Day 2 - September 11, 2001
Came out of the bathroom to screams of "Look at the TV!!" as the second plane flew into tower two of the WTC. It was beyond comprehension. Adam dropped us down at Newport Beach and we had breakfast in a little cafe down there. Coca Cola have an Orange Juice over here called "MinuteMaid" and it tastes horrible. Everyone was talking about the events of the morning. We then set out to find a Jet Boat hire place we knew about. After about an hour of walking we asked a local for directions. We were heading the totally wrong direction. We hired some bicycles and rode a few miles down the beach to Balboa and hired a small fibreglass boat instead of a jetboat. Turns out the girl at the hire centre was from Brisbane and had been in CA for a few years as she met a guy on a contiki tour here and married him. Said the only thing she missed in Australia was here Mum and her Dogs... I suspect that's because she was from Brisbane. We spent 90 minutes touring Newport Harbour which has Balboa Island in the centre of it. The houses and boats were a sight to be seen - Americans certainly like everything to be BIG! We also saw Shirley Temples first Childhood house and the house John Wayne used to live in on the waterfront. Another Bacon Cheese burger for lunch (I think I managed to finish that one) and we met Bob. Bob was this big beefcake guy and all we ever saw him do was eat and drive his beefcake SUV (big 4wd thing). Rode back up to Newport and dropped the bikes off - and there was Bob again. Standing next his beefcake SUV and still eating. The five minute drive from Balboa to Newport Beach must have made him hungry! After some shopping we ended up walking (two hours) back up to Huntington Beach and on the way we saw Bob again! We also got very sunburnt in the process. The beaches here stretch as far as the eye can see. Later when Adam came back we went for a drive but all the shops were closed due to the Terrorism events. I drove the car around a massive car park (The Malls here dont have multi storey carparks, just acres of flat tarmac) and it was a strange experience (left hand drive and all that). We had dinner at a pizza place up the street. I didn't finish this meal either!
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