welcome to the high country

Saturday March 13 2004

we decided that the sleepy suburb of tustin just outside LA didn’t hold any great tourist appeal for us, and we were spending money faster than it could be printed, so we now find ourselves in williams arizona and in an hour or so we are heading up to see the grand canyon. so once agin our tour starts with a bit of r&r/touristy action before the maddness begins. despite out fears, we cruised through at the airport without any dramas. but given that we only got our work permits with half an hour before the consulate closed on the day before our flight, you can imagine the stress that was involved with that. anyway, got here fine and picked up ou van. anyone that has had the chance to hear me rant would know i’m a gadget freak and would appreciate why i’m so incredibly excited that we have GPS (global positioning satelite navigation) in the van. it is the best thing ever. i particularly hate reading maps, and i’m pretty sure that we would have complained endlessly in the past tour diary about being lost for at least half an hour each day. but now, the little american lady’s voice guides us from door to door - perfect. eating here is proving to be a bit tougher than we expected. for some reason we thought it would be cheap, but we’re already down to making our own sandwiches for dinner. i’m sure we’ll find a routine soon enough, but so far i’m finding the whole highway diner thing a little overwhelming. and a big thanks to peter from the flowermachine in california for the handy hint to just double the tax to calculate the tip. tipping doesn’t really happen in australia, and i now know that by american standards if i ever do i’m a total cheapskate! oh well. the first of many lessons no doubt. other notable differneces to back home are that a little machine spits out your coin change at the supermarket, and the toilets (which apprently you have to call ‘the bathroom’ here) but anyway, the toilets seem to be about twice as full of water as the ones back home by default. weird. south by south west is very soon which is exciting. hopefully all our buddies thaet are coming over managed to sort out their work permits in time too. it should be a lot of fun i think. well, this is the most expensive internet i’ve ever used (US$4 for 15 minutes) so i’d better sign off, plus the grand canyon awaits! PC