Booked and Champing at the Bit!

ITS ALL BOOKED! Wooooooooooooooooooooooo!

We're booked in! Aside from the already booked flights SYD > LAX & LAX > SYD.

Kyoto Grand, Hilton Anatole, Paris Las Vegas and Holiday Inn Express Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Plus flights between all 4.

I'm so stoked. I'm practically begging to go now haha!

Theres so much circling in my head right now, things I want to do, places I want to see. Photos to take, vids to capture. Can't fucking wait :D

Now I got 10 weeks left to save all for my food, taxis and spending money.
Tomorrow I'm going to head over to Borders to check out their maps. Hopefully theres something there worth having.

Tip Top's the One

Good on ya Mum!

She just linked me to an ebay auction for 2 tickets to the Paris Las Vegas Eiffel Tower experience. $14 for both! Snapped those up quickly :)

The Book of Notage + bits n bobs

So I've decided. Notebook! All of the very important information in here that is required during the trip - i.e. places & addresses etc - will be going into a nice handy notebook for me to take with us.

I have to make sure I find the local pharmacies & etc. This'll probably go straight into the book unless I do it at work.

Also, I need to enquire about a replacement battery for my laptop, a spare for my camera and need to give JT extra monies for the travel insurance he booked with our flights today.

Dallas...fast food style

Burger King:

3.3 Miles

8383 North Stemmons Freeway,  Dallas, TX 75247

Standard & Pours Coffee Shop:

4.1 Miles

1409 South Lamar St,  Dallas, TX 75215

Taco Diner West Village:

3 Miles

3699 McKinney Avenue Suite 302N,  Dallas, TX 75204

Whataburger:

1.1 Miles

2741 North Stemmons Freeway,  Dallas, TX 75207

Hooters:

2.4 Miles

2201 North Lamar St,  Dallas, TX 75202

TGI Fridays:

3.1 Miles

1713 North Market St,  Dallas, TX 75202

Taco Bell:

3.2 Miles

8249 North Stemmons Freeway,  Dallas, TX 75247

Wendy's:

6.4 Miles

2241 West Northwest Highway,  Dallas, TX 75220

Places of interest... - LA

Guinness World Record Museum
6764 Hollywood Boulevard
Hollywood, CA 90028

10 AM - 12 Midnight 

Adults - $12.95 USD

Hollywood Wax Museum

6767 Hollywood Blvd

Los Angeles, CA 90028

10AM - 12 Midnight

Adults Online Price - $12.95 USD

Universal Studios Theme Park

Universal City Stop, Metro Train Line

9AM-7PM / 8PM / 9PM

Adults Online Price - $67.99 USD - 2 Days

Hollywood Trolley Tour (1 hour)

Departs Grauman's Chinese Theatre

6925 Hollywood Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90028

9:30am - Sundown, every hour. (Not Mondays)

Adult - $20 USD

Address Me Closely - LA

Addresses of places closest to the Kyoto Grand.

Popeye's Chicken:

2000 E Marengo St, Los Angeles, CA 90033

Taco Bell:

510 S Broadway,  Los Angeles, CA 90013

McDonalds:

330 S Broadway,  Los Angeles, CA 90013

The Original Pantry:

877 South Figueroa St, Los Angeles, CA 90017

Original Tommy's World Famous Hamburgers:

2575 W. Beverly Blvd,  Los Angeles, CA 90057

Flea Market - Big Bazaar:

560 S Los Angeles St,  Los Angeles, CA 90013

Tipping is not a city in China, apparently

Or so a tipping etiquette guide tells me.

Here is some info from a better site than that (the UK's BBC, in fact)...

Food And Beverages

• Waiting staff and food servers - Tipping varies significantly based upon the class of restaurant. Common tips for bar staff - bartenders and cocktail waiting staff - are 50c for a single beer and $1 for a mixed drink. If a tab is run, a minimum of 10% of the tab should be paid as a gratuity.

• Food Delivery Services - Most food delivery services (such as pizza or chinese food) add a delivery fee into the cost of the food. It is recommended that the total tip, including any delivery fee, equals 10% of the bill.

• Fast Food Restaurants - Tipping is not expected.

• Limited Service Restaurants - If there are waiting staff members who bring drinks to your table or clear dirty dishes away from the table, a minimum of USD $.50 per person should be left as a tip. Examples of this type of restaurant include buffets and salad bars.

• Full Service Restaurants - The general rule of thumb for tipping in a full service restaurant is 10% to 20% of the final bill, depending on the level of service received from the waiters or waitresses. Mediocre service should be rewarded with only 10%, average service with 15%, and superior service with 20%. If the service is terrible, it is advised that the customer leaves the server an insignificant tip so the staff member realises the tip was not overlooked, and instead that he/she was intentionally slighted for the poor performance.

  Larger parties (usually of eight or more diners) will frequently be charged a 15% gratuity automatically by the restaurant as part of the cheque (bill). Make sure to review the bill carefully when dining in restaurants as some restaurants will automatically add in a baseline gratuity charge, regardless of the party size. In these cases, no additional tip is expected unless the diners feel the service was so outstanding that the serving staff merit more.

Transportation And Lodging

• House-keeping - Depending on the class of the hotel and the care and quality of the room, gratuities should be based on 5% of the per-night room cost. Gratuities are not usually expected by motel workers (limited service hotels), but are expected in full service hotels.

• Hotel Staff - The level of gratuities for hotel staff vary depending on the quality of the hotel. Hotel waiting staff, room service providers, and bell-hops (baggage-handlers) should be tipped in accordance with the rules for tipping waiting staff and baggage-handling as above.

IT'S OFFICIAL

We're going! Our international flights have been booked and travel insurance is also done :D

Also;

http://www.laokay.com/

For future reference.

From there I've discovered a Mickey D's about 2 blocks from the Kyoto Grand. ;)

Outback steak houses are no where near the city centre (shame, could have been an interesting visit). 

And I'm currently looking into finding out how much is a good tip for waiters & bellboys. 

Your Approval

Well, I've finally had my holidays approved. So now all thats left to do is book. 

I'm waiting on JT to get his visa waiver junk approved. With any luck he'll do that tonight and then we can start booking hotels and flights etc.

Deep Dish

"OCAU Food Forum - "Possible to make pizza on stove top? No Oven"

Basically what I want to try is make a deep pan pizza but in a pot on my stove top without the use of an oven?"

Here's the train of thought.

Hmm. Deep dish pizza. Man vs food. Google.

"deep dish pizza LA"

Search results turn up LA Foodblog. 

Found: Tony's Little Italy Pizza.

1808 N Placentia Ave, Placentia, CA 92780

Approx 15 minutes without traffic from the Hilton Anaheim. Bitchin'

Shuttles & More Agent Failure

I've done the most half arsed pricing of some shuttles just now. I'll have to do a bit better when I have all the details in front of me later on.

LAX -> Kyoto Grand

US$17 Per Person

DFW -> Hilton Anatole

US$12 Per Person

This is with rideflyreservations.com

Everyone else keeps asking for more specific details.

JT spoke to the travel agent on the phone today. Said $3200 for what we priced at just under $3100 - "his reasoning is he can ensure we have a great, and safe trip with everything running smoothly"

We're not going to be doing that :)

This is Home calling

One more note before I forget. International roaming has been set up on my mobile. Charges are a friggin' killer, but my Dad (who so kindly did the setting up for me, as the account holder) says that theres a card I can use so charges aren't so wounding. I'll have to remind him about that as the dates get closer.

Taste of my own Medicine...and failed Agents

Alrighty. Here's the little excerpt I found - I believe it was from the smart traveller website.

Going offshore...know the medicine law. It’s illegal to take PBS medicine (subsidised by the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme) out of Australia, unless it’s for your own use or the use of someone travelling from Australia with you. Penalties are steep; fines of up to $5000 and/or two years imprisonment. 
If you do take PBS medicine overseas, follow these simple steps: 
• contact the embassy of the country you’re visiting to ensure the medicine is legal there 
• carry a letter from your doctor with the medicine, stating what the medicine is, how much you’ll be taking, and that it’s for your personal use 
• leave the medicine in its original packaging, so it’s clearly labelled with your name and dosage. 
For more information about taking PBS medicine overseas, call the Travel-ling with PBS medicine enquiry line on 1800 500 147, or log onto www.medicareaustralia.gov.au

Aaaand a little note - travel agent visit was fail. Just got some useless books. JT says he'll be ringing the agent that 'helped' us during the week, so we'll see what they say. I think we should just book it ourselves, saves time and hassle in my opinion.

Done + $$$

Alrighty, so I've got the passport. Its all good. And I've just done my ESTA application - all good too, all done. Excellent stuff. 

Of course, I had to spend about 15 minutes trying to figure out why the page wasn't working. Basically - US Government sites hate Google Chrome. Lame.

Also a big happy - airfares are back down. In fact, cheaper by $50. Hopefully we'll book the flights real soon so that we can score on that.

Oh and a lil' bonus is that the US dollar is just that tiny bit further up. 76c. Lovin' it, keep on coming :D

In Soviet Russia, Passport receives you!

Yep, I've just been told that my passport has arrived at home this morning. Thankfully my sis decided to study from home today and was there to sign on the dotted line for it :D Thanks dude ^_^

We're looking at going to a travel agent with our plans in the coming weeks to see if we can get a better deal than what we've been able to price. Going through a travel agent would make me feel a little safer with hotel bookings and such too.

The Cancellation Fear

So swine flu is a prick. Or - more accurately - the media is a prick for blowing everything out of proportion.

Right when we were ready to buy airfares it looked to us like we were going to have to postpone. And the decision was made a few times. 

Of course now its revealed that only 19 people in Mexico have died from this thing, and only 1 in the US. The generic flu screws more people than that in a week in the US than this thing has done.

Stupid media.

Anyway, its all still on. But the bad thing is that airfares have now gone up by about $200~ each which freaking bites ass. Ah well. I guess the better thing is that the AU is up to almost 75 US cents. Hopefully it keeps on going.

I've been grocery window shopping on the Walmart website. Yoo hoo is on my "to buy" list as are Ruffles. Stoked.

If I can pull off my stringent saving plan I'll have saved exactly the 7k I budgeted for the pay before we leave. And I'll get paid the first week we're away, which is another $700 odd to add to the spending money. It's all looking very good at this point, and I've got enough to book everything. Now I'm just saving for food & 'in case' money before I get onto the spending savings.

Oh, and one last thing: 60% completion on the passport. Come onnnnnnnn :D