In Santa Monica you get your coffee from the coolest places on thepromenade

Id been looking forward to the adrenalin rush of the roller coasters at magic mountain as The rides we'd been on so far hadn't quite got my heart pumping! Driving up to the theme park all we could see was twists, turns and  loop de loops of about 10 roller coasters!! Once again, we didn't know where to start but with no crowds on opening we ran between the first three within the first thirty minutes of walking in! Needless to say after that we needed to sit down for a bit with our feet planted on the floor and let the mega G's catch up to us! Rhys tried to order a 'regular sprite' which turned into an epic saga with the guy asking about 20 questions... "Do you want to upgrade to large for 50cents, for $16.99 you can get it in this refillable cup and get free refills all day, are you sure you don't want to upgrade to large?" After all the upselling the guy totally forgot the original order and 10 minutes later we had our drink! After our bodies had stopped shaking, we decided to slow down a bit and hit a few slower water rides before getting back to the coasters. Lets just say that when a sign on a ride says 'you may you get', you Will not only get wet, you will get soaked! Turns out we picked the right seats for the ride, we copped the first splash and them a little more but walked off a lot drier than the rowdy tween girls sitting opposite us, who walked off with not a dry spot on them and a "wet bag, I'm so suing if my phone is wet!"

We then hung from the batman ride and our first water roller coaster before meeting our final match, X2. I'd seen a documentary it, the worlds first 5D ride and it looked mean so there was no way I was leaving the park without going on it! We waited in line for a while but it was so worth every second! It wasn't a regular coaster, there were fire effects, the seats rotated independently of the cart so you were always spinning around and there were lots of twists and turns. It was essentially the wipeout at dreamworld (my favourite ride in Aus) crossed with a roller coaster so I absolutely loved it!! Teamed with a hot day and a lot of G's we were exhausted when we got home so treated ourselves to a nana nap before indulging in a night in with an old school Indiana jones movie! (Inspired of course by our visit to Disney land) 

After spending many days at theme parks we were glad to spend a day on our feet exploring Santa Monica pier and beach (but not to say we didn't go on any roller coasters). We hired bikes and rode up to  the lifeguard station where they filmed bay watch, along past muscle beach and down to Venice beach. It was a sunday after noon so the beach was packed and we made a few stops to watch some dancing roller bladers, some carni kids walking along slack lines and people swinging along the hanging rings. We took a tour of the houses of Malibu beach and learned that the iron pumping Arnie who made muscle beach famous owns half of Santa Monica! The tour itself was a bit dull and unfortunately in an open top bus so we were burned to cinders in the midday sun and our guide was less than impressed when we didn't partake in the traditional end of tour gratuity giving! We would've been more inclined to do so had he not told us the same thing about 12 times and continued to tell stories of all stars he'd seen on previous tours who "gave us a wave and came over for a chat". 

The day would not have been complete without a roller coaster ride at the pier! To ensure everyone got their monies worth, the roller coaster ran through twice which enabled us to take photos of the scenery on the second trip! We also took a ride on the Ferris wheel, which is fully solar powered, before ending the day with some delicious fish and chips (Emma and Rhys style of course so it was really grilled fish and vegetables...)