which would have been very embarrassing if they had gone ahead with that.

Vietnam war protesters suddenly realising that America’s domestic policy

is worryingly similar to America’s foreign policy

By the end of it all, 58,000 US troops were killed and 1.1 million North Vietnamese troops were killed. Public opinion in America became deeply upset at how the war was handled, because in addition to the above, when you are so unsure about civilian deaths that they could be anywhere between 0.5 million and 2 million, you know you really messed up. Naturally, this raised humanitarian concerns about America’s ability to handle a conflict.

At the same time...

African-American Civil Rights Movements

Roughly between 1955 and 1968, American civil rights were characterised by campaigns of civil resistance by African-Americans, Mexicans, assorted non-whites, and their supporters. Activities ranged from sit-ins, marches, boycotts, civil disobedience and a whole host of other non-violent resistance methods.

Also riots, plenty of violent and awful riots. I thought about using a picture of the riots, but they made me sad, so instead here is a picture of Martin Luther King playing pool like a badass.

"Take that, white ball!"

Some of us are too young to remember what everyone was so upset about. Some notable examples were acceptable racial discrimination in education, employment, wages and financial services such as mortgages. There was also segregation on public transport, toilets, water fountains and other public facilities. Basically if you weren’t white in America then you were last in line for everything, and by the time you got to the front of the line all you got was a water cannon to the face.

Below is an image of nine African-American students being escorted by federal soldiers into Little Rock public school in 1957 (in Birmingham Alabama), to illustrate how much white people really didn’t want to sit next to a “coloured” kid in class.

It is sobering to consider that my parents were old enough to walk when this was happening

Although I can understand America’s need to racially segregate in schools, because how else would the white kids win any sports?

1967 African-American Athlete meeting-

Bill Russell, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, and Kareem Abdul Jabar, Carl Stokes, Walter Beach, Bobby Mitchell, Sid Williams, Curtis McClinton, Willie Davis, Jim Shorter, and John Wooten

-Oh Snap!

Between 1964 and 1968 all the major laws were passed to protect against racial discrimination, the main one being The Civil Rights Act of 1964 which outlawed segregation in various places, but it took a while for culture to catch up with the law.

Now it would only be fair to show how far England has come, in regards to racial issues. With that in mind, here is a picture of me last year with a golliwog doll on sale in shop close to where I lived in England.

Offensive and terrifying in equal amounts...

Also the doll is pretty bad.

As a Direct or Indirect Result...

...of all these distasteful issues and how badly they were handled by those in power,  America and Britain elected left wing governments, 32 countries (mainly African) gained independence from their European colonial rulers, and it seemed the philosophies of peace and love were taking hold as the world was becoming more globalized and people were recognising that people around the world weren’t so different from themselves. Apart from in Germany, where they built a wall.

Although it looks like the hippies got to it eventually

Mix these sentiments of anti-establishment, peace and equality, with the invention of the Contraceptive Pill (suddenly everyone can have spontaneous sex with no babies!) sprinkle in some good music and recreational drugs to enhance that sex and America managed to create hippies. What we recognise today as the stereotypical hippie image originated in California, supposedly right here in San Francisco in the Haight district (pronounced as hate) where young hippies formed large groups to be able to rent expensive apartments, forming the prototypes of the communities that still exist today.

Are the events of the sixties that led up to the counter culture of hippies being formed being mirrored today? A decade long war in a country for reasons that the public doesn’t really understand? People in charge making bad decisions that affect millions and not being held accountable? Police assaulting peaceful protesters around the world who simply want the world to be a better and fairer place?

We clearly have so much in common...

You decide. For now, tying some the themes of this entry together nicely, allow me to leave you with a portion of a speech by Martin Luther King Jr, delivered on April 4^th 1967 at Riverside Church, New York, while speaking on the subject of the Vietnam War.

-A true revolution of values will lay hand on the world order and say of war, "This way of settling differences is not just." This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love.-

Lifestyle Edition

It should not be ignored that San Francisco has a big history with homosexuality and alternative lifestyles.

Even if you try to ignore it, life has a way of (ahem) thrusting it in your face.

One block away from Caitlin’s apartment

So this edition of Reclaiming the Colonies will focus on California’s experience with discrimination and sexuality.

If you need further justification for discussing it, you should know that on the 20^th of September this year, America’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy on letting homosexuals join the military was repealed. Which means that if our glorious Queen is going to bring the United States back under British rule, we must be prepared to face an army of... glorious queens.

So let’s compare the discrimination scoreboard.

Same sex activity has been legal in England since 1967, which may seen quite late to let two consenting adults express affection for each other without the threat of imprisonment, however in some parts of the United States it was illegal until 2003 (and yes, of course it was Texas trailing behind).

Same sex couples can adopt since 2002 in England, whereas in the United States only about 50% of the states allow a same sex couple to adopt. Strangely though, in every state it is perfectly okay for a homosexual individual to adopt, because obviously one gay is only half as gay as two gays, and that is... better?

Same sex couples can get a civil partnership in England since 2005 (but still no sight of actual marriage), and the rules in the United States are... well here is a diagram that doesn’t explain anything but gives an idea of how patchwork the rules are.

  

Discrimination is confusing, but one day you’ll get the hang of it.

But England is still winning the discrimination Olympics, because MSMs (men who have sex with men) are not allowed to donate blood in England. Probably because officials are scared that it might result in a scenario similar to 28 Days Later.

That was a great documentary

California has a big history with homosexuality and rights, notable high points include the first openly gay couple on television in 1969...

... the formation of The Gay Nazi Party in 1974 (delicious, right?), legalisation of homosexuality in 1975, legalisation of same sex marriage in 2008, and the banning of same sex marriage in 2008. I promise that sentence is perfectly correct.

What happened you ask? Well let me take you by the hand (but not in a gay way) and lead you through California’s hazardous Proposition 8.

In May 2008 California’s Supreme Court (a panel of 7 judges) ruled that marriage is a fundamental right to United States citizens regardless of the genders involved, and that allowing same sex marriage does not affect the protections of opposite sex marriages.

A few weeks later, a public campaign for Proposition 8 was allowed to go ahead for public voting, and was successfully passed in November 2008. This Proposition provides that “only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognised in California”.

However, any same sex couples that got married between the times the Supreme Court made its decision and when the proposition was voted in by the public, got to keep their marriage licences, because the whole process is basically a circus.

And circuses are pretty gay

Now you can argue that in a democratic country, something like this should be decided on by a vote. However when the results are as close as 52% yes 48% no, it can also be argued that something like this should be decided on by a Supreme Court. But I’m not great at politics.  

Another issue is that the heaviest campaigns (and the most money for the campaigns) to push Proposition 8 through came from Catholics and Mormons, and there is an important debate to be had around how much religion should interfere with government. If homosexuals are allowed to get married, the Catholic God probably still won’t let them into Catholic heaven, so I’m not sure why Catholics are interested in politics at all.

Notably, people from outside the state of California are allowed to donate money for political campaigns that only affect California, meaning every Mormon in the state of Utah (1,600,000 of them) could donate money for TV advertisements like this-

Oh no! We might be forced to talk to our children about real world issues!

Good luck with the Santa Claus discussion, (he’s gay).

Over 43 million campaigns dollars was raised this way to ban same sex marriage in California. The only political campaign that year that resulted in more campaign money being thrown around was the actual presidential election. I hear you ask, what is the point of each state being allowed to choose its own laws if people from other states can affect the outcome so dramatically? Remember, the whole thing is a circus.

Fun Fact: there is nothing in the Catholic religion specifying that homosexuals cannot have sex. The Catholic religion states that homosexuals cannot get married, and that sex outside of marriage is a sin, so homosexual sex is a sin by default.

And the outfits are pretty gay

I would address the Mormon position, but doing so would validate them as a religion and institution. “But Dan, discriminating in a blog entry about discrimination undermines your points”, that may be so, but what you fail to appreciate is that I am a hypocrite. Oh Snap!

Please refer to above flowchart for proper use of Oh Snap!

The History Channel tells me that at one time in the past, America and Britain teamed up to give a big international punch in the face to someone who was persecuting  and discriminating people based on their lifestyles, lifestyles that caused no harm or inconvenience to anyone else. Now you think about that, because I have forgotten my point.

I will leave you with some photos of last weekend’s Folsom Street Fair, the largest annual leather street fair in the world, a San Francisco tradition since 1984. We had a lovely time.

WARNING: The below images may not be safe to view while at work.

I hope you appreciate all the time I spent checking those for background penises. And remember, America is all about the freedom to pursue happiness, whatever shape that might take, as long as you are not hurting anyone. Sexuality is one of the most important ways to pursue happiness, and it certainly doesn’t hurt anyone (apart from those guys who are getting whipped).

So keep the love America, otherwise the homosexuals are all welcome to come to England and boost the Queen’s economy.

Peace!

Eating, The American Way.

So now I have been able to relax in San Francisco and get more accustomed to the American way. And I must say, it has begun to soften me.

I was even willing to look past having to constantly pick hair out of my food.

Fistfulls of the stuff, how do you have any left on your bodies?!

Maybe these people have earned their independence, all on their own they invented  the airbag, napalm and scrabble. I was all ready to remove my iron boot from above this unsuspecting (yet simultainiously paranoid) nation, but then I saw this a few streets from Caitlin’s apartment-

Such... flagrant insolence! Using our own sweet Brown Ale against us, and what on earth is that huge billboard doing at street level?!

I wasn’t going to mention this, but at Christmas I beat Caitlin, her Dad and her Grandma at scrabble. That’s right, three generations of an American family got owned in one game (and as previously mentioned, their own game), and that is just the start America!

So this week I’ll focus on American food, in particular Californian food.

Firstly, San Francisco is surrounded by water, with the Pacific Ocean on one side and the bay on the other, sea food is a big deal here. Shrimp, crab and lobster are available most places and always come big and tasty.

Wikipedia tells me that San Francisco is 33% Asian, 20% are Chinese, which has a big impact on the cuisine here. The city is covered with Chinese restaurants, sometimes several on one block, and the competitive nature of a market that saturated means great food and great prices.

Fuse that eastern influence with the sea food aspect and there are some amazing sushi places all over the city. My personal favourite sushi dish is the Dragon Roll, which normally is made with rice, avocado, cucumber, eel and crab. It may also include sesame seeds, nori and wasabi. Plus I like showing off how good I am at using chopsticks.

Another important element is Mexican food, because until the mid 19^th century California was still part of Mexico. The way the economy is going America might have to sell it back to them.

I am a huge fan of Mexican food, particularly burritos and tacos, and it is really something that England is missing out on.

That is enough of the cultural angle, now for the roasting (food pun, get it?)

What is that you ask? Of course I have been here less than three weeks and already seen competitive eating! You can’t claim your food is better Britain’s if you don’t bother to taste it before swallowing it.

This photo has not been modified at all.

The sport of competitive eating is almost totally dominated by America and Japan (and yes it is an officially recognised sport), and as horrific as that sounds, a little innocent part of me can’t understand why we can’t resolve every international conflict this way.

Funny story, from 2001 to 2006, a young Japanese man Takeru Kobayashi dominated the annual hotdog eating contest that had been a Coney Island tradition for over three decades. Not to be outdone, the Americans made him compete against a 1,089 pound, 8 foot Alaskan Kodiak Bear. The bear was from Alaska so it totally counted. I’ll let you see how it turned out in this video; it is a real insight into American attitude towards sports and foreign diplomacy; use a bear!

One odd aspect of eating out in California, is that in every eating establishment there is this sign in plain view-

“Chemicals known to the state of California to cause cancer, or birth defects or reproductive harm may be present in foods or beverages sold or served here.” At first this was very alarming, but Caitlin was quick to reassure me that the government requires anywhere that uses a chemical from the list in Proposition 65 must display this sign. It just so happens that the list includes over 1,400 chemicals, including Mustard Gas, Lead, and good old fashioned Alcohol, so expect to see this terrifying sign anywhere you want to eat in California.

It isn’t all bad news; in America KFC offer catering!

There is just something beautiful about knowing that at any time I can order $899 worth of fried chicken and having one item appear on the receipt. If that photo doesn’t have great resolution, which includes 400 pieces of chicken, 15 gallons of side dishes and 200 buttermilk biscuits. This truly is the land of dreams... and awful, awful heart problems.

Finally, I would like to point out that a few streets away from the original Newcastle Brown Ale billboard I saw, there was a notice board, advertising pets, tutors, clubs and such. But one particular notice caught my eye...

Amy, out of the kindness of her heart (and upon payment of $150) will teach you how to prepare and eat your placenta after giving birth. She has only done this once before, but she is very excited about having the opportunity to poison you with your own dead insides!

Amy goes on to say that the placenta is a source of iron, B Vitamins and proteins, but I should point out that so are plenty of things that aren’t horrifying and disgusting.

I will absolutely take a Cornish pasty over that any day. Bon appétit.

Week 2: Monterey, Santa Barbara, Santa Monica, San Dieg

This week (29/08/2011) Caitlin and I went on vacation to San Diego, which is on the southern tip of California, bordering Mexico. We took Highway 1, which follows all the way down the coast of California, making for stunning views of the cliffs against the Pacific Ocean.

For a sense of scale, the road we took is about 595 miles long, and John O’Groats to Lands End is about 605 miles (in a straight line). Yes we are a small country but we have nukes too, and we decide what time it is everywhere, so WE decide when you go to lunch Mr. USA.

The road itself gives views such as –

And for about 200 miles I got to drive it, which is extra special for me as I only passed my driving test a few weeks ago. Although it was the English test, so I was driving on an unfamiliar side of the road in an unfamiliar side of the car on cliff edges with no safety barrier. You’d never get away with that in England, no barrier on a cliff road, the health and safety police would be on that like a... rockslide.

Also there were signs warning of rock slides. I have no idea what the purpose of those signs are, as if there is anything I would or could possibly do differently having acknowledged the sign. No matter, on with the road trip!

Monday we put the cats in the fridge (to keep them fresh) and drove to Monterey (B on the top map). Monterey is another coastal city, but very quiet and serene.  

That evening Caitlin and I walked down to the pier, which contained the usual overpriced waterfront nonsense such as lamps with seashells glued to them, picture frames with seashells glued to them, and seashells with seashells glued to them.

-with googly eyes, 500% profit margin, BAM!

Which, coming from a seaside town myself, naturally made me rather homesick.

However that night we found an amazing restaurant called ‘1833’, which had only been open for two months, and it was just what I needed. We ordered a pizza that brought tears to my eyes it was so beautiful:  lamb sausage, feta and roasted garlic.  The waiter told us the restaurant was originally a pharmacy (built in 1833), and run by a man who decided to call himself a pharmacist (with no qualifications) and who was so incompetent that most of his patients died under his care. The pharmacist later decided to call himself a doctor and lost even more patients, including the town’s mayor.  The ghosts still haunt the restaurant to this day....

Or something, I was busy eating.

Tuesday we drove to Big Sur, a National Park on the way to our destination, which covers roughly 4 square kilometres, which is popular for its massive redwoods.

Caitlin didn’t have the proper footwear, but we proceeded bravely on up the valley. We took an hour round-trip hike to Pfeiffer Falls, enjoying the valley views and exotic wildlife.

Left: a gorgeous blue bird I can’t be bothered to look up

Right: a hair scrunchie that Caitlin was certain was a snake skin

That evening we arrived at Santa Barbara (C on the top map), another coast city, and ate dinner on the harbour.

There isn’t much for me to write about Santa Barbara, as it was only somewhere to sleep on our way down the coast.  Although we did watch Top Gun in the hotel room, which absolutely counts as an authentic American experience. Danger Zoooooooooooooooone!

Wednesday we drove to Santa Monica, on the coast of Los Angeles (D on the top map), where we sunbathed next to the pier. And by sunbathed I mean I burned the back of my lily white British legs. The pier itself had an amusement park built around it which again reminded me of Southend.

Try to spot the ape dancing for tips, in the black tracksuit, in blistering temperatures.

Also Santa Monica’s pier also had a trapeze school, because...

Just because.

Afterwards we continued down the coast to San Diego, our destination (E on the map).  We met up with Danielle in Old Town San Diego for some very authentic Mexican food. And I mean that literally San Diego used to be part of Mexico, and certainly feels like it. If you got black out drunk on margaritas and bought souvenirs in Old Town, it would be very easy to convince yourself that you had crossed the border.

Thursday we spent enjoying the resort. It was a resort in a very literal sense, tennis courts, spa, three pools, and a harbour, all hanging out on its own peninsula.

We got a free room upgrade to be able to see the harbour from our terrace.

With optional gondola rides. Seriously.

I sat by the pool reading and drinking Mojitos all day.

That reminds me, I spied something I would very likely never see in England, a couple pushing a little white dog around in a baby-stroller. At a holiday resort. Talking to it. By the Adults Only pool. Both of them looking concerned, I can only imagine what they were thinking.

Her: I wonder if dogs need sun-screen...

Him: I wonder how much sun-screen I would have to consume to kill myself...

Although one extra cool addition was that the resort was right by Naval Amphibious Base Coronado, which meant that the resort also got free military air shows as they were training. Also for some reason one the buildings in the base are shaped like a swastika.

Busted, Jerry!

Friday we checked out of the hotel (after breakfast and piña coladas) and drove to meet Danielle at Del Mar beach, a little north of the resort where I picnicked and panicked about three recent great white shark sightings. However, I decided to face down Jaws and braved a play in the Pacific Ocean.

That evening was a real treat as Caitlin and I went to Balboa Park, which contains San Diego Zoo as well as multiple museums, galleries, gardens and theatres.

Two over the shoulder shots in one blog, touché Caitlin

Our particular target was The Old Globe theatre, where we watched an open air production of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, and I pretended to understand everything that was being said because it’s our language, damn it! It was absolutely brilliant, hilarious and a perfect ending to our vacation.

In some ways, I am Shakespeare in America.

Okay, in every way.

Saturday Caitlin drove us back from San Diego to San Francisco, using the much straighter Highway 5, which runs for hundreds of miles through dry yellow hills, which took eight hours. It was long, but we listened to Kenny Loggins so it was all okay. ROAD TRIP MONTAGE!

More next week campers! Danger Zooooooooone!

Week One, San Francisco - Sacramento - Truckee - Lake Tahoe

This blog will serve as a record of my experiences as an Englishman in California, attempting to bend the wayward colony to my whim, and bring them back under the crown. Starting the week beginning 22/08/2011 (or for Americans- 08/22/2011).

Firstly however, I will include a short review of the movies I saw on the flight-

Fast Five- Imagine Ocean’s Eleven, set in Brazil. There was just one car chase scene to my memory, but it was right at the end and totally worth it. Also there is a massive scene where Vin Diesel and The Rock are having a full on fist fight that reminded me of The Hulk and Abomination fighting in Ed Norton’s version of The Hulk. 7/10

Sucker Punch- I watched it with the sound off, I recommend everyone see it that way. 4/10

Rio- Terrible, I watched it for twenty minutes before I realised there hadn’t been any jokes. Couldn’t finish it. 1/10

Win Win- Small town family drama with Paul Giamatti at his best, if you don’t know who that is then you might not like it. 8/10

The Lincoln Lawyer- Good effort at a legal drama with an excellent twist, if you are into that kind of thing. 7/10

Kung Fu Panda 2- A real surprise, I was expecting it to be a weak sequel but in my opinion it was greater than the first one, great comedy, great character development, best movie of the flight. 9/10

Anyway, I arrived safely in San Francisco (although the baggage handlers had completely messed up my suitcase, no joke) and was picked up by Caitlin. We took a drive back to her apartment, just south of Golden Gate Park.

San Francisco, for those unfamiliar American geography, is a city to the north of the state of California, which is under constant attack by super intelligent apes, Romulans, Magneto, The Hulk, Sean Connery, Jet Lee, Giant Sharks and The Terminator.

San Francisco’s Violent Past

It exists on the tip of a peninsula, surrounded by water, connected to land to the north and east by bridges.  At any moment it could slide into the ocean, snap in half from an earthquake, or get punched in the face by a tsunami. I felt an earthquake when I was here last year, I am living on God’s Etch-a-Sketch.

It is a relatively small city, stretching only seven miles wide and seven miles high, but is the second most densely population city in the U.S.A (just after New York) with 805,235 people.

The ‘A’ is approximately where Caitlin lives, and I hope I don’t have to pay Google for these pictures. It was a relaxing and jet-lagged Monday, with the city covered in mist that regularly blankets it from the bay.

Tuesday morning, we took the train to downtown San Francisco (east on the above map), took the bus to Emeryville on the other side of the Bay Bridge (B on the below map), and then took another train to Sacramento. The train is actually two stories high, so we sat on the top deck, (deck? Floor? Level?) and for several hours watched the dry farm lands and small towns roll past for several sunny hours, we travelled just under 100 miles that day.

Also there was a billboard the size of a house, reminding people not to shake their babies.

Sacramento is the capital of California, home of the Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and also where Caitlin was born and raised. We had amazing Mexican food and stayed at her parents’ home that night. That day I also drove for the first time on the right hand side of the road, in the left seat of the car. I was a little worried at first, but I soon remembered that in fact, I did have some experience driving on the right side of the road.

Oh now I remember! This is how America works.

Wednesday morning Caitlin’s parents (John and Melanie) drove us up through the mountains, through Donner Pass. These mountains were where settlers would travel westwards during the 19^th Century in search of the beach and Californian girls. The journey would have been insane because these mountains are ridiculous steep monsters, covered in pine trees, and for half of the year covered in snow, and these people wanted to cross them in a horse and cart. All the green on the map below is mountainous pine forest.

The first recorded instance of cannibalism in U.S history occurred in Donner Pass in 1846, when a group from Illinois became stranded in the snow for months and resorted to eating each other. They were later named the Donner Party and there is now a huge monument to the event in the mountains. The monument is over 25 feet high, because why the heck not, right?

Remember that America is a relatively young country, so they have to have monuments to absolutely anything that happened in order to make it look like they have a lot of history.

On the drive we stopped at Donner Lake (B on the above map), named after the before mentioned cannibals, and sunned ourselves, ate watermelon (which I pretended was human flesh, you know, to engage with some of the heritage), and for some time forgot that it wasn’t the ocean because it was huge and had a beach!

We then continued on to Truckee, a little town in the mountains named after a child’s toy (again, America is a young country). The total drive was just over 100 miles, and Truckee sits at 6000 feet above sea level, my ears popped from the pressure change as we drove up through up the narrow mountain roads. That night we ate out in a great restaurant in Truckee and relaxed in the hot tub in at the hotel.

Thursday we drove from Truckee to Lake Tahoe, which is the massive body of water south east of Truckee on the last map I included. The word Lake doesn’t seem appropriate; it is more like God’s birdbath. Its surface is over 6000 feet above sea level, and is over 1600 feet deep, which is showing off in two different directions. It is 22 miles long and 12 miles wide, which means that it could unfortunately only swallow half of greater Manchester.

The Lake is ridiculously beautiful. Still blue mountain water lined by mountains and pine trees. Also the lake runs right down the middle of the state line between California and Nevada, which means that on the east side of the lake there are casinos (hence the dice on the below map) aka the fun side of the lake. Gambling is illegal in California.

We pulled in at the north end, by King’s Beach and drove all the way down the west side of the lake down to Emerald Bay at the south shore. Find Emerald Bay on the above map (using the red circle I have provided), it is a tiny little bay at the south west corner of the Lake, this will be important for scale.

That huge pool of water walled in by mountains that are effortlessly containing a big steam boat and island (which has a castle on it) is Emerald Bay, with the rest of Lake Tahoe rolling out in the far distance. This thing is big.

After sightseeing we continued to drive around the high mountain roads down to Camp Richardson, and had lunch. The special on the menu was fish & chips, but there were no mushy peas so I let it go. We hit the beach there, then drove back up the east side of the lake and had dinner at Tahoe City. Honestly I am just having the most fun eating here, this whole blog could easily be about food. I was very grateful to John and Melanie for taking me on that drive. We stayed at Truckee again that night.  

Friday we drove back from Truckee to Sacramento, John and I talked about politics, he explained to me what a constitution was (the supreme law of the United States detailing how the government operates), and I explained what a David Cameron was (a puppy-eating rubber-faced weasel).

 David Cameron about to eat lunch

Once back in Sacramento we took a walk around the park by Caitlin’s parent’s home and Caitlin tried to get me to do yoga, A Sun Salutation and Downward Dog later I decided it was pretty gay, but I did it because she agreed to buy me donuts afterwards. Afterwards we took the train back to San Francisco.

Saturday and Sunday we relaxed in San Francisco with Caitlin’s old roommate Danielle, eating ice cream and taking a stroll through the Botanical Gardens in Golden Gate Park, which I will provide photos of in the future.

Next week Caitlin and I are going on a road trip to San Diego, stopping off at Monterey on the way (point B on the map below), covering nearly 600 miles of road headed south, and taking in the scenic Highway 101. Will let you know how that goes next week!