Irvine, California

We flew into LAX on Thursday 7th April at 12:35pm, having left NZ at 7:30pm that same day! Those time differences do kind of mess with my head a bit... I had pre-booked a shuttle to take us to Irvine, about 45 miles south of Los Angeles.

Irvine is a planned city, population just over 250 000, in Orange County, Southern California. It usually features in lists of the most expensive places to live in the States, but on the plus side, it is also touted as one of the safest places in the U.S. to live. Personally, I think I would have preferred cheaper and slightly more dangerous... Our plan for the American leg of our trip is to live in Irvine for 3 months while Will works as a visiting academic researcher at the University of California, Irvine (UCI). We'll then do a bit of travelling through the country for about 6 weeks, incorporating Will's conferences in Denver, Colorado and Vancouver, Canada in July. We return to Irvine for another 6 weeks, before spending 3 weeks or so on the East Coast.    

We didn't start the lease on our apartment until Saturday, so we spent the first two nights in the Newport Beach Extended Stay America hotel. It was fine, reasonably well-priced, plus the closest hotel to UCI. That night we walked to our apartment to check it out, plus explored the University Town Centre which is right across the road from our new home. The town centre has loads of restaurants and cafes, a few retail shops, a movie theatre, Trader Joe's (more on that later), and a 24 hour fitness gym which I've joined. At night it also has pretty lights! Being our first night in the States, we decided that pizza was a suitable dinner.

On Saturday morning we took an Uber to our new apartment. The apartment is great. It is 1-bedroom (pretty much all we can afford here, especially since I've taken a year off work!) but really roomy at 802 square foot. Nevertheless, it still takes a bit of adjustment going from a large 4-bedroom house to a 1-bed apartment! The noise also took a bit of getting used to. In Wellington we only hear the birds from our place, whereas here we have an apartment full of college kids who like to play loud music living directly above us! I have a new appreciation for ear-plugs...

When we arrived the furniture rental company had already been in and set the place up for us. It is a brilliant service. They fully furnished the place, plus I had also added on a home-wares package which included kitchenware, glassware, crockery, cutlery, bed linen, towels, vacuum cleaner/broom/mop, iron, shower curtain, waste bins etc. and even small details like toilet paper, kitchen towel and napkins. The only things I've had to buy were a grater (I suspect a lot of Americans buy ready grated cheese), a couple of plastic bowls and a few more storage containers. The best part is, on the day we move out they come and take it all away again too! By leasing an unfurnished apartment then renting the furniture ourselves we saved loads when compared to renting a fully furnished place.

The apartment has a hot tub and pool that Will and I have been using loads, but hardly anyone else seems to. We're not sure why... Below Will is enjoying having the pool all to himself.

 

During the first week I bought myself a bike off Craig's List. It is a 2015 model and hardly used. The women I got it from had bought it for her daughter who, having only ridden it a few times, decided that she would rather have a mountain bike. I got it for a great price, and should be able to get at least that price back when I sell it in a few months when we leave. Irvine is brilliant for bike trails, it has miles and miles of them. I can get myself to Newport beach using off-road trails nearly all the way. If there aren't trails where I want to go, nearly every road has dedicated bike lanes, so it feels really safe being on the road. We are going to try and get by without buying a car. People think we are crazy and reckon it won't be long before we give in and get one, but we shall see...

When we arrived in Irvine I signed up to Lyft which is very similar to Uber, but only in the States at the moment. When you sign up you get given $50 worth of credit in the form of 5 free $10 rides. Will and I decided to use up a couple of these rides going to Newport Beach and back to celebrate his first week of work at UCI. 

The beach is awesome with golden sand and coastline as far as the eye can see, both north and south. 

We walked the 3km or so from Newport pier, above, to Balboa pier, below.

Both piers had lots of fishermen trying their luck off the ends of them. At both piers we also saw seals hanging around, waiting for surplus bait or fish off-cuts to come their way.

The whole Newport Beach area is really interesting, the beach is actually a peninsula. I've put a pic below to give you an idea of the place. 

From the Balboa pier we walked a couple of blocks back from the ocean beach and caught the Balboa ferry over to Balboa Island. The ferry was cute and cost us all of $1 each. We enjoyed wandering around Balboa Island, checking out some of the crazy real estate (one house we saw for sale was only 8 million...). It really is a case of 'how the other half live', or more accurately, 'how the top 1 or 2% live'.

After catching the ferry back to the peninsula we chilled out on the beach for a bit more. We were just about to head home when we noticed some people around us getting quite excited. Lo and behold, we had a pod of dolphins leaping in and out of the water. It's a shame we didn't have our SLR camera and big lens with us to get a decent pic. You can just make one of the dolphins out in the pic below from my phone. 

   

During our second week we got an email from the apartment company to say they were putting on a complimentary pool party for residents on the Thursday night. Will and I are always up for free stuff, so we headed along. There were burgers, salad and chips for dinner, plus free beer, so that saved cooking for that night! Apparently the company puts on several resident events throughout the year.

While accommodation is extremely expensive here, food, both in restaurants and supermarkets, isn't. As mentioned earlier, we are right across the road from a Trader Joe's store which is awesome. It is like a mini version of Moore Wilson's Fresh (for those from Wellington) and has loads of organic and interesting produce and products. The best thing is, despite mostly being organic, it is cheaper than the 'normal' stuff in Albertsons, a huge big supermarket also a few minutes walk from our home.  

In general I have been really impressed with the produce. Everything I've bought so far has been super fresh. It helps that California grows over half the produce for the whole of the U.S.A. so everything is reasonably local. If it doesn't come from California, then odds are it's from neighbouring Mexico.

I love Mexican food, so am in my element. Chilies are ridiculously cheap, and I can also get huge ripe avocados for 99 cents each. Alcohol is also cheap, dangerously so... The 1.75L bottle of Bacardi in the pic below cost $16! Mojito's are Will and my favourite cocktails, so that has been our drink of choice...

Out of curiosity we also tried the $2.49 bottle of Californian red from Trader Joe's below. It was surprisingly drinkable! We've since found out that for the Charles Shaw label they buy up surplus stock from various wineries and bottle it under their own label. Sometimes you are getting very good wine for a bargain basement price, but it can vary. I guess it's a similar idea to the 'cleanskin' bottles sold in NZ and Australia.

We are now 3 and a half weeks into our time in Irvine. Will is really enjoying his time at the University. He is especially enjoying the opportunity to concentrate on his research, without the usual additional load of things like teaching and admin. I'll write more about UCI in my next post. 

I am finding no problem filling my days. It is very nice having the time to get to the gym whenever I want to, and it is also convenient having it right across the road. To start with it was bit of a mental workout as well as a physical one, having to convert all my weights from pounds to kilograms so I knew what I should be lifting! I'm also enjoying doing planning and logistics for our upcoming road trips at the end of our first 3 months. Reading by, and swimming in the pool also helps the day pass by, as well as taking my bike out for adventures.

My very first adventure on my bike was to Walmart to get myself a helmet, and the basket you can see on the front of my bike. The woman I bought the bike from had kindly thrown in a brand new lock she had which was surplus to her requirements. It is bright pink, but beggars can't be choosers! Walmart was bit of an experience, it's HUGE! The photo above is just the Duck Tape selection! Americans must really love their Duck Tape, although why you would need it in all those colours is beyond me... As well as the bike stuff, I also picked up a pair of Levi jeans for less than $20, and a couple of pairs of gym shorts for $6 each. I think I might have to post a box home when we leave the U.S. as my bag was already pretty full on the way over here.

Another excursion was to Newport beach, where my bike looked right at home! It is about a 40 minutes or so cycle to the beach, but that is using the Back Bay cycle trails meaning I hardly have to spend any time on the road. There might be quicker and more direct routes, but this one is nice and scenic alongside the estuary wildlife reserve. It doesn't matter if I work up a sweat getting there as I can jump straight into the ocean to cool off!

This is plenty for this post, next time I'll talk more about UCI which is a very cool place.