State of the Union - what we think about the USA.

So, while you're battling swine flu and drab bank holiday weather back home (so I hear anyway - I'm sunning myself in Barbados personally), I thought I'd sum up some observations we've had about the USA. Some good, some bad, some just... bizarre.

Fatness - I think a lot of Americans get a bad press when it comes to their weight. In California and Miami especially, it appears the average person is struggling to put food near their mouth. However, it's when you go the touristy areas, that you start to see the Americans from the middle of the country - and boy, some of those people are monstrous. When your footsteps register on the Richter scale and the Ordinance Survey people ask if you're officially a hill or a mountain, it's time to put down that last twinkie. And while we're at it...

Huge bums - Not a day goes by without Liz pointing out a ridiculously disproportionally huge backside. Now I may sound like the kettle telling the pot he has a big arse, but my derriere is like a pimple next to these things. Some of the women possessing them (and this is a purely female phenomenon for some reason) have normal, well-proportioned top halves, but then you look down... God knows how they buy jeans.

Free Refills - One of the best things about American restaurants is the soda fountain. 3 dollars is a lot for a coke, but it's not bad for unlimited glasses of said drink. And the waiting staff aren't stingy about refilling either - sometimes I've barely had a sip before they're bringing out another drink. Remember this next time Pizza Express charge you four quid for a half pint of ice topped up with some coke out of a tap.

Tattoos - Every American has a tattoo. You see a middle-aged, mousy librarian from Kansas, and - WHOA, there's a topless biker spearing a dragon on her ankle.

Smoke Shops - As far as I know, marijuana is illegal in every US state. But every city we visited had a 'smoke shop', where they offer bongs, lighters, pipes, 'Take Me To Your Dealer' posters and equipment which I have no idea how it's related to weed.

Homelessness - This is a huge problem. Apparently the US government allowed many of their mental institutions to be closed down, and the patients to be discarded to the streets. And it shows. It's way too common to see men shouting to themselves or to be asked for money by beggars - it's about time the authorities stepped in and helped these people out.

Candy - Every chocolate bar must have nuts or peanut butter in, or both. I think it's a legal requirement.

Tourists taking photos - I am very aware we are tourists, and we took photos of things that the locals wouldn't bother. But we are not in the same league as some tourists. First, the Oriental visitors take it to a whole new level. Most of them seem to take photos of anything. "Look, we must get a snap of this Health and Safety notice for the guys back home!" There were times they asked me to take photos of them in front of something, and I had absolutely no idea what the something was.

Also, what's up with tourists taking photos of things that they're not even looking at with their eyes? We queued for a ridiculously long time to see the Constitution, and when we get to the front, people are just taking photos of it and walking away. They didn't even pause to attempt to read it. And what's with people posing in front of inappropriate things? There's nothing like going to the National WWII memorial, standing in front of it and flashing a cheesy smile. And I don't think the soldier statues at the Korean War Memorial were meant for people to put their arms around and yell 'CHEESE'!

Grocery Shopping - On the few occasions we went to a supermarket (by the way, they still have Safeway over there), they often bag your shopping for you in paper bags. This is surely the solution to our plastic bag issue bag home. Completely recyclable, more durable than plastic and still cheap to produce.

Traffic - It's a much better system for crossing the road in the US - cars can turn if there are no pedestrians, but must wait if there are pedestrians. Simple.

ATM Fees - $3 to withdraw cash from another bank's machine? Oh, do p*ss off.

Public Toilets - Everything is automatic. You needn't touch anything but your own genitals throughout the whole toilet experience. A toilet seat cover is automatically dispensed so your buttocks do not have to touch where other buttocks have sweated before. When you have done your business, an infra red sensor flushes it for you. You put your hand underneath the tap and soap dispenser, and voila! You don't even have to touch anything to get a paper towel. Beats giving the attendant in London club toilets a quid for him to pass you a tissue and sing 'Freshen up for the punani'.

Tipping - As mentioned in a previous blog entry, tipping has gone too far here. You only give a waiter 10% if he has given you poor service - surely it should be 0%?! And bartenders get a dollar tip for opening a beer bottle?! Even worse is when you find out that every time a waitress gets you a drink in a restaurant, they must tip the bartender a dollar themselves out of their own money, in the hope that you give them enough of a tip to make up for it. Oh, and they get taxed on their earnings, based on getting 15% tips, whether they got them or not. However, the customer service is tip top, as the staff really do try and earn their tips for the most part.

Presidents - It seems pretty much everyone (apart from the news channels and people in Texas) are happy about Barack Obama, and everyone claims they didn't vote for George W Bush. Some of them must have...

Food - I love the food here - lots of meat, bread and sauces. Mexican quesadillas, pulled pork, pancakes, burgers, shakes, BBQ, gumbo, pizza, etc. However, they cannot do bacon. It's too streaky, hard and tastes wrong. I'm loathe to say this, but get me some 'proper' bacon when I get home!

That's all I can think of right now. Please feel free to comment below on anything you agree/disagree with. Other than that, it's just two more nights (one spent on a plane) before our adventure ends. We're lucky enough to spend it here in lovely Barbados, as Liz's uncle Robin has kindly invited us to stay at his home. It's a tough life of sailing, sunbathing and swimming, but someone has to do it.

I hope you've been enjoying the blog and I'm glad people have actually been reading it. We're looking forward to seeing you all when we get back, and please remember our birthdays took place while we were away, and it's not too late to get us a present...

MIami Twice.

Just wanted to finish off posting about Miami, and more specifically, Key Largo. The only coral reef in the US can be found in the Florida Keys, so we booked ourselves in for a snorkelling session. You see the amazing brightly coloured fish, get up close to the strange living-but-not-living coral itself, and it's another chance to wear a skin-tight wetsuit.

You may be wondering - why are there no photos of these amazing sights? Well, the main reason for that is after our first snorkelling dive, we spent the rest of the time vomiting. It was a choppy day on those waves, and our complexion soon resembled that of seaweed. Luckily, Elizabeth still managed to get up close to those fishies, as they quickly came to feed on the vomit she had deposited over the side of the boat. One Fisher's sick is another fish's dinner.

As for the rest of our time there, we sampled the lovely Mexican and Italian food of Espanola Way, frequented the bars of Washington Avenue (if you're in town, check out Automatic Slims with its kitsch 50s style American decor, and Playwright, for a somewhat authentic Irish pub), the shopping on Ocean Drive and Lincoln Avenue, and sunbathed with the topless women and men wearing Stars and Stripes speedos on Miami Beach.

We're going to Miami, oh ey ye oh yami yami

We arrived in Miami to a thunderstorm but we needn't have worried, it's not called the Sunshine State for nothing. The beach is amazing - white sand, clear water and a disproportionate amount of fake breasts. This really is a home for poseurs - whether it's the stores full of diamante-studded clothing, wearing ridiculously high heels during the day or carrying little snappy dogs (men and women).

In our first couple of days, we've visited Little Havana, home of the Cuban population here. I'm not sure what their former leader would make of the 'Burn in Hell Fidel' hot sauce on sale there. The fried rice and plantains are delicious though, and you don't have far to go to find huge cigars (I'm not convinced they were rolled on the thighs of a virgin; maybe by the sweaty guys playing dominoes in the store?).

We also took a trip to the Everglades; more specifically Gator Park. After a trip on the famous Airboats (just like Del Boy and Rodney did in the 'Miami Twice' episode) where you get up close to the birds and even gators, we got even closer to the alligators when we sat in the front row of their 'wildlife show'. A mad pirate guy dragged a slimy baby gator all over Elizabeth's face - she was ecstatic of course. After showing us how to wrestle a full size gator as well as his huge snapping jaws in action, we got the chance to hold a gator in our arms - unfortunately the photos are on Liz's camera, so you'll have to wait until we get home to see us reluctantly touching the cold soggy skin of one of nature's great predators...

The famous Miami nightlife has also been sampled when we went to its oldest bar - Mac's Club Deuce Bar. Shooting some pool over a couple of cold beers seemed inocuous enough; but it all changed when we sat at the bar. What I thought was a friendly gay couple starting some small talk quickly became what I would call slightly mental. The well-groomed tanned white guy in the vest joined us and told us how much he loved Britain, especially the Pet Shop Boys and Kylie Minogue. He then revealed his girlfriend and mother of his two sons died in a car accident a month ago and he was here to get over it. We also found out they had split a few months before that as he thought he might be gay. Heavy going to say the least, and we obviously felt sorry for him.

Then the black guy he was previously sitting with introduced himself as a local Miami TV personality and showed us a photo of his young son. It was this point that the white guy (I can't remember their names right now) whispered to us he thinks this black guy is gay and that he didn't want to have bum sex with him. So this black guy who has heard the white guy's story wants to keep him company and make sure he's ok, while the white guy is shouting he doesn't want bum sex with him. Oh, and asking a friendly middle-aged woman at the bar whether she's a tranny, while fondling her friend's breasts.

I hope they all survived the night but I have no idea as we scarpered the first time they were distracted.

Restaurants, Rapids and Rollercoasters.

A flight down to Florida and we're in Orlando - well, technically outside of the city as we stayed in Theme Park Central: International Drive. If you like all-you-can-eat buffets, people dressed as cartoon characters and queueing for half an hour for a minute-long thrill, you're in the right place. Luckily these are things I enjoy.

My favourite day was of course my birthday - April 16th if you need to update your diary for next year. The lovely Liz woke me up with great presents, cards from my family (which was a nice surprise) and a chocolate muffin with candles in it. It was then time to complete over 15 years of waiting: finally I could go to a waterpark. Since I visited one as a child, I have been desperate to go again - and I got my chance at 'Wet n Wild'. It lived up to expectations; I got to enjoy Elizabeth's screams on the Black Hole, surfed the wave pool and took on the near-vertical Bomb Bay slide. It's pretty scary falling through a trap door onto a 100 foot steep slope. Luckily I was rewarded with a Chicago deep dish pizza for my birthday dinner...

As for the rest of our week, you probably already know if you would like Orlando or not. Universal's speciality is the attraction/show, like the amazing Simpsons ride (which feels like you're on a wild coaster but you actually stay in one room) and fun Fear Factor Live show. Islands of Adventure is best for rides like the Popeye rapids and Dudley-Do-Right falls which soaked us so much we might as well have been at the waterpark and the Incredible Hulk coaster with its 360 turns and high speeds. What made it even better was Liz keeping her eyes open and refraining from just counting how long the ride lasts. Seaworld is a weird mix of rides and wildlife - seeing killer whales leap out of the water in synchronised movement and the chance to get close to polar bears, beluga whales and manatees is unique. Aquatica gave me the chance to go to another waterpark; while less extreme, it was probably more fun than Wet n Wild with plenty of group rides.

Other than that - there's more 'British pubs' here than in your local high street, more Northerners than you can shake a deep-fried Mars bar at and more buffets than you can throw up at. Incidentally, some buffets have been renamed all-you-care-to-eat buffets, presumably because all-you-can-eat sounds like a challenge. And believe me, we've seen a few people who have taken that challenge.

A&E in DC

We're off to Orlando tomorrow for theme park mecca so here's a quick blog entry on the nation's capital. First off, we're in a dorm again in a very strange hostel. Most of these places are full of young backpackers travelling around like us. The major demographic here is old people (and I mean elderly) and the French. We shared our dorm on the first night with an ample-bottomed French girl (on a side note, we have seen some huge arses here. Some normal sized women have backsides so large I worry that if they sit down, they may never get up again due to rolling. Oh, and I do realise this is the kettle calling the pot fat-arsed). Anyway, Mademoiselle Derriere came in at 3am and turned on the light for ten minutes. Typical. But the weirdest person here is an old man in braces who talks to himself in a variety of different languages. There's nothing about getting the fear from a hairy-backed ogre when he's in the shower at the same time. Anyway, DC is the home of monuments and museums - we've seen the White House, Capitol, some moving war memorials, Colin Powell giving a speech, the Lincoln/FDR/Jefferson monuments, Kermit the frog, Muhammed Ali's Rumble in the Jungle gloves, the Apollo module that took Armstrong, Aldrin and the other one to the Moon, the original Constitution, the fastest plane ever, the Star Spangled Banner, a buffalo sandwich and the Wright brothers' original flyer. But that old hairy bloke in the braces will stay with me forever.

ADRIAN!

Aaron back on blogging duty here. Next up was Philadelphia, where we spent 2 nights in a dorm for the first time. Now Philly is of course the birthplace of the United States (and the Fresh Prince) so did we check out the history as soon as we got there? No, we went to the Museum of Art to run up the steps like Rocky. They even have his statue from Rocky 3 at the bottom. By the way, we weren't the only ones - in fact, there were probably 100 people doing it while we were there, and about 1 who actually wanted to look at art. That night, we went on a fun pub crawl with other hostel guests. All nationalities mixing through the international language of alcohol (although the drinking games were hard to explain without a translator)... A couple of hours of sleep later and we decided to see the sights such as the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. Unfortunately our guide was duller than James Blunt, Katie Melua and Snow Patrol put together. After he declared he'd been doing his job for 30 years, the crowd applauded; I'm sure it was because they were amazed he hadn't been sacked. In the evening, we sampled the infamous Philly Cheesesteak in Jim's Steaks. Dripping in gooey cheese, full of greasy meat, packed into a bun - an artery-blocking masterpiece of a dish. We then checked out a cool bar called Raven Lounge where we played Connect 4 over a few beers (if Kanye West does it, so can we) before going to Helium Comedy Club. After some top support acts, we got the chance to see JB Smoove, best known for his role as Leon in Curb Your Enthusiasm's Black family. Although he didn't threaten to 'get up in anyone's ass', it was definitely an experience...

New York, New York (Part 3)

After such good weather, we were back to the rain that seems to have followed us from Britain and inflict itself on us every few days! So we decide to stroll down 5th Avenue for a bit of window shopping, and spend way too long drooling over the new iPhones. Afterwards we headed to a comedy night at Crash Mansion on the lower East side, which featured some great musical comedians (musicedians?). We also checked out Brooklyn Bridge, went shopping in South Street Seaport and had great wonton soup in Chinatown's Bo Ky, which looked like the kind of place the old man from Gremlins would frequent. On our last day, we queued for hours to visit the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island - although it was well worth the wait. The view from Liberty Island of the Manhattan skyline is great and Ellis Island is pretty interesting, especially if you can trace your roots. We also checked out the World Trade Center site, which currently looks like a building site but the Freedom Tower and memorial plans look very impressive. All in all, I don't feel we did half the things we wanted to do in NY but that's the beauty of it - there's always our next trip...