US adventure

Finger lickin’ good

We decided to do the one other big tourist thing to do in New Orleans (without leaving the city and going on a “plantation tour”) – go on a riverboat cruise. Most tours in the US are booked online and often sold out so we were happy just to be able to secure tickets. We opted out of the (expensive) lunch and setup camp at a table on the outside deck and watch the world (or New Orleans and the Mississippi at least) go by as we listened to the occasional sound of jazz filtering through the boat. We decided it might be a good opportunity to try some beignets (deep fried croissants covered in powdered sugar (i.e. somewhere between a donut and deep-fried mars bar on the heart attack chart)). We changed our tune when we got to the café that made them – there was a longer line than the rides at Disney.  As we steamed down the river passing moored ships and those making their way upstream in what today remains a working river port, we saw the signs of devastation from Hurricane Katrina that still remain. It’s not a conversation we had with locals – there is something macabre about quizzing those who’ve lived through disasters about the devastation to their town but at the same time this horrific event is now part of the rich historic fabric of this city. As you cruise down this mighty river and see the flood barriers and the jetties that burnt down, it is hard to imagine how the water got so high. Then you go past some of the wards that were near obliterated, lying below the current water level and you realise that the river is at its lowest in winter. With a whole lot of snow from the northeast, Midwest and the great lakes basin due to flow into the river in the spring, you can see exactly how a massive storm and hurricane winds could flood the city. But the place is resilient. Sure – the Hurricane was over a decade ago now but it’s not the only one they’ve seen and the city has both a flavour of lawlessness (mostly due to some of its anything goes attitude) and a deep rooted sense of resilience. And the river itself is impressive – the rate of flow and the commerce conducted on it makes Australia’s great rivers look more like streams or stagnant pools (which some of them are more often than they should be.

After our Mississippi sojourn, we set off to the nearest mall to participate in a more modern thanksgiving ritual – Black Friday sales. Personally, I can’t think of anything worse than interrupting a relaxing holiday to fight with someone over something I don’t really need to save a couple of bucks. When you travel, though, you compromise, and we headed for the sales. We found a small mall and made our way through what looked a lot like the boxing day sales. And like boxing day sales, unless your goal is to buy sheets and towels or bog-standard undies, or score a really nice pair of shoes, the sales are pretty underwhelming. No sheet or towel set is cheap enough for me to lug it across the states and back and most of the shoes were actually really boring. And with no electronics or outdoors stores in sight, Dan was over it after he bought some extra underwear to stretch the time between laundromat visits. I did ensure we checked out the vintage dress shop a couple of doors down from the hotel before we headed on our cruise. I tried on a few things (which were all massively overpriced) but nothing jumped out at me and I would have expected much better quality for the prices being charged.

Next was another culinary adventure. Wille May’s Scotch House is touted to have the world’s best fried chicken, so we felt we had to find out. Not sure what the neighbourhood was like, we decided to catch an uber. Our uber driver knew the place quite well and had dropped more than a few people there that day already. She said there was a bit of a line. Strange thing about New Orleans – all of the uber drivers we encountered in our time there were African American girls. In fact, we had only encountered one other female driver so far and that was at Disney World. It may have just been a fluke, but I found it interesting. When we arrived, the line was indeed long but we had come this far so we just joined the end. We got talking to this couple standing ahead of us and in a ploy to get a table quicker, we registered as a party of four when the time came. It didn’t help us in the end but conversing with our new friends about world travels, the US, Australia and politics made the time pass quicker and gave us two interesting dinner companions. It also ensured we enjoyed a meal without phones, google and facebook.

We sat down and ordered quite soon after. Like a lot of restaurants that specialise in certain foods, the menu was limited but the decisions on sides were still difficult. One of our dining companions had a gluten allergy but decided to risk it for the sake of the chicken experience. I chose to have my chicken with mashed potatoes, gravy and peas. You could also choose white or dark meat. We both chose white. And a cornbread muffin. You can’t go without a muffin. Dan had the Mac and Cheese.  And cornbread of course. I was happy with my choice. The cornbread and mac and cheese were good, but nothing has so far compared to the corn bread and mac and cheese at Red Rooster. The chicken though was excellent – properly cooked through with no pink bits and it was really juicy. Not something you often find with fried chicken. I had an iced tea and got to try a root beer – you hear the term on TV a lot and I just thought it was a different term for creaming soda. It isn’t. It actually had an aniseed kind of flavour. It was nice but I am not sure I could drink a whole can.

Our dining companions, a husband and wife quite a bit younger than us, had moved from Utah to a town an hour or so away. They had come into New Orleans to get cooking gear in the Black Friday sales, and like us, had dropped by Willie Mae’s to see if it was indeed the world’s best fried chicken. That is a big call, but I have to say it was pretty good. And the company too. We hadn’t yet started suffering from cabin fever the way you sometimes do on holidays when you mostly only have each other to talk to but it was good to share an hour or so in conversation with others.

After dinner and a pic for Facebook out the front, we electronically friended our dining companions and bade them farewell as we ordered an uber to take us back to the French Quarter. [Minstrel Boy – Joe Strummer and the Mescalaros – Joe Strummer was a genius with whatever he did – and this track – a hauntingly beautiful instrumental – is the soundtrack that ends The Future is Unwritten the brilliant documentary on Strummer’s life.]

We went back to the hotel briefly but recognising this was our last night in New Orleans, it wasn’t long before we ventured out into the nightly party that New Orleans is renowned for and headed up towards Frenchman street once more. We were a bit too tired for crowded bars by this stage and didn’t really catch any music that piqued our interest while we meandered through the French Quarter. We wandered along the foreshore, stopping momentarily to collect souvenirs along the way – magnets with feather headdresses, a rather cool looking cyber punk mask for Dan and a day of the dead inspired 50s style dress (of course) from Roadkill, my type of shop with goth and vintage clothing and a range of Irregular Choice shoes. The kind of place you would find in Camden.

I left the shoes behind, reminding myself that I could mail order from the UK for the same price. With bags a plenty… We wandered up to Frenchman St with the idea of heading into the Spotted Cat, but it was absolutely packed. Despite the excellent music coming from inside, we weren’t really up for the sardine experience. We wandered into a makeshift craft market in a vacant lot nearby where Dan bought a T-shirt featuring the silhouettes of parade performers. As I had added a dress to my bag, I resisted the temptation to add a T-shirt as well.

Frenchman street was pumping and the music and entertainment was spilling out into the street. We stopped for a while to watch a group of young brass and percussion players entertaining the crowd. It was like a street party happening on the corner. And there were plenty of people selling and drinking booze on the street as they watched. We stayed for a time but declined the offer to buy booze from a random person’s esky on the street. We were by no means hungry by this stage but we had been meaning to check out a diner recommended by some friends and thought when in Rome (or at least the US)… And they definitely didn’t steer us wrong this time either. As described, Clover Grill is a simple old skool diner replete with fixed stools at the counter and laminated photocopied menus. This was no trendy redressing. It was the real thing that felt like it had more than a few stories to tell about this renowned party town. We definitely weren’t hungry but when you travel food is about experience not sustenance and in the belly of America, excess in all things is king. Dan could still squeeze in a cheeseburger and said it was awesome. I needed something more akin to a simple late night snack and opted for a grilled cheese sandwich (otherwise known as a cheese toastie. It was cooked to perfection. Actually grilled with butter on the outside, not toasted in a sandwich press, and oozing with drippy, gooey cheddar cheese. Perfect.  And just what the doctor ordered. [Chicken Parma – Loin Groin – a brilliant satire of Aussie male culture, in support of LGBTI rights. And a great tune!]

With very full bellies we took one last wander through the chaotic mess that is Bourbon St – mounted police, open containers, roadworks, schiesters and all (but relatively few musicians) and then headed back to the hotel to sleep and pack for the first leg of our cross country train journey.

After our (reasonably) late night diner experience – it was about 10pm – we headed back to the hotel to pack so we could pack ready for our epic two day train journey across the south.

US states – 5, t-shirts – 8, fridge magnets – 8

Funk Soul Brother

From Disney we grabbed an Uber to the airport for our last (internal) flight to New Orleans. Through Atlanta. It doesn’t seem to matter where you are going on the Eastern seaboard, especially on Delta, you fly though Atlanta. After a short delay between flights, we finally landed in New Orleans and grabbed a cab from the airport. The driver was an older African American gentleman who had all the swagger of a jazz muso. He chatted to us as we drove and pointed out good places to eat and discussed the lunacy of Black Friday sales turning into brawls at Walmart.

Eventually we arrived at our home for the next few days – a quaint old hotel, Bienville House. We dropped our bags and went exploring through the French Quarter, striking a bunch of panhandlers with cheap Mardi Gras beads peddling the “I bet I can tell you where you got those shoes scam”. Foreigners fall for it almost every time. The answer is “on your feet”. Panhandlers then shine your shoes (even if they are sneakers) and charge you $5 for the bet and $5 for the shine. Watch them disappear real quick with a whiff of police even approaching their direction. And there were plenty of targets as we had arrived the day before Thanksgiving, along with a slew of domestic tourists – there was a big NFL game that night and then a college game and battle of the bands across the weekend. The French Quarter smacks of a tourist trap crossed with a booze hound destination. While for me the drawcard was the architecture (and hopefully) the music, for some it was obviously the cheap (although watered down) booze, that you can walk around with as long as it isn’t in a glass container.  You can even buy it from some guy with an esky in a cart on the street. The South certainly is a place of few rules, and Bourbon Street in particular, the scene of much debauchery. That must be why the area is also peppered with people trying to save the souls of the depraved. We saw this a little bit in Miami but here the preaching on street corners is on steroids – more souls to save I guess.

From here we headed to find the restaurant where we were intending to have Thanksgiving dinner to confirm their advertised promise that they would take walk-ins (despite my numerous attempts to email them, I was yet to secure a reservation). When we arrived, they advised they were sold out with over 100 people on their wait list. We went back to the hotel to ask the concierge for alternate suggestions and set about calling until we found somewhere that could take us. A number of the booked out places were helpful – suggesting alternatives who were no doubt competitors any other day of the week. Eventually we found somewhere and booked a late Thanksgiving lunch. [Bridal Train – The Waifs – more than just ‘London Still’, the Waifs are one of my lazy morning easy listening favourites. This little ditty about the bridal trains taking Australian women who married US sailors during the second world war on a one way ticket to the US is a fave of mine.]

Sorting our Thanksgiving dining had left us hungry, so we headed back out to look around the French Quarter and find something to eat. Dan saw a place that looked OK and we both decided there was something on the menu we could eat. It turns out that Tableau is one on New Orleans’ best creole restaurants. Dan chose the brown butter gnocchi for appetizer and I had a bowl of seafood gumbo (when in Rome…). One of the things you get almost as a matter of course in American restaurants (other than fast food places), is bread or some form of dinner roll and butter. And here the bread was really good. Dan was mightily impressed with the gnocchi. I could tell the gumbo was really good too but despite those who crow about it – the seafood stew is not the best thing I have ever eaten. We also split a wedge salad after having enjoyed the crisp freshness of it so much on our previous experience. We weren’t disappointed. For mains, Dan chose a pork schnitzel, which when it arrived was almost as big as your head. It came with spaetzle, cucumber salad, shaved cabbage and gingersnap jus. Dan was even more impressed with this (but there was no way even he could finish it). I chose BBQ shrimp and grits. Yes – Shrimps are prawns and these ones were from the gulf and about the size of king prawns. They came with a BBQ sauce and grits – grits are like a savoury porridge made out of corn with butter. These were also made with beer (which was unusual). They were definitely high quality and I am sure something you could get used to but again not as great as many Americans seem to think they are. The shrimp was excellent though. And if you are going to try Shrimp and grits, I recommend Tableau as the best place to do that. With heaps of food leftover, we were asked if we wanted a box. It is common practice in America, regardless of whether you are at the Cheesecake Factory or a high-end restaurant like Tableau to have your leftovers boxed up to take home. Obviously, that isn’t really very practical when you are travelling but I also ask the question whether a reheated breaded pork chop or shrimp and grits prepared by a top chef would lose something in its enjoyment. We didn’t need dessert but couldn’t resist it, as the rest of the food was so good.  I chose the sweet potato bread pudding which came with pecans, chai crème anglaise, cinnamon sugar and sweet potato chips – it was delicious but again not finished. Dan did finish his vanilla bean crème Brule. He said it was just too good not to. I fear some serious dieting and exercise will be needed when we get home or we won’t fit into our wedding clothes.

After dinner we thought it best to take a bit of a walk to lessen the impact of all those calories. We didn’t have the energy for a four day hike so we walked up to Frenchman St. This used to be where the locals went for music but so many people know that now that it has really become the place tourists go. We didn’t see too much evidence of good music amongst the party hardened in Bourbon St but there was a smattering of bars in Frenchman St were pumping on Thanksgiving Eve. We didn’t have it in us to make a night of it though, so headed back to the hotel for a good night’s sleep.

US states – 5, t-shirts – 7, fridge magnets – 6

It’s a small world after all

In order to ready ourselves for the day in as calm a manner as possible, we decided on the (reasonably priced) in room breakfast – just your basic bacon and eggs and coffee but I was a nice way to plan out our day and try and get as much out of the experience as possible. We decided to skip Animal Kingdom and concentrate on the quintessential Magic Kingdom and Epcot, which I had wanted to see since I was a little girl, dreaming of travelling and seeing all the cultures of the world and exploring space. Epcot appealed to be back then and something about its kitschy Star Trek imagining of the future still appeals.

First stop though was the Magic Kingdom. I had experienced a small version of it in Hong Kong but had missed out on the ride I had been hanging out for since my grandma bought me back a book about Disneyland when I was five. It’s a small world. The ride was closed when I visited Hong Kong Disneyland in 2012. And whether Dan liked I or not, we were going. There was a lengthy line-an hour wait. Although Disney would call that 65 minutes. It is never an hour and a quarter it’s 75 minutes. I actually saw some attractions with a 145 minute wait. The line gave us time to plan the rest of our day – to book for dinner and book in our three fast passes for Magic Kingdom later in the day.

The concept of It’s a Small World was my favourite part of the Disney book my Grandma brought me from a trip in the 70s (I also got a Minnie mouse Doll) but it was the book and the idea of all the worlds cultures (packaged up for a six year old) that held my imagination. I remember singing the songs as a child and when we got our first set of encyclopedias when I was 12. I invented my own school project, going through each volume and noting the key details of every country in the world and drawing their flag. I also spent a lot of time going through the sides from my Mum’s trip around the (mostly European and North American) world in 1963.

And the ride lived up to my expectations – reliving my childhood in a cacophony of colour and mostly two dimensional animatronics, capturing world culture in an ultra, simplified and kitsch laden way yet still leaving the central message of unity in diversity – it’s a small world after all – ringing in your ears (and in Dan’s with my terrible singing for the next hour or so). You get loaded in a boat that floats its way through the different continents with animatronic Spanish dancers, traditionally dressed Latvians and Japanese geishas all looking just a little bit like babushka dolls. It is blindingly colourful and has the song playing the whole way. When we rounded the Australian exhibit, it was all about the fauna – kangaroo, koala. And a traditional indigenous person with a boomerang standing behind a dingo.

The Magic Kingdom is a lot to take in. It has the most rides (although most are suited to the little ones) and there are many, many more kids than the other parks. People were also starting to line up for the character parade and it was getting chaotic with kids full of sugar awaiting their chance to see Mickey Mouse (or probably more likely Ella from Frozen). Our next stop was back to Hollywood Studios to see if we could get a dinner reservation for the SciFi drive in theatre. We couldn’t. We decided it was a great time to escape to the relative calm of Epcot. We caught the ferry. It turned out we probably could have walked the last part much faster than the ferry. When we arrived at Epcot, it was an altogether different vibe to the other two parks we had visited. It was calm – Half of it was another version of the cultures of the world concept, although this time with food and twee attempts at re-creation of landmarks and cultural icons, surrounding a lake. This included Canadian wood huts where you could sample wood smoked salmon, a German beer hall, complete with miniature train next door, a Chinese garden and temple with acrobats and a version of several Venetian landmarks (it wasn’t enough that the US already did this in a casino?). The lake around which all this transpired was joined to the imagined future of the 60s and 70s. The sort of curved modernist concrete walkways over the lake with the monorail and the recognisable Epcot golf ball structure could have been straight out of Star Trek or the paradise of Logan’s Run. You could imagine cadets in Star Trek uniforms emerging from the buildings. [A New Hope – Blink 182 – One of the lesser played tracks from Dude Ranch, this little ditty about a schoolboy crush on Princess Leia is one of my faves. And not just because I have a Star Wars obsessed better half.]

We mistakenly thought the rides at Epcot would have quite short lines. After having subjected Dan to the cutest ride at Magic Kingdom, my mission was to visit the so bad it’s good cult classic, Spaceship Earth – a ride through the history of communication (with old school animatronics that haven’t been updated in quite some time). Luckily for Dan, the ride had broken down. After a walk through half the countries of the world (or at least the ones that made it to Disney’s rendition), we headed for the space flight ride. There was a less scary option with a shorter wait time – we chose that. It worked much like the Star Wars ride (and we should have gone with the scarier version – the less scary one was a little lame). We looked at the Test track, which depending on the descriptions is either just a vehicle simulator or an opportunity to design a car and then test it, but the wait was about 175 minutes. If it was the design option, I’m bummed we missed out otherwise not sure why the wait needed to be 175 minutes. Spaceship Earth was still broken so we went for a leisurely stroll around through the ‘world cultures’ surrounding the lake and then headed for our German Bier Hall dinner.

We entered expecting a tavern. We forgot this was Disney. What we actually found was a village with a painted sky and taverns painted around the edges. It was community seating, like in a beer hall, and an all you can eat buffet. It was all pretty good and had all the favourites – fried potatoes, German sausages, schnitzel, red cabbage. Washed down with a stein of beer it was just what the doctor ordered. By the time we were done, Spaceship Earth was operational again. I convinced Dan that we had enough time to get through the line before we had to head back to Magic Kingdom to use our fast passes. We waited for what seemed like an eternity and then we finally got in Spaceship Earth puts you in a coaster carriage that spirals up inside the golf ball and then back down, along the way telling the story of communication from the invention of paper to computers and then sort of tries to predict the future at the end, including a survey that then draws a cartoon of you with details about your life in this reimagined future. Sadly, this isn’t an interactive Disney experience where you can buy/ have sent the output. It should be.

We bade farewell to Epcot and steadied ourselves for the onslaught that is the Magic Kingdom at night. We finally got to catch the monorail which was a fun experience although we didn’t get to ride it through Epcot, which would have been cool. Here is where our fast passes started to pay off. First up was the quintessential Fantasyland ride – the Mad Hatter teacups. Not exceptional as a ride but the imagery of the brightly coloured tea cups that you could spin around was cool. And spin we did. Dan isn’t really one for rides, so it was fun to enjoy this with him. The other Disney experiences we had were really either a single rider experience or a journey through animatronics. This one provided some interactivity between us as we spun around. From there it was over to Tomorrowland – my favourite Magic Kingdom land. We had a bit of time until our space mountain fast pass window so just wandered around for a while through the convenient slew of gift shops. Or should I say hobbled. We had walked quite a long way and our feet were pretty sore by now.

We entered space mountain as soon as our fast pass window opened – a roller coaster completely in the dark, space mountain is exhilarating because of the curves and drops that you can’t see coming. You don’t go upside down, which in my view is a plus. And Dan really enjoyed it, which was another big plus. Afterwards, we decided to take the elevated train through Tomorrowland. It didn’t have a line and was a good way to sit down for 10 minutes. It isn’t immediately obvious but it goes through a number of the experiences, including Space mountain so it was great to hear the other people screaming, and get a glimpse of the ride from a different perspective.

After that it was time to stakeout a spot to see the nightly fireworks show above the Disney castle (modelled on the stupid (Neufwatschen) castle in Germany). The fireworks show was pure Disney and reminded me of my childhood watching the opening and closing credits to a wonderful World of Disney, featuring an animated version, with Tinkerbell. Here Tinkerbelle also appeared on a zipline from the castle to Main Street, above everyone’s heads. From here it was our last fast pass experience. Th Pirates of the Caribbean ride. Expecting something thrilling, we were bitterly disappointed after discovering that it was yet another boat ride through animatronics. They did cast an eerily accurate animatronic version of Johnny Depp who pops up quite often throughout the ride. We probably had time to just squeeze in one more ride but by this stage we were over Disney.

The only reason spending more time here would have been good, would be so we could have some quiet time between assaults on the park. We do want to come back but only so we can visit the new Star Wars part of the park after it opens. Some of the stuff they were constructing (like a new transport system that looked like it was designed to connect Star Wars to Epcot) looked intriguing.

Farewell Disney – Not sure you qualify as the happiest place on earth, but we did have some fun moments here reliving our childhood (Well my childhood and Dan’s ongoing fascination with Star Wars). Can’t really understand the Americans who vacation here every year though. [Weapon of Choice – Fatboy Slim. I remember the first time I heard Fat Boy Slim – like most, it was Rockefeller Skank, a tune that I was sure I would tire of after a few listens but 20 years later.]

US states – 4, t-shirts – 7, fridge magnets – 6

    Exit through the gift shop

    We finally bade Miami farewell and headed north to Orlando, destination – Disney world. The train journey which mirrored the road was pretty boring and after shelling out for Amtrak tickets so we could see the countryside, we hoped they weren’t all going to be like that. Eventually the train wound its way into Orlando station, the last we would actually see of the city itself. We grabbed an Uber to the “happiest place on earth” or at least our hotel on the edge of it. We were staying at the Dolphin hotel, a mid-range Disney hotel. Just like everything in Florida (and Disney. It was big. A big driveway, a huge foyer, and lots of rooms. This was the first place where we saw the enormity of mass crowds in America, starting with the front desk that had a rope line, with different entries for Disney frequent flyers. In fact, the whole place was set up in such a way that Disney just expected that anyone who went had been there before.

    After checking into our room, which didn’t have the Disney touches that you find in Hong Kong Disney, we headed for the guest pass desk to grab our two-day park hopper passes. These were accompanied by a series of maps and a badge proudly declaring we were first timers to Disney. We didn’t wear them. In retrospect I wonder If wearing them might have made life easier given everyone acted like we were supposed to know how everything works. Things I learned at Disney that would have been useful to know before we tackled the parks – 1. The fast pass doesn’t just give you the three fast entry to rides it promises. It will actually give you access to more once you have used the first three. It is just that it will only allow you three at a time and only the first three have to be in the same park. Sound confusing – that’s because it is. 2. Book for popular eating places ahead of your visit. Don’t just assume you can rock up. 3. When they suggest you will need more time than you think, they’re right. 4 I am pretty sure Disney invented the concept of exiting through the gift shop. You can’t enjoy any Disney experience (except maybe eating), without going through a gift shop. And all parks have at least some concept of a main street which is filled with stores selling even more Disney merchandise. It’s as American as…

    We picked Hollywood studios as our first foray into the wonderful world of Disney – partly because it is where the Star Wars stuff is. We caught the ferry, conveniently located just outside our hotel. At check-in, we were issued with a Disney card that was pretty much our ticket to everything. The first use was swiping to get into the park (after an incredibly thorough bag search). But swiping the card wasn’t enough. They then collected your fingerprint so every time you used the card from then on, it had to be accompanied by a finger scan. The person at the gate and the machine told you to choose a finger and then use that finger for your scan for the rest of the visit. I was astonished at the number of people who had trouble grasping that concept. Dan was just astonished by the number of people. It may have been that we came on the Monday and Tuesday before thanksgiving or just that Disney is always that busy. But here we were, confronted by a slice of middle (mostly white) America. The people who choose a Disney vacation every year. The other thing that astonished us was the number of (hired) motorised scooters in the park – there were clearly older and disabled people who needed them but I am fairly certain the majority of those using scooters to get around were just too lazy to walk. Now I am fat, and I am not exactly an enthusiastic fitness devotee but it would never occur to me to use a scooter to get around an amusement park rather than to walk. They other things that was astounding about Disney was the stroller parking lots. There were areas within the parks, often near rides specifically suited to younger children, that actually had stroller parking labelled (and they were always full). [Walk this Way – Run DMC vs Aerosmith – one of the greatest collaborations of all time. Interestingly, there is an Aerosmith Rock’n’Roller coaster at Hollywood Studios which I may have been tempted to wait the 115 minutes to ride if it also involved Run and Co]

    Into the park, we decided to go for a walk around to check things out and grab a bite to eat at the 50s Prime Time Café. Except that there was an hour wait unless you booked. So, we booked to come back at 9:30pm. It was then time to find something to do. There was a Star Wars show that had some live character action in front of clips from all of the movies, we watched that for a while and went in search of the Star Wars ride. The best part about it was probably the massive walker outside. Having not worked out the fast passes, we stood in line for about an hour. I will say this though – Disney know the lines are going to be long so they ensure there is plenty to see, including video displays and animatronics to get you (and the kids) excited/interested in the ride. In this case you were led through a docking port for space ships before you took off in a shuttle with C3PO and R2D2. Eventually you went in and sat in a row of 4 in front of a screen with specialty goggles. I imagine the perspective was quite familiar to gamers (I am not one) but with added perspective and physical sensations. For me, it was fun (although quite short. Dan thought the same, although the sensations were probably more foreign to me as a passive consumer of entertainment rather than a participant.

    After the ride, we still had some time to kill before dinner so after a quick lap past the kid rides and experiences (little mermaid etc, we headed over to watch the final Indiana Jones show for the evening. Heavy on the audience participation/ embarrassment, which Americans seem to be fine with, members of the audience were put through their paces prior to the show, then participating in it. The show consisted of various stunts from the Indy and the Temple of Doom (where they leave in the plane at the end. And of course, that is the big crescendo. It was a bit of fun watching the special effects explosions and hearing a little bit (albeit in a dumbed down version) about how they create the stunts.

    After the show, we headed over to the café to be seated for dinner. The drawcard of the café was the 50s décor, complete with clips from 50s TV shows, including the original credits to Wonderful World of Disney, and melamine kitchen tables and benches and all manner of other 50s accoutrements. There were waitresses in 50 attire declaring that everybody needed to keep their elbows off the table and being sure to enforce this with the kids in the restaurant. The other drawcard was the 50s homestyle menu. You expect the food at an amusement park to be terrible but Disney has obviously invested in providing good quality food. It’s not cheap but it’s enjoyable and so you are prepared to pay. We started off with a typical 50s appetizer – an iceberg lettuce wedge with blue cheese dressing. Simple yet thoroughly enjoyable. I decided, as is my want, to try A Sampling of Mom’s favourite recipes consisting of pot roast, meatloaf and chicken (with all the fixin’s) and Dan had the Aunt Liz’s Golden Fried Chicken -with mash and gravy (some of the best gravy I’ve tasted) and collard greens. We washed it down with a Bowie Wowie for Dan – which tasted a bit like a Pina Colada and Dad’s Electric Lemonade for me – Blue Curacao based – both of which featured glowing electric ice cubes. Dessert, as has often been the case here, was a bit of a disappointment – we shared a brownie and apple crisp – both were a lot sweeter than we had hoped. What we were really looking for was a good apple pie (which had so far eluded us).

    After dinner we went for a walk around the Toy Story part of the Park which was a mesmerising collage of brightly coloured rides and opportunities to have their picture taken with different characters (for purchase at a later date). It was all a bit overwhelming although we both mused that the Toy story roller coaster (which was quite sedate would be fun if we didn’t have to queue for an hour to get on to it. From here we headed back to the hotel, feeling a bit overwhelmed, hoping that a bit of rest and some studying up on how things work would set us up better for the following day.

    Despite how many people there were and the wait times for the rides, the park is set up extremely well, with a number of different transport modes to get people from one place to another. Plenty of food options, including the Boardwalk close to our hotel that we didn’t end up visiting. [Wharf War – H-Block 101 – a great Australian punk band that probably never got the recognition they deserved (or probably wanted) – with a 70s/80s punk sensibility and political philosophy they didn’t ever sit that comfortably with the myriad of Fat Wreck Chords, skate-surf pop punk prevalent at the time, but have always struck a chord with me)].

    US states – 4, t-shirts – 7, fridge magnets – 5

    Give me Fuel, Give me Fire…

    We had a big afternoon ahead of us so we took things easy – rising late, putting some washing on and wondering to Front Porch at the northern end of the esplanade to grab some breakfast. I had the eggs and hash which were great but the hash was done with a jerk flavour. It just didn’t quite stack up against my first experience in Pittsburgh. Dan opted for the breakfast burrito, which he was impressed by and biscuits (which are actually scones). Americans seem to love them with gravy for breakfast (the gravy they come with tastes much more like white sauce than the type of gravy we are used to). Dan declared them, with butter and jam, to be the best scones he had ever eaten. They are pretty good with the scones here… just wish they knew how to serve them with cream (especially seeing as they put cream on absolutely everything else. After breakfast we went back to our room and chilled until it was time to go to the Miami Speedway – it was NASCAR day and we were off to the Ford Eco Boost 400. And the first step was getting there.

    It turns out that Miami is pretty big and the Ford Eco Boost was over an hour away – a $50 Uber ride. This was our first experience of using Uber in the US. Up until this point we had used taxis or public transport. It was also our first experience of booking an Uber. We were a little concerned we wouldn’t be able to get someone to take us all the way out to a speedway where there was little likelihood of a return fare. Booking an uber doesn’t really seem to do anything – the app starts searching for an uber once it ticks over to your booking time so the only advantage would be if you expected to be without phone service at the pickup point. We needn’t have worried though, we got an uber quite easily in the end.

    The journey though was a different matter – after a short jaunt down the freeway, we turned into w field of palm tree seedlings. It makes sense I guess as there are palm trees lining most of the streets throughout Miami. They stretched for miles though and they were in paddocks like city blocks. As we drove through them, we made turn after turn in a multitude of directions. The uber driver could have been driving us around in circles for hours and it did occur to us for a split second that this was somewhere you could dump a body and someone might never find it. Eventually we made it safely to the edge of the parking paddock and bade our farewell as we walked past row after row of pickup trucks amongst the (not quite as bogan as expected) crowds. Just like entry to any sporting event here, bags and tickets were checked (although less thoroughly than in NYC).

    We found our gate and clambered up the stairs to our seats. What had looked like just bench seats, actually had a back, making them much more comfortable. Our tickets were at the end of the row but we were pleasantly surprised with the view (we had purchased cheaper tix as this was all about the experience). We could see the whole track from our seats and as I expect is the case with most oval racing, that is one of the advantages over a street track. When we sat down, we noticed quite a few people with headphones on and some wired together. It seemed a bit excessive to us. At first, I thought they were such big fans they were tuned into the frequency of the garage they were following. [All Tomorrow’s Parties – Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – the big sound of this has become a bit of a staple for me while I’m travelling – not really a road song in itself it evokes the idea of the wide open spaces we are travelling through across America.]

    As with motor racing in Australia there was a fair bit of pomp and ceremony before the main race got underway – a couple of songs, a procession of drivers, the national anthem (which everyone stood for with their heart. The national anthem seems to be played or performed before all games/matches here. In Australia (my recollection is that) the anthem is usually only played at international matches or before grand finals and the like – Bathurst of course qualifies as the V8 Supercar grand final. This was not Bathurst although it was the last race of the season and would decide the championship.

    When the race finally started – from a rolling start which lessened the first corner carnage we are so used to seeing at home – the reason for the headphones became evident. The cars were s loud you couldn’t hear the commentary or the person sitting next to you. Some may say this shows that I am a motor racing virgin. Not true – I have been to Bathurst, the GMC 400 and to Goulburn speedway. Maybe it’s the cars, maybe it’s the speed, maybe it’s the acoustics of the speedway or a combination of all three but it is possibly the loudest thing I have ever experienced (and I go to metal, hardcore and punk shows). It was fantastic. I love motor racing and while the twists and turns of street tracks make the racing (and armchair viewing) more interesting, and you can’t beat the atmosphere of Mount Panorama, I have to say, being able to see the whole track, every pass, every manouvre makes it so enjoyable. [Going Out Strange – Rollins Band – I have only seen Rollins Band once – from behind the merch desk but it was worth the work to get the ticket and my most frequent travelling companion bought a T-shirt from me.]

    Just like racing in Australia, the pit crews had a big role with the lead changing numerous times due to faster pitting. There were plenty of tyre changes. Curiously though all changes were done one side of the car at a time. I have no idea if that is a safety requirement but it did seem like an inefficient approach to pitstops.

    The race format was a series of three races so after the first one was finished, we went downstairs to find some food – the food outlets were under the stands and also provided a bit of respite from the late afternoon sun. We grabbed a traditional foot long hot dog, which here you could add mustard ketchup and gherkin relish to. That was a revelation to me, as a lover of all types of gherkins and pickled things generally. And it was good. In fact the hot dogs, which tasted more like a good Viennese or continental frank, were far superior to the dogs at the ice hockey in New York – the home of the hot dog. We also took the opportunity to try an arepas – a kind of grilled corn cake. The iconic picture of endless fields of corn in the Midwest is probably pretty accurate. Forget aliens – corn is the real conspiracy here. They put it in everything and find a way to use it in every meal. You see endless tanker trains full of corn syrup to sweeten all the food (including, I am sure, most bread), they serve corn grits (a kind of porridge textured dish) for breakfast. If you don’t have grits, you have syrup on your pancakes or waffles, and then there is a plethora of tex-mex food almost everywhere with corn as a staple, if not southern shrimp often comes with grits and there is always corn bread.

    After dinner, we headed back up to the stands for the final two races – the last of which was conducted fully under lights. The racing was close with the lead shifting several times in the last 20 laps, which seemed like they took only seconds to complete. It was a nail-biting finish that decided the season champion and it was an amazing event to experience. Even if you’re not into cars, I would thoroughly recommend NASCAR as an all-American activity on your travels – the speed of the cars is just exihilating and it was a thoroughly enjoyable way to spend an afternoon.

    Once the stands had emptied and we were walking through the massive carpark with everyone else, we had to deal with the next problem – how to get an uber back to Miami. Once we finally got the parking attendants to let us make our way to a road, it was a lot easier than expected. In fact, the uber driver had been hanging around hoping to get a fare. That surprised me. [All Nightmare Long – Metallica – I was introduced to Metallica many years ago by a friend who had discovered Master of Puppets. It was my first experience of metal and remains one of my favourite albums. This is from another good album – 2008’s Death Magnetic.]

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    US states – 4, t-shirts – 7, fridge magnets – 5

    Let it shine

    After a long sleep we rose to head up to Harlem for the infamous Red Rooster Gospel Brunch. It was a nice day, so we decided to walk up through the Upper West side. The New York marathon was on so we had to take a route a couple of blocks west of the park, but it was a beautiful day for a walk. We wandered past the Lincoln Centre and up through the Upper West Side, briefly stopping to browse an antiques and vintage market. We were looking for coats – one for my bridesmaid and one for the groom – mine was sitting in the hotel room waiting to be hemmed.

    As with many things in New York, the estimated time it would take to walk was underestimated by google maps – I suspect it probably works it out for New Yorkers who don’t always pay attention to the don’t walk signs. We had to hustle through Harlem in the end and we were about 15 minutes late but made it in time to get brunch before the performance started.

    Ginny’s Supper Club, in the basement of Red Rooster felt just how it was supposed to feel like a 70s style club modelled on the speakeasys of the 30s. Buried away in the basement, the cavernous room, divided to include a private dining area if required, is decked out in maroon, red and wood with a wooden floor and bills from all the musical acts who’ve played plastered on the columns flanking the stage. It felt homey, it felt like New York, it felt like Harlem.

    The Gospel brunch was a buffet style affair with the extensive menu laid out across the back of the room. We were seated right at the front near the stage and promptly offered drinks. Coffees were great and my bloody mary was excellent. Then it was time to head to the buffet. The only problem with buffets is that I basically want to try everything and then I look like a pig because my plate is so heavily laden. Dan is always more conservative, picking just the things he is really excited by but then he always goes back for at least seconds. So here goes with my overladen plate – tasty and juice fried yard bird (chicken) – hard to do both but Red Rooster succeeds, collard greens (great if they are done well and these were), Mac and Cheese (with collard greens – absolutely wonderful), scrumptious cornbread madeleine, waffle, brisket and a devilled egg. Don’t be turned off by the devilled egg. I have tried to make them before with an average result but these were sublime. 

    And then the centrepiece of the brunch – the gospel performance. The performance was led by two charismatic performers and a group of high school students form a performing arts program in Harlem. The program supports students from across New York state and surrounding areas to board and study at no cost to their family so they can soak up the spirit of the performing arts in Harlem and learn their craft. They were amazing, even if some were a little nervous. It was the perfect way to experience a gospel brunch – the voices of the future and the Harlem family behind Red Rooster are to be applauded for their commitment to the arts and the community, especially this project. Teaming up with infamous chef Marcus Samuelson has allowed them to highlight the talent in this gentrifying neighbourhood.

    The performance was mostly contemporary music with a Christian bent and a few actual hymns thrown in – it included a cover of Purple Rain in tribute to Prince. It also included audience participation – This little Light of Mine is a familiar hymn to those who grew up in the 1980s and was often successfully sung in rounds. Here it was the subject of a traditional passing of the microphone. Dan got caught up in this with three lines of the song at the end. It was fun and fitted with the nature of the performance. The performance was amazing, the food was excellent, and the venue tied it altogether for the perfect Harlem neighbourhood feel. A perfect Sunday morning (even if I didn’t see anyone in a “church crown”.

    After brunch, we decided to wander back through the park. It was a crisp clear autumn day and an enjoyable walk, except for when we pulled up alongside the marathon – Americans are really good at encouraging the runners but it is so loud! Not conducive to a leisurely stroll through the park at all. We left the park eventually and headed back towards our hotel to chill out before we headed out for the evening.

    We had decided a trip to New York should involve a Broadway Show so we had chosen The Book of Mormon for a few reasons – it was created by the minds behind South Park and Team America, it was supposed to be funny, the songs would probably be funny too and it was totally irreverent. It turned out to be an excellent choice. Without wanting to include show spoilers in a travel blog let me just say this – it is all those things and more, filled with pop cultural references, irreverent dialogue and laugh out loud jokes, it was well worth the admission price. The theatre – the – is an old theatre and a tight squeeze. We were jammed in a couple of rows from the front, a process was needed for the toilets and bar at intermission and the orchestra (in this case band) pit was below the stage but all of that seemed insignificant. [That’s Entertainment – Billy Bragg – Billy still remains one of my favourite interviews. He was eloquent and thoughtful and what is on stage is what you get. A genuine musician, Not a rock star.]

    Without time to get dinner before the show, we headed for the nearest diner. Our long walking excursion meant a sit-down meal was preferable to a street cart hotdog but the one we chose was a mistake. It wasn’t particularly cheap and the pizza was average and the mac and cheese virtually inedible. We were so tired by that stage, we just took a couple of bites and then headed back to the hotel to sleep.

    Days to wedding – 4

     

    New York, New York, it’s a wonderful town

    The beginning of our big US adventure began in the second worst possible way. Yes, we woke up in time for our flight, after about two hours sleep – Dan with a throbbing thumb after dislocating it while packing and me with a yet to be finished wedding dress. [While these pages will cover our travels and make mention of the wedding, the wedding activities will be shared with friends and family on our wedding blog.] And then we arrived at the airport early only to find our flight had been cancelled. One friend, who was joining our flight in Sydney arrived in NY on time by herself. Two others joined us on the re-routed flight through Melbourne, only to have our alternative flight from there delayed by three hours, which then missed our original connection out of LA. But that wasn’t the worst of it. The food on the flight was not as good as previous trips and I swear Qantas must have purchased shares in a raspberry factory. Every meal had raspberries (which I am allergic to) – the muffin for breakfast, the dessert with the meal and the second breakfast on arrival in LA. The vegan girl sitting next to us on the first flight donated her muesli bar which wasn’t, in effect, vegan, but didn’t have raspberries.

     On arrival in LA we lost the two remaining members of our travelling party who were on a later flight. We flew American Airlines to NY on a packed flight. Dan was much more impressed with the meal on American – a ham and cheese wrap. The Customs experience in LA was quite OK until we got to the security check to get on the plane. Dan had carried a cooler pack with gel from Australia for medication but the US TSA were quite concerned about it. In order to let it through, they did a full pat down on Dan which took about 10 minutes. We were both pretty tired by then and just wanted to get to New York.  The process to get off the plane at New York was quite quick. Our bags made it, we collected them and grabbed a cab. Our usual New York procedure is the train/ subway/ walking but with an extra bag of wedding gear, and it being now quite late in the evening, we took the easy option – a flat $50 fare.

    After checking in we decided to go for a wander to Times Square to get the full force of arrival in America. We met our friend who arrived on the non-delayed flight on a corner – one of the things I love about New York – meeting people on the corner of two streets – they are well signposted and easy to understand with the numbering system (until you get way downtown where the grid pattern disappears and actual street names (like Wall st for example) take over. [Ken (The Mother Nature’s Son) – You Am I. You Am I always make me think of home (and being young) when I am travelling. They conjure up memories of the beer soaked sticky carpet in the now shuttered ANU Bar.]

    We looked for a diner for something to eat – we chose an Italian sandwich shop (that was quite expensive) and ordered some food – I had a fab pastrami on rye (complete with pickles). Dan followed his sandwich with a (very large) slice of NY cheesecake. After sustenance, we continued our journey to the church of rampant consumer advertising – Times Square. It was our friend’s first time in Times Square. And we were so mesmerised on our first visit we had recommended it as a first night activity for all our friends. The rampant neon that surrounds you on all sides is engulfing and much like the city/country that spawned it feels sometimes like it could chew you up and spit you out without even blinking an eye. Having said that, our experience of New York and New Yorkers has always been positive. They don’t go out of their way to welcome you but are always helpful and polite.

    After Times Square it was back to our hotel – The Salisbury Hotel on W 57th – to crash. The Hotel seemed a little bit more work and the bathroom grubbier than when we stayed seven years ago. No doubt the n=management had changed. We were in an accessible room which had not been updated since probably the 70s or 80s. The shower worked well though and the beds were really comfy – which made it worth the hefty price tag. Not that there is really such a thing as a cheap hotel in NY. It was also quite spacious for New York standards as it was an all-suite hotel when opened. Dan mused that we didn’t have a view. I asked what he was talking about – we had a perfect view of a 1930s apartment building across the street, complete with an old school water tower on the roof.

    Other friends joining us in NY had embraced several options to lessen the cost – some had scored really good deals on Times Square and Hell’s Kitchen hotels, hostels in upper Manhattan and Brooklyn and Air B’n’Bs in Harlem and East Harlem. [The Prince – Madness – on the first Madness album and the first of theirs I ever owned – a gift from a group of friends for my 15th birthday. I didn’t know it then, but this was their tribute to another ska great. Prince Buster.]

    Days to wedding – 5