After three weeks of gallivanting around California, we have a couple days left to explore our final Californian stop - San Diego. It's the second-largest city in the state (behind Los Angeles) and is home to about 1.4 million people. Despite that, San Diego has a somewhat slower paced atmosphere than the typical hustle and bustle of a city of its size. We started as we often do by checking out the city's downtown area. This here is known as the Gaslamp Quarter, a historic district with a number of historic Victorian-era buildings dating back to around the 1860's. Nice little spot to wander through.

Elsewhere in downtown, Little Italy is full of Italian people, Italian restaurants, Italian shops, and more Italian people on the lampposts such as Chef Boyardee here (not sure who he is).

Later we headed to Balboa Park - the country's largest urban park at 1,200 acres. The park is home to 15 major museums, several performing arts venues, gardens such as the one above, and the world-famous San Diego Zoo. The zoo houses over 3,700 animals of more than 650 species and subspecies, and is one of the few zoos in the world that houses the giant panda. Unfortunately we don't really have time to see it though; next time :)

Most of the buildings in the park are in the Spanish Colonial Revival style of architecture, which means absolutely nothing to me hehe. Basically they have a Spanish / Mexican flavour and look cool. Kristina made the observation that this city looks like her hometown of San Antonio, Texas but on the beach. That about sums it up.

Looking towards to the downtown skyline (with a naval ship going by in the shot on the right from the nearby base) from Coronado - a small affluent city plonked on other side of San Diego Bay. Several people in the past have recommended San Diego to me as a good spot to set up camp. Aside from the expense of living in California in general, I kinda like what I see so far.

This is overlooking the affluent San Diego neighbourhood of La Jolla (pronounced La HOY-yah), a hilly seaside community occupying 7 miles (11km) of curving coastline along the Pacific Ocean.

The University of California, San Diego is located in La Jolla, and has this rather impressive library that was worth a passing look. We've seen several such architecturally interesting libraries on this trip as it turns out.

La Jolla Cove beach, one of several along the La Jolla coast. Not bad!

This one is particularly rocky and rough, so no swimmers in sight.

But there were plenty of these guys however, sunning themselves on the rocks.

Except this one - he was rolling all over the beach and getting smashed by the waves, and absolutely loving it hehe.

Sea lions seem to know how to live :)

From La Jolla he headed to the southern border of San Diego, which happens to be the Mexico-United States border. On the other side of the fence is the Mexican city of Tijuana. It's a pretty intimidating fence, but if anyone did happen to make it over, at least there's a Porta Potty. Out of shot however were US Border Patrol agents who are constantly patrolling the fence.

San Diego on the left, and Tijuana on the right looking very densely populated! If we had a little more time we probably would have headed over for a quick look.

What's the view from your living room? For these guys, it's the USA hehe.

The south-western corner of the United States. We left Vancouver in Canada exactly a month ago today and crossed back into the US, and have been traversing the west coast ever since. End of the road :)

Mexicans!

Just this one little fence separating the two country's beaches. The shot on the right was taken through the fence, after which a little old Mexican man on the other side walked over and started talking to me in broken English hehe. Border Patrol and several security cameras are constantly watching though, and in fact this shot got me in trouble. Despite the absence of signs, you're apparently not allowed to approach the fence - a means to prevent people passing things through.

If you really felt inclined, there's not much stopping you from just swimming around the fence, and apparently many people do hahaha! I got talking to the Border Patrol agent who had told me step away from the fence, and he said it's almost a daily occurence to have folk swimming over from Mexico, though mostly at night. And if they're not swimming over, they're on a jet ski instead and it becomes a race with the Coast Guard. In the ten years this guy has been a Border Patrol agent, he claims he's been in fist fights, armed stand-offs, and had people try to drown in him the ocean hehe - geez! Anyway, that's it for San Diego, and that's it for the ocean; we're heading to the desert!

The infamous Route 66, spanning 2,451 miles (3,945km) between Chicago and Los Angeles and passing through several states along the way. We've actually seen both ends of it on this trip but this is the first time we've driven on it. Route 66 was one of the original highways within the U.S. Highway System, and was established in 1926. It became one of the most famous roads in America, and served as a major path for those migrating to the west.

We drove a section of it in eastern California, and these shots pretty much sum up the scenery - desert, desert, and more desert! Specifically this is the Mojave Desert, which we'll be spending the next several days in.

Despite its fame, Route 66 is actually no more. The beginning of the end for Route 66 came in 1956, 30 years after it was established, upon the introduction of the new Interstate Highway System. Route 66 supported the economies of the communities through which the road passed, and people doing business along the route became prosperous due to its growing popularity. Those same people later fought to keep the highway alive in the face of the growing threat of being bypassed by the Interstates, but alas it was officially decommissioned in 1985. It is now no longer possible to drive Route 66 uninterrupted between Chicago to Los Angeles, though much of the original route and alternate alignments are still drivable with careful planning.

This here is the tiny community of Amboy, California. Amboy became a boom town after the opening of Route 66, and Roy's Motel and Café prospered as the only gasoline, food and lodging stop for miles around in this part of the Mojave. When the town was bypassed by the nearby Interstate 40 in 1973 however, Amboy faded into memory. Ever seen the Disney/Pixar film Cars? Its plot mimics this story exactly.

We continued along 66 through the desert for ways before eventually having to detour away to our next stop. In other news, today is our 100th day on the road :)

The infamous Las Vegas Strip! Self-billed as "The Entertainment Capital of the World" but also known as Sin City (and with good reason), the Strip is lined with mega casino-hotels, seedy characters and entertainment, and a perpetual abundance of tourists. Compared with other cities in the western US, Las Vegas is a relatively recent arrival having been founded in 1905. For many years it was merely a small settlement in the middle of the desert, but several pivotal events helped Vegas grow into what it is today. For starters, the construction of the Hoover Dam (which we'll be seeing in a few days) in 1928 brought thousands of workers to the area. Three years later the state of Nevada legalised gambling, after which Vegas became an entertainment center for the dam workers. During the same period, Los Angeles was also growing rapidly, but with gambling banned in California, folk began traveling to Vegas for vacation, recreation, and entertainment. Business was thriving and a building boom ensued, as did a tradition of one-upmanship with each new hotel and casino trying to outdo another. That tradition continues today as the Las Vegas Strip skyline continues to evolve and grow.

They say you can travel the world in a day in Vegas. Here we have Paris represented by a half-scale replica of the Eiffel Tower above the Paris Las Vegas casino-hotel, as well as other Paris landmarks.

Rome is represented down the road by several fountains and other Roman landmarks, spread throughout Caesars Palace casino-hotel.

And Venice is represented across the street at The Venetian casino-hotel, which features an indoor version of Venice's Grand Canal complete with gondola rides. Very cool!

One of the most visible aspects of the Strip's cityscape is its use of dramatic architecture. The rapidly evolving skyline and constant modernization of hotels, casinos, restaurants, residential high-rises, and entertainment offerings have established it as one of the most popular tourist destinations in the United States, and the world. Don't expect to stay on the Strip and have a cheap holiday - this place is bloody expensive, both in terms of the accommodation options and the shopping. If money is a consideration then do what we did: stay the hell away from here in a crappy motel elsewhere in the city, drive into the Strip and make use of the free parking on offer at most of the casinos.

On the other hand, you could win all of your money back again and some, or sink more into the hole hehe. The Casino floors are vast, and whatever your poison it's on offer here.

Also vast are the slot machines - hundreds, maybe even thousands of them are scattered throughout each casino.

Keeping in mind we're on a four-month trip and don't have jobs, we agreed to limit ourselves to gambling just $20. Well after 30 minutes on various slot machines we had tripled that to $60. We then gave $20 of it back again in losses, and sunk a further $20 on the roulette table. So in the end, we broke even, and left happy hehe.

The Strip is busy by day, but the real action and sinfulness starts after dark and the area's population swells dramatically!

We headed up to the top of the Eiffel Tower to admire the chaos from above. On the left is the dancing water fountain in front of the Bellagio casino-hotel in its 8-acre lake. The fountain erupts every 15 to 30 minutes and is synchronised to music.

Down the road outside of the Polynesian-themed Mirage casino-hotel, their big lake contains an artificial volcano which 'erupts' hahaha! Seriously, these places spare absolutely no expense!

Caesars Palace, looking rather tranquil at night but don't be fooled. And that was our day in Vegas. We won some, we lost some, but we made it out in one piece with our bank accounts and retirement funds still intact ;)