Through Detours to Vancouver

Upon arriving in Toronto, I met up with Leo, whom I had met on Facebook, in a parking lot in the city. The next day, we planned to go to Niagara Falls together. First, we drove to our shared accommodation and cooked together, preparing for the next day. In the morning, we drove towards Niagara Falls in his older Volvo car and picked up 2 more German girls in the city. During the drive, we exchanged our common experiences and plans here in Canada. Leo and I had a Couchsurfing host in the town of Niagarafalls, so we drove to his place. After a brief greeting, the four of us walked to the waterfalls. We spent the early afternoon exploring the waterfalls. There, we said goodbye to the girls and returned to our host's place. We spent the afternoon watching series and movies on Netflix, and for dinner, our host cooked a great meal for us since he had a passion for cooking. There was even some leftovers that we could pack for the next day.

The next morning, after having breakfast together, we headed back to Toronto. I said goodbye to Leo, who had a flight to Cuba that day.

In Toronto, I met up with my next host, who showed me around the city and gave me some tips in the afternoon. We ended the evening by relaxing in the sauna and jacuzzi on the rooftop of the apartment building. The next day, I explored the city all day and visited some recommended places from my host before heading to the airport in the afternoon since my flight was in the evening. Toronto is overall a beautiful and modern city, much larger than Montreal. It's kind of like the New York of Canada.

In the evening, I boarded my flight to Los Angeles. There, I was greeted by an acquaintance from Montreal, and we planned to go on a road trip to Vancouver together. He had already been traveling in the US for 4 weeks, and now I was joining him to travel along the West Coast to Vancouver.

Check-in and customs took a little longer due to some questions about my plans and the contents of my carry-on luggage, as I had packed some fruit for the flight. Unfortunately, the fruit was thrown away right in front of my eyes since food is not allowed to be imported into the US. The flight went by faster than expected, and Steve picked me up from the airport. We drove to our accommodation and the next morning, we explored the city together. We visited the Walk of Fame and the Hollywood Hills. It was a temperature shock for me since it was a warm 25 degrees Celsius, and I had to adjust to the heat. LA is a huge city, and there was always a lot of traffic. But it was also dirty and dry, so I don't necessarily want to come back here. Maybe you need a few more days and it's better to explore the city without a car to see more beautiful things.

In the following days, we traveled to many different places along the West Coast and got a brief glimpse of various towns. On the same day as our last stop in LA, we headed towards Santa Barbara. Unfortunately, we didn't have an address from our next host until the evening. We met him in a parking lot of a marketplace and followed him to his house. To our surprise, his room was just a converted and quite messy garage. We decided to leave as early as possible the next morning and had breakfast in a local park. During the day, we explored Santa Barbara and were impressed by the pier and the overall greenness of the city. Around noon, we drove to the remote Cold Spring Tavern to take a break. There, we met some locals and told them about our trip. They promptly invited us to have a burger with them, which tasted really good. After taking a group photo together, we continued to Santa Maria. Besides the beautiful beach, there were sand dunes right before the beach, and it almost felt like being in the desert. In the evening, on our way to our next destination in a town halfway, we had some bad luck with the host again, so we ended up sleeping in our converted car. However, the next day, he apologized to us as his home had been broken into, and he had been busy dealing with the police. We understood.

On Thursday, we headed to Monterey. We rented a spot at a campground and explored the city during the day. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't great, but the coast and its cliffs still looked impressive. In the evening, after having dinner, we were looking forward to a warm shower, which Steve happened to find there, as it's not usually available at campgrounds. In the car, we passed the time with music or listening to podcasts during the drives, which were conversations about various topics discussed by 2 radio hosts. Since neither of us had internet access on the road, we usually stopped at a Starbucks to get updated from time to time.

Then, the next day, we headed towards San Jose. There, we visited the Winchester House and went to the famous flea market. Unfortunately, we were a bit late as most of the vendors had already packed up. However, we were either positively surprised or skeptical of some of the remaining stands. The parks in San Jose weren't fully accessible either, as parts had been destroyed due to a flood last year.

So, there wasn't much keeping us there, and we eagerly made our way to San Francisco. Our host had already prepared dinner for us. He also recommended some places in the city for the next day. We were not disappointed, and we really liked the city. In the morning, we went to Twin Peaks and got an overview of the city. It was very windy on the hills, and we had to be careful on the descent. After visiting Old Mission Park and another hill called Ashbury Heigth, we walked through Little Italy. Then, we went to Pier 39, where we spent over 3 hours: On a sunny day, you could see different street performers here, such as dance groups, musicians, and one-man bands. There were many different shops on the pier where you could spend your money. Finally, we discovered an arcade with old classic arcade games and were overwhelmed by the variety. After driving down the famous Lombard Street, which is a narrow serpentine, we went to see the sunset at the Golden Gate Bridge, and we were impressed by the sight. It didn't feel real to be so close to this world-famous landmark. Then, we went back to our host's place, planned our next journey, and watched a movie.

In the morning, we went to the huge Golden Gate Park and had good weather, just like the previous day. In the afternoon, we headed east towards Yosemite National Park.

On the way, we stayed with another Couchsurfer. Together with his friend, he invited us to a nice evening at a local brewery, where I tried 5 different beers. On the way to the brewery, we rode in a 2017 Toyota and were impressed by the technology and features. After an evening of conversation and playing with the husky, we went to bed early since we wanted to leave as early as possible the next morning to see as much of the national park as possible, which would be my first-ever national park. In this week, I have seen and visited many different places, and it's difficult to describe everything in great detail. So, in this entry, there are a lot of photos of the various attractions, although not all of them are included in the gallery since the variety is simply too great. Unlike me, Steve runs a video blog on YouTube, which is also intended to serve as a guide and help for other travelers. Since he has been traveling for a while, I think this is a very good way to document his experiences. He told me that he is a bit behind in editing the videos, so our shared experiences are not yet online. Once they are finished, I will definitely watch them again and make them accessible in this blog as well.