LOS ANGELES.

The City of a million stories.

Captains Log Day 18 – 23/12/14 12:20am.
Maingate Resort and Spa

After a long hiatus of
log entries, this recollection of events commences immediately after departing
from San Fransisco, as the captain and his comrades take on the City of Dreams.

The journey to LA began
just as any trip to the Hollywood city should, with the sighting of an A list
Celebrity – Waiting at the airport as the vessel we were to travel on was
cancelled, out came Courtney Cox, followed by a man who looked like Freddy
Kruger. Although we are unsure about the Freddy part the Captain and the team
of Super intendent Dave and Wing Commander Nand were lucky enough to use some
of their Aussie charm to manage a selfie with Courtney Cox.

After a bit of a delay to
our flight, was finally on its way and it didn’t take Wing Commander Nand long
into our decent to realise L.A was a monster of a city. Departing the airport we discussed our plans
for the night and called our first Uber into the city, which got cancelled, and
then called another which once again got cancelled. Waiting about 45 minutes at
the airport tensions were mounting, it seemed like no one wanted to pick
the cross atlantic crew up. Finally
after a substantial time waiting, along came our transportation saviour.

A few minutes into the
conversation we discovered that our Uber driver was a full time actor, he had
been on T.V shows such as Greys anatomy, Dial M for murder and was currently
working alongside Jack Nicholson in a movie.
He gave us a card and recommended his services if we required actors. At
this point, thoughts crossed my mind about motion picturing the captains log
and having him play his character. After dropping Super intendant Dave to his
Banana republic Hostel we made for our abode, agreeing to meet up with super
intendant for the nights activities.

We had not eaten since Master Chef and Base Captain Rish
had fed us Pancakes and sausages earlier in the day, so we quickly prepared our
materials and headed out to the Banana Republic – chanting “Leeves” as we
walked. We rendezvous with Super Intendant Dave and headed to Roscoes Chicken
and Waffles. Roscoes was a suggestion that was made by Wing Commander Nand – as
he had seen it multiple times on Fresh Prince of Belair. This place had to be
sampled. The food was both Delicious as well as a heart attack waiting to
happen. It crossed the boundaries of segregation between sweet and savoury and
delivered fried chicken and waffles. It took our minds a few minutes to process
what we were eating, and our bellies a lot longer to digest it.

Belly’s full and minds
confused the squadron of three headed to Hollywood boulevard to check out the ‘Stars’
of the strip. To our surprise there was thousands of these, 2000 plus to be
more precise. Stars upon stars, many of these unknown and nestled amongst a
heap of known personalities. Walking for
about 3 hours we saw the strip and returned home exhausted.

At this point had been
hit with an illness – i could only describe this illness as Santa Flu. Since
the onslaught that was Santacon i had started to feel a deterioration in my
health. This started with a itchy throat and developed into a cough, finally
mutating into a severe chest pain. Not to hinder Super intendant or the wing
commander I carried on, pushing the limits to the extreme, also leaving large
deposits of phlegm and saliva everywhere I went. The health was getting bad and
my party could feel my failings.

Day 2 in L.A began with
the squadron of three meeting up in the morning and walking towards the strip,
trying to figure out what the best run of actions would be for the day. As we
headed towards the strip, a odd looking gentleman approached us and discussed
if we would like to go on a bus tour to see LA landmarks, at first a little
confused we heard his reasoning and the prices and decided – why not. Some time
was remaining for the tour to start and our bellies were making some type of growling
noise, we thought it was best to go and feed. As a recommendation of Super
Intendant Dave we headed for a Mexican chain called Chipotle. We ordered and
what came can be described a burrito the size of a small baby (not a foetus but
a Baby) not only was the size of this meal amazing so was the taste. Guzzling
our Burrito babies we headed back to the tour area and met with the Odd looking
fellow. Upon Arrival he started speaking to us, it seemed a slurred speech and
required some concentration, soon he revealed that he had been shot in the head
a few months in the past and was on the road to recovery. He has been smashing
doctors initial diagnosis of full speech recovery sitting only at 1%, he was
now at 80% speech capacity.

We boarded the bus just
in time for a storm, and to add to the adventure the bus didn’t really have
much of a top. Getting drenched, we drove past places such as Rodeo Drive, The
Hollywood sign and Micheal Jacksons house. Having a semi deaf driver did not
accommodate our request for him to speak louder. Possibly the worst tour have
ever done. Moral of the story – don’t trust a street seller that has been shot
in the head.

Drenched and exhausted
from the tour we walked up to the Chinese theatre to see fit our hands in those
of our celebrity heroes. As walking up the strip we were once again approached
by a random person – this time with no dents on his head. He approached us and
stated that he had some open spots for the shooting of “The Price is Right”
with Drew Carey, for the next day. At
first we walked past thinking this cant be true, then we walked to him and he
advised it was! Not only that but they choose contestants from the crowd. We
were advised of the early start and agreed to the conditions. We were going to
be on the Price is Right! To celebrate we bought some beers and a bottle of
Vodka and headed back tot he hotel, listening to some Rap music we polished off
the bottle and were flying high and after a few hours we decided to grab late
night snack and call it a night – we had a mega day ahead of us. Santa Flu was
getting worse.

Waking up at 7am after
polishing a bottle of Vodka off really sucks. Another life lesson learnt on
this trip. Scurrying we headed to CBS studios, stopping by the Banana republic
to grab Super Intendant Dave. The wait was insane, lines upon lines – all up
waiting time was well over 3 hours.
Although i can not disclose much of the shooting (NDA) i will say that
we did not get called down 🙁 despite our epic photographs and our charismatic
interviews). On the bright side we are surely on the screen multiple times
cheering and a carrying on like we have parts of our brains missing (we maybe
do). The set and the shooting was very entertaining with Drew Carry and George
(the MC) making a heap of jokes. Also in the first time in Price is Right
History the producers revealed the WRONG showcase! This had to be re shot and
the executive producer came out to apologise to the crowd and the contestants.
The show will be aired on the 10th of March 2015, so the wearing of my Santa
hat was not allowed 🙁

Following an eventful
session at the CBS studios Wing Commander and I departed ways with Super
Intendant Dave. Dave headed back to Banana republic and we headed to Warner
Brothers Studios to see the sets and the homes of our favourite TV shows and
Movies. Once again we faced Uber issues as the Driver ended up taking us the
wrong direction and straight to universal studios, upon seeing Jurassic park,
both Wing commander and I knew we were at the wrong spot. The Uber Driver
apologised profusely and voided the charges. Inside Warner Brothers, Wing Commander and i Marvelled at Batman and
Harry Potter props, including original costumes and artwork. we walked around
the dessert in Terminator and the Lake in Dexter. We had been given sneak peak
into how the industry does it, the so called ‘Movie Magic’.

Concluding the tour we
dialled D for Dave and planned a meet up in Santa Monica Pier. Our new Formula
one Mexican uber driver made us reach in no time – beating Dave by a full half
an hour. We strolled up and down the pier crossing Bubba Gumps restaurant, the
Pier theme park and other novelty places including a semi raving santa. We
reached the end of the pier we watched a Seal steal the bait off fisherman and
laughed. it was pretty random. Catching up with Dave we walked down to view the
famous Venice beach, strolling up and down before decided to head back towards
our hotels for a well earned dinner. To
fit right into the shoes of a true tourist – dinner was to be at Hardrock Cafe.
In my deathly sickness everything had started tasting like mush and the service
was nothing to admire, like a snooty frenchman we complained and managed to get
a 12% discount. Disappointed in dinner but satisfied with a full day the
Captain and the Crew headed back to base for a well earn rest. At this point my health had reached its worst
point. I went straight to bed hurting inside – i was worried that it would
jeopardise my tour of Vegas.

Since this was the end of
LA journey, it was time for D man Dave to end his service and return home. A
very sad moment in our trip as we gave Dave a big hug and promised him a visit
to the beautiful city of Vancouver. Sadness filled our minds as we fell asleep.

We awoke exhausted from
the previous day, and also realised we had already begun to run late. Our bus
was to leave shortly and we had not even gotten ready – in a mad Dash we got
ready and caught an Uber towards the Bus stand
– Today was the day we were leaving for Vegas! Sin City! we rushed and
made it to the bus stand 2 minutes before the bus was to depart, once again
being the last ones to board. Thus ending our L.A adventure and heading North
east towards the Sins that awaited us.

Los Angeles The City of a
million stories.