LA Trip #2: Road Trip to Mexico!

So after I was laid off, I had to leave the USofA within 10 days of losing my job. Originally I was going to fly up to Vancouver for a weekend or something, but then Rishi said "Let's do a road trip!" and I said "Sure!". So Plan B was road trip up to Canada on the President's Day long weekend. It's a 16 hour trip one way, on the fast highway, and would have required a stop-over at Mr. Dilts' house in Portland with an approximate arrival time of 3 a.m. Saturday morning (luckily Andrew was going to be there that weekend, so not totally crazy). But then one of Rishi's friends pointed out we could just go to Mexico if all I had to do was leave the country and re-enter. And so Plan C was born: Road Trip to Mexico!

Our friend Mary came along as well, so 'twas a grand time. Rishi & Mary drove, since I can't drive stick. We stopped in Pasadena on the way south, to have lunch with Mary's friend Lawrence, who took us to an amazing Vietnamese restaurant. Next stop: Mexico!

We drove down, parked on the US side of the border, then walked across into Tijuana. First thing to note: no one checks your passport going into Mexico. Note to all you crime fiction writers out there. Once in Mexico, we bought some tequila, as you do, then wandered around looking for a likely bar to have a drink in. There were a lot of people trying to drag tourists into various sorts of establishments, which we resisted just because they seemed to pushy, but finally decided to go into one when the guy gave us his card and his name was Robert de Niro. So yes, we had drinks with Robert de Niro in Tijuana.

Walking back across the border to the US meant we also got to skip this insanity:



We spent the night at a hostel just outside San Diego, on the beach. We ate heaps of Mexican food, Rishi & I stayed out to watch some local punk bands at one of the bars, and we did some hang outs at the beach. Next stop was Santa Monica. There was beach, Korean food, karaoke, more karaoke, and some random tar pits in the middle of the city where the bones of things like mammoths and dire wolves bubble up to the surface from time to time, and more beaches and sunsets. We also saw a hipster trap. We ate at the restaurant across the street, where I had a beer called "The Philosophers", then we went across to the hipster trap and had brown bread ice cream for dessert.

I didn't get to go back to the Star Trek park :( BUT I learned that Minion #2 will be coming to visit me next December, so maybe I'll get a chance to do that then, when being a tourist again.