Mission Acomplished.

Well, I made it! I am now officially in Burlington!

On the 20th of January, I left New Zealand with 34 other Rotary Exchange students. Rhi, Emily, Pippa, Kaden and Ange came to see me off, and gave me a St. Christopher Necklace, which I haven't taken off yet. It was so nice to get to say goodbye too them, and Em phoned me at the airport to say goodbye, which was very special. With only a few tears, I eventually went through the gates.
An 11hour flight followed, which, while exciting at first, the novelty wore off pretty fast. I did however get to watch Zombieland (:D) and Case 39. Needless to say, no sleep was had.

After landing in LAX, we caught a shuttle bus to the Hacienda Hotel, and after changing out of our Rotary Uniforms, we went to Westfield Mall (and ate maaaassiive pizzas), and Venice Beach. We all had lots of fun there, and learnt that it takes 3 Helium Balloons to float a wafer biscuit. We then spent the evening chilling in the hallway with the other students, all using the internet.

We went to Disneyland the next day, and that was aaaawesome! It was raining, but that meant that there were no queues, so we could get straight on all the rides, and stay on for a second turn if we wanted! We spend the second half of the day at California Adventure, a joining theme park, where we did the California Screamin' Rollercoaster, the Maliboomer, and the Tower of Terror! We then had dinner with the Westchester Rotary Club, which was great! It was lots of fun meeting the people who have helped make our stopover so awesome.

The next day was Universal Studios. We took a train ride through all the sets, saw where Desperate Housewives was being filmed, right as we drove past!! We also saw where David is-a-god Boreanaz's Irish Flashback scenes on Buffy and Angel were filmed, and I am fairly sure that if I could have gotten out I would have been licking the floor. We also saw where C.S.I and Bones are filmed. We saw some seriously cool sets. like the Jaws set, and the War of the Worlds set. Plus there were some seriously insane special effects we got to experience, Like earthquakes, and flash floods!
After that we did some of the rides, like the Simspons Ride (A simulated rollercaoster, that really makes you feel like you are on it) and the Mummy Ride, (a freaky indoor rollercoaster thingie) though Jurasic Park was closed. We also saw the 'backdraft' show - showing how they create and contain movie fire, and a show on special effects, which we got front ro seats on, as Sam volunteered to help out. After that, we got to drive down Rodeo Drive, and see the Beverly Hills sign. We stopped on the Walk of Fame, took heaps of pictures, and saw the hollywood sign!

That night we had dinner with the Westchester Roteract and Interact members (kinda like a junior Rotary). We ate lots of Pizza, and met some pretty cool new people.
Then, we packed up, and (some of us :P ) tried to get a goodnights sleep, before hitting the road the next day. Destination: Burlington!!

Nick and I, who were both flying to Canada got on the shuttle bus with Sue at 10am, and drove to Los Angeles Airport. There we checked in, and had around 2hours to kill before our flight. I bought a coffee thing from Starbucks, which was horrendously expensive - around the same price it would be in $NZ! Finally we boarded the plane, and took off. We were sitting beside an ex-kiwi, who has been living in Canada for the last 15 years or so. I watched some 'Big Bang theory' and the Simpsons, and befor I knew it we were preparing for landing. It was 0' as we landed, and very, very cold. There were virtually no queues going through immigration, and we had a lovely lady proccessing our visas, who we chatted to. I was met at the airport by lots of people! Laurie and Terry, my host parents were there, along with lots of others. They gave me a red and white canadian scarf, and some Helium Balloons :D
We went to 'Tim Hortons', a canadian icon, for coffee and hot chocolate, before Terry and Laurie took me home.

That's all for now, I will upload some photos next time.
I miss you all,
Sarah
xxx