The second day in Toronto was going to Niagara Falls. It was a day trip that left in the morning and got home about 6pm. We firstly went to the observation tower near the falls, it gives great panoramic views of the whole area and it was absolutely freezing out in the open. It had snowed the night before and there was ice all over the place.

We then walked down to the falls and got some great photos before heading down the river towards Lake Ontario. We stopped off at a town called Niagara on the Lake that used to be the capital of upper Canada. Then it was time for the big trip back to the city.

On our last day we utilised the Hop on Hop off bus to get around town. We actually started the day taking the subway down to CN Tower (as the bus did not start to 10am) to get great views of the city, then we jumped on the bus to go to the St Lawrence Markets for breakfast. We then walked back to the waterfront to get on the free boat tour.

After the tour we head to the Hockey Hall of Fame and then finally caught the bus over to Chinatown. The day would not have been complete if I did not do one more bit of shopping before going home, so I am now carrying four extra pairs of shoes. I suppose that will make it one for every pair of jeans I bought. I did well, I only bought three new things in Canada, but I have a decent carry on bag on the plane with me and there was no room left in a backpack that was pretty empty when I left.

So now I am at the Toronto Airport waiting for my flight to LA, I don't board for another two hours, but Lisa had an earlier flight than me. I then have a seven hour wait at LAX, I am going to see if Qantas will let me in the lounge, I doubt it but it is worth a try.

Got to Toronto around 1pm today, after arranging tickets to go to Niagara Falls we went and found some lunch. It is getting cold here so we quickly discovered the PATH, the underground tunnels that connect all the city buildings. You can go all over town without having to go outside, but it is a bit confusing to start off with.

We also bought ticket for the hop on hop off bus, so we took the last bus of the day and just took the full trip around the city without getting out. We will do the proper sight seeing on Wednesday, off to the falls tomorrow. Bought one more bit of clothing today, it is like I can't stop at the moment.

Been a very busy time here in New York, very long days every day.

On the evening of my first night I met some other travellers in the lobby and we decided to go check out a rooftop bar call 380 on 5th, it was on the 20th floor and had fantastic views of the Empire State building.

I had two more days here by myself before Lisa arrived. The first day I caught a train downtown to near the Brooklyn Bridge and then walked down the water from to try and find a get a good picture. I continued to walk down to the Stanton Island Ferry, but by the time I got there the rain was starting to get quite heavy.

So the decision was made to make it a shopping afternoon, so I caught a train to midtown to check out Macys. After finding some good deals (I am now carrying a second bag to fit everything), I headed to a bar called “The Australian”, I heard from a guy in the hotel that they sold Coopers beer and I have missed my coopers.

I then went back to hotel to dump my latest shopping successes. I ran into the same guys from the night before (and a couple of others), so after a bit of dinner we headed back to “The Australian” so they all could be introduced to what I was spruiking as the best beer in Australia – Coopers.

The next morning the day was a lot nicer, so I attempted to finish my site seeing from the day before and caught a train straight to the Stanton Island ferry. This is a free ferry that goes very close to the Statue of Liberty. I figured if I actually went to the island I would be too close to take photos. It seems to be a very popular thing to do, with most people getting off and going straight to the return ferry. You also get really good views of the downtown buildings.

On my return I walked up through the financial district and down Wall st, struggling with the masses to get a good photo of the “bull”. I then went down to the World Trade Centre memorial, there is lots of security to get in which I can understand, but it was worth seeing. I still remember seeing it all happen live on TV all those years ago.

I then headed up to Century 21 (another big shopping centre) and am happy to say I did not spend that much money this time.

By his time the new hotel would have been ready for me, this is where I was staying with Lisa. So I head back and got settled in and waited for Lisa to arrive. She got in fairly late and after a long day of flying for her we went out and got some dinner and had an early night.

Saturday was a very big and long day. Even though we were right next to the Empire state building we never went up it. Instead we went up to the Rockefeller Plaza to do “Top of the Rock”, this has great views of the city and Central Park and the great advantage is that your city photos actually have the Empire State building in it. That is the one problem going up the Empire state build observation deck, you take photos of the city without the most iconic building in it because you are on top of it.

We then walked down to Grand Central Station before heading to Times Square to buy tickets to the Lion King. We then caught the subway down to Chinatown before doing a walk half way across the Brooklyn Bridge and then walked down to Century 21 so Lisa coud down some shopping. We had to go back to Times Square so I could go to a Lids shop to buy a baseball cap.

Last day in New York, so we caught a train up to Central Park and spent a few hours walking through there as well as checking out the zoo. It is such an impressive park and I could really have spent the day walking around.

We then headed to midtown to go to a shop Lisa wanted to go too, but before heading back to the hotel to pack and get ready for show. We figured you could not go to New York without going to see a Broadway show and the Lion King is one of the biggest at the moment. It was a very impressive show and I very happy we went.

We are now at JFK airport waiting for our flight to Toronto where we are staying for three nights. I will load up some photos soon, but I have about 800 photos of New York to work out which ones are good and which ones are rubbish.

Been a very busy three days and have not had much of a chance to do much on the blog.

After my very interesting night in Uvalde I moved onto Houston. Uvalde was very country, it main industry around the area is game hunter. They have massive farms out there with exotic animals that hunters coming all over to shoot things.

Houston was the craziest place I had to drive, I had a bit of time before I had to meet up with my frind Kevin, so I went to NASA Houston. This meant I had to go from one side of town to the other on the freeways, it really was the spagetthi roads you seen in the movies and was really hard work.

I caught up with Kevin and his friends Will at Will’s appartment, we then went out on the town going out for dinner and finding some cool pubs to drink.

The following day we drove to Nederland where Kevin lives, I had a nightmare scenario where my GPS would not start up, I knew which way I had to go, but after some searching I could not find the freeway, so I went back to Will’s and got directions and loaded up google maps on my phone as a reference. As it turns out about 10 minutes down the freeway the GPS kicked in and it was an easy drive.

After settling in at Kevin’s house his parents took us out for dinner for some Cajun food – Gumbo is very nice. Kevin and I went out after dinner in Beaumont, the bigger city near his home. We went to one of his locals and then headed to the John Wayne bar to catch up with some of his friends. I ended up doing a bit of line dancing and the two step.

After a bit of sleep in we went to the wetlands to see if we could spot an alligator, we saw a couple in the water, but had no luck finding one on the bank to get any good photos. We then went back into Beumont to see the worlds third largest fire hydrant, I can only assume that once upon a time it was the largest.

On Monday I drove to New Orleans, from Vegas to New Orleanns I covered 2500 miles, so it was quite a journey. I went for a walk aroun town during the day and then went out in Bourbon Street with some guys I met in the Hostel.

I caught a flight to New York today, getting to my Hotel around 4pm. I think I am just have a quiet night today and go for a good walk around tomorrow. I used the subway to get into town, so I have arleady had a feel of New York.

It is Wednesday night here and Lisa will arrive on Friday night, so that will be a bit of fun. It is a lot colder here than every where else I have been in the US and am wearing a jacket for the first time since being in the US.

It is funny how hard it is to sleep sometimes - I had everything going for me last night, 9.6 mile hike, the restaurant closes and 9pm and no TV in my room - yet I was still awake at 11pm. Never the less I still made it up early and packed up all my gear ready to check out by 11am. I had a quick coffee and juice, then headed out on a 3.8 mile hike so I could get back and shower before checkout.

I did the window trail today, this is to the "V" you may have seen in a lot of my photos. Where I am staying is called the basin, but it actually 1500ft above the surrounding area, it is the middle of a big mountain range. The window is a gap in this range where all the water collected in the basin falls to the ground. It is dry most of the year, but it was a must do walk to do before I leave. Still no bears or lions.

After finishing the walk I checked out and had an early lunch before hitting the road. I took one of the smaller highways to Uvalde, needing to go through border control three times, since I am was so close to the Mexican border at Big Bend and for most of my drive today it is understandable. I never actually left the US, but they are still looking for illegals.

It was quite a nice drive, going through Amistad National Recreational reserve.

I got to Uvalde about 6pm and have settled into what seems like a nice hotel. I really feel like I am Texas now, the hotels moto is "we welcome hunters". It is Halloween tonight, the hotel has a bar but I don't how crazy it will get as it seem pretty quiet so far.

Of to Houston tomorrow, first stop is NASA and then meeting up with my friend Kevin for a night out.

A big day on foot today - had a bit of a sleep in mainly due to the two hour time zone change over the last two days. I could not get to sleep before midnight and ended up waking at 8:00am despite my best efforts to be at brekky by 7:00am.

So after a quick meal I went to the park information office and got some information on the longer hikes that I could do in a day. I decided on a 9.6 mile hike that ascends about 1500ft, it started in one valley on a trail called the Laguna Meadow Trail which went about 3.3 miles, I then took a 1.8 mile trail the took to great views of the Green Creek Valley (destroyed by fire in 1989 and recovering nicely) before heading onto the Pinnacles trial which lead me down into another valley before crossing into another valley to get back to lodge.

It took about four and half hours to do, I was going to do another 3.8 mile hike, but the rain started getting heavier towards the end of the first hike and never really let up again. It drizzled on and off for most of the first hike, but it was not too bad, but it was more consistent at the end. It was probably all for the best as I realised it was the 31st October in Australia and it was the last day I could do my e-Tax.

Tomorrow the plan is to the 3.8 mile hike in the morning before I have to check out. I will only do this hike if it not raining as part of this walk is the views you get into some other valleys.

I will then start my two day trek to past Houston, I have decide to take one of the smaller highways rather than the bigs ones to enjoy the view more.

So not as big a drive today making it to the Big Bend National Park with plenty of time to go for a short walk and watch the sunset, though with another time zone change I lost another hour.

It was quite a good drive with the country side change quite a lot through the drive, there was some very strange art work on the way (I assume that's what it was) with a small Prada shop in the middle of no where.

The drove in was amazing and am staying in a place called the Basin, this is starting point of all the walks and I have a very busy day planned with a 10 mile walk. It is a combination of three walks, so if it gets too much a can cut it down by basically turning off.

Had a big day on the road today, it will be the biggest of any of the days driving. In total I did 563 miles which is a bit of 900kms. Not the most ideal way to spend the day, but it needed to be done so I could do the whole drive into the Big Bend National Park and hopefully get a walk in before dinner.

I had a terrible nights sleep last night, had these crazy dreams about people breaking into my and take my stuff. You think it was scary, but once I mention that the person attacking me was pretending to be a big cat and when I fought back I could not hurt them because they had a cardboard box on their head. The dream all worked out in the end, they got caught and deported back to England - don't ask me, it was just a crazy dream.

So I left Kingman around 9:30 after getting a good American breakfast into me, but I really can't handle how they do their bacon. Took about four to get to Eloy where there is an indoor skydiving center, though I did stop quite a few times to take photos. Since it had been a while since I had jumped and never been in a wind tunnel I thought it best to just go through the beginner training than just jump in there and see what happened.

I did 2 x 2 minute sessions which was a lot of fun, but all up took an hour out of my day. So I hit the road again and got to Las Cruces in New Mexico around 8:30. But now I have crossed into central mountain time and it was actually 9:30. Got a very hotel room tonight and best of all they have a laundry, so I have done all my washing before bed - though I was very upset to find I have lost a sock.

After a couple of days of letting hair down in Vegas with the other guys from the conference (Tyler came down from LA as well) we parted ways with everyone heading home. So the road trip part of my holiday has finally started, though I did not get too far today.

I stopped off at the Hoover Dam which is only about an , since I was there I did a tour of the place. The photos don't do the size any justice. I then kept heading south and then turned off to go see the Grand Canyon. Once I had to turn of the highway the drive got pretty slow, they doing the road up and the 30 miles was on rough dirt roads.

I went to the Skywalk, which is counter levered walk way that hangs over the side of the canyon and has a glass floor. It is pretty freaky, unfortunately they want let you take a camera out with you (they have their own photographers and want you to pay for their photo's).

By the time I left the sun had set and had to drive about another 90 minutes to get to Kingman, the town I decided to stay in for night. I am staying in a old highway hotel right on Route 66, it is nice and cheap, but really just picked it for the big sign they have out the front.

The conference is finally over and it is time to get the blog up and running. So here is a breakdown of what I have been up to in the last week.

I left Melbourne last Thursday morning, flying to Sydney to get a connecting flight to LA. Work sent me Premium Economy, so it was a very comfortable flight. The only downside was that I had seen most of the movies showing on the flight. So a few drinks and I was ready for a sleep anyway.

Landing in LA I was all ready for the long wait through US Immigration, but when I got to the line there was only two people ahead of me and I was out within 10 minutes. Got a shuttle bus to the Hostel just off Hollywood Boulevard. So due to the time difference it was still Thursday morning.

Did not get up to much for the rest of the day, just walked down the Boulevard to the Chinese Theatre and checked out the area. It is a pretty run down area and no way as nice as I expected. For the rest of the day I just hung out at the hostel recovering from the flight. I had dinner and drinks at the hostel.

After a good sleep I took the hostel walking tour to Beverly Hills. A few of the places we went past was Elvis's LA home, where Michael Jackson died and the Playboy Mansion.

Tyler a guy I worked with at Hydro now lives in LA, so he came to stay at the hostel for a couple of nights (he lives a bit out of the city for us to stay there. After a few drinks catching up we went back to the hostel for a BBQ dinner. We then went to see a UK house band call Disclosure. We then went y to the Roxbury Night club.

On Saturday went to Universal studios to do all the rides and a backstage tour. After the big night we weren't feeling too flash after some of the 3D rides, but we made it through and it was quite cool doing the backstage tour. That night Tyler organized Ice hockey tickets to see the LA Lakers, great seat just behind the dug out area (not really sure what it is called).

On Sunday I went and picked up my rental car and started the drive to Vegas, I got out of LA pretty easily once I got on the freeway it was a breeze. It was pretty cool driving through the dessert, but I have a lot more of this to do in the coming week.

Once in Vegas I settled into my hotel room which is cool and waited for Ricky and Tony (my coworkers) to turn up. We went out and got dinner and put our plan down for the coming week. I won't go into too much detail about the conference other than saying it was very long days and I learnt a lot. The evenings were filled with socializing and drinking and last night the band Imagine Dragons played.

So the conference is now officially over and I am going to spend today and tomorrow in Vegas and then starts he big drive that will finish in New Orleans after about eight days. Tyler is coming to Vegas for the weekend, so we will hang out for a couple of days doing a bit of shopping and partying.

Once again the internet has been pretty erratic out in western desert, but I should be happy there was some at least some of the time so I could keep up to date what is happening in the world. So here is the final entry for my trip, I am now at a hotel in Cairo and will be catching a taxi in a couple of hours to the airport. Here is what has happened this week:

Monday So New Years in the Bahariya Oasis was a good as can be expected. We went out for dinner and then moved up to the hotel roof to have some drinks and set off fireworks. It was a pretty good night, though it is strange to be in a place where there are no other celebrations going on.

Tuesday The next day we had a big bus trip to the Siwa Oasis, it took about six hours to there. Half the trip is on a new road and the other half is on the old road which was built during World War II and looks like it has not been maintained since.

We took a detour into the desert to check out the remains of WWII fighter plane that crashed and then just out of Siwa we stopped off at a natural spring that was originally developed by the Romans and used by soldiers during the war. It was so clear and at one end you could still see the original Roman walls and steps. The water comes out of the ground at about 20 degrees.

Once settled into our hotel we went for a walk into town to look at the old part of the city which was all mud brick (and preserved for people to see). We climbed up to the high point of the building to watch the sunset. We went out for dinner and then picked up our bicycles that we were going to use the next day.

Wednesday So today was our bike riding day around Siwa, the first to was the mountain of the dead, a mountain not far out of town where 300 tombs where found which date back the Greek and Roman era when Alexander the Great rule Egypt.

When then went to a temple built by Alexander and then to the place where he was made king of Egypt.

Once final stop for the bike tour was to go to a spring used by Cleopatra, once again it had been enlarged since, but you could still see the original stone work under the water. It was the warmest spring yet at 24 degrees. We hung out at a cafe set up next to the spring where we had lunch and smoothies.

Thursday This day was pretty much a day stuck on a bus again, taking 8 hours to get to Alexandria - our final stop for the tour. Once there we went to Alexandria library and then out to find a local seafood restaurant to eat as we were all starving.

Friday The last day of actually doing touristy things. We started at the catacombs under the city, then to Pompey's Pillar and the museum. After a felafel lunch we then walked to the Citadel on the waters edge.