Little Henry calls me Big Al, so that's who I am.
Little Henry is a stuffed sheep, but he thinks he is someone important.
I found a space to put him in my bag, along with Patch the dog for our trip to California.
I hope he enjoyed the trip to Los Angeles from Sydney, because I didn't.
The plane kept rocking about because of air turbulence. It was a long and boring 13 hours in a small seat. I couldn't see the movie screen because the seat in front was too high. There was not enough space to sleep comfortably.
And Dad kept hogging the ailse seat.

This is Marla, my cousin, and I trying to figure out from the maps where we are in the Mission San Juan Capistrano. The mission is in a little town in Southern California called San Juan Capistrano. Just south of Los Angeles.
Little Henry seems to think we should be going to the right. What would he know?
(Turns out he was right again)
That's one of the native Indian shelters in the background. And yes, that is a cannon that Little Henry is using as a pointer. A little rusty but still a cannon.


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This is a big hello from Laguna Beach.
Laguna Beach is on the Pacific Ocean south of Los Angeles and apart from being a good surfing beach in summer (it is now only early Spring here, so too cool for swimming), it is a popular place for artists who first came here to paint the sea.
It seems strange here because the sea is on the western side, whereas in NSW we are used to the sea being on the eastern side. If we look hard enough to the southwest across the Pacific we should be able to see Sydney!

This is us at the Anaheim Doll Museum.
They had dolls from all over the world, including Australia, Thailand and Japan, most of them very old. Especially the beeswax dolls made in England.
We are standing in front of the Barbie doll collection with more than 500 Barbies in it. Whew!


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This is me at Disneyland. But why is my visor so heavy?
I went with my cousins and we went on loads of rides, including Splash Mountain which was wet, and The Haunted Mansion, which was spooky.
We stayed there all day and did not get home until 10pm. It was fun, but we were very tired and fell asleep on the way home in the car.

We went one day to Hollywood, where most of the American movies are made. We started on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, which is on Hollywood Boulevard West. That's me (or part of me) walking east along Hollywood Boulevard.
Each star on the footpath has a name in it of someone who made a contribution to either film, radio or music.
There were hundreds of them and we never got to the end.

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They even had a star for Big Al!.

Of course!

Then we found a very famous star. Britney Spear's!.
This is my cousin Michelle, my cousin Marla and me.




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A few days ago we went to the Pacific Aquarium at Long Beach. The aquarium has some really big tanks and has fish habitats from different parts of the Pacific Ocean, including fish types found in the waters of Australia.
The seals were good, and they had a big shark tank and a small one. In the small one you can pat the small sharks (less than a metre long) and the stingrays. The sharks have a rough skin.
This is a groper in the background of the picture of Marla and I.
The aquarium also had shrimp, big lobsters, turtles, eels and all sorts of starfishes and anemones.
We also saw Nemo, Dory, Crush, Bubbles, Gil and Bruce!

Disneyland now has two parts, with the second called Californina Adventure. We were lucky enought to get tickets to both for the price of one, so we went back for another day of activities and rides.
Californina Adventure is based on the features and industries of California. Our first stop was the film backlot where the movie industry is represented.
There is me, then all my American cousins, Amiry, Michelle, Bory and Marla - who seems to have sprouted extra ears.
Trust Little Henry to get in there too!

This is the 'Beauty and the Beast' room where we have to answer questions about our personality to see which character we are most like.
Turns out I am most like Cinderella! Can you believe that?


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Clearly, I am not like that other Alice.
She's very two-dimensional compared to me!







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This Marla, Chili, and me on the Big Zephyr ride. Chili is a new acquaintance won by my dad on the 'Knock 'em downs.'
Isn't he clever?

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And if you are wondering what the Big Zephyr ride looks like, it is this long silver bullet shape ship that spins around with about twelve people in it, getting higher and higher the faster it goes.
My dad says that this is because of something called centrifugal force.

PT Flea had his dodgem car rides in the "Bug's Life' area. We all got in and had a go.
This is Marla chasing me.

And this where she caught me!


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No comment.

This is the Flik ride, which lifted us off the ground and spun us around - failrly slowly.
Little Henry was brave enough to come on this one too.





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After that we left Los Angeles.
With me mum on Refugia Beach, north of Los Angeles off Califonia Highway 1 on the road to San Francisco.
The coast here is very foggy - it is still officially winter - and you can see it in the background.


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There is a very good museum at Morro Bay where there is a big volcanic plug on the beach (you can see it on the sign). The museum has lots of hands-on activities for kids, like me, to learn about the estuary of Morro Bay where the salt water and fresh water mix together.
I am pointing to the Blue Heron rookery, which is where the birds nest high in the trees. Little Henry went too.



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Say cheese!

The American ground squirrel. Inquisitive little dudes.

This is Bubblegum Alley in a little town called San Luis Obispo. The alley had old bubblegum stuck all over it! And it had this sweet, sickly smell too. I had to hold Little Henry's nose for him (he couldn't do it himself).

This is my mum (mom, over here) and I at a very famous bridge concealed by a very famous fog.
But if you look very closely, you can see the bridge - a bit.
Yes, we have arrived in San Francisco!
Have a look on Little Henry's page to see what the bridge really looks like.


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Driving around San Francisco there are a lot of long cars known as stretch limousines. These are for the very rich, not for people with very long legs.

The west coast of California is famous for having the tallest tree in the world. It is the redwood tree.
There is a nice little forest of them just north of San Francisco at Muir Woods.
These are seriously tall trees.




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A place to have a rest in the redwood forest!

When you're walking along the trails in the redwood forest, you have to push the trees apart in some places, it is so narrow!



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On the way out of San Francisco we went across the Bay Bridge to Oakland and we found my street!






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Leaving San Francisco, we headed inland and east towards the mountains. Besides the mountains and trees, this area is known as 'gold country,' as this is where gold was discovered during the Californina gold rush of the 1800s.
On our first day there, though, we went to see some more big trees in the Calaveras State Park at over 5,000 feet above sea level (about 1,550 metres). This bear and cub have been carved from wood by chainsaw!

Calaveras and other areas around it are famous for the sequoia tree. This tree isn't the world's tallest, but is the biggest in volume because it does grow very tall and is very big around the base.
Here we are standing on the stump of one! It is about 20 feet (7 metres) in diameter.
That's big!

And to give you a better idea of the height of the sequoia tree, have a look for me at the bottom of these two specimens at the Calaveras state park.










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The town of Columbia has a restored gold mining town and this is me with one of the old horse-drawn wagons.

The gold prospecting area of Columbia had some narrow trails too!
Those rocks came in too close sometimes!

We knew we were getting close to Yosemite naional park when we saw all the water in the rivers from the melting snow.
For a good look at what we saw at Yosemite, check out Little Henry's site - he has some good pictures.

Well, someone has to stop the tree falling into the river.

The trees at Yosemite can grow to be very big. And to get as big as they do, they are old.
This one was over one thousand years old when it fell over. A lot of things happen in a thousand years.



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The Indian museum at Yosemite included a teepee structure.
I don't know that I would want to live in one.

Just so you know that it is not all galivanting around over here, I have my homework to do too. This is maths.

Oh well, looks like it's off to France! Au revoir!



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