4366 miles We started on June 14th in Des Moines. A Bus picked me up and the long drive to the Niagara Falls begun. I was wondering because I noticed that we drove in the opposite direction. I asked some people if I were in the right bus but I was. They told me that we first had to pick up some people in Kansas City and St. Luis which in totally not on our way. But to bad I couldn�t change it anymore. So me picked up all the people and arrived after a 24 hour drive in the New York. On our way we passed by Buffalo and Chicago. We could see Chicago because I was night when we passed it but Buffalo was nice to see. It is big city but pretty dirty. We saw Lake Michigan and Lake Ontario. These lakes are not lakes they are oceans, so hugh. Finally we arrived at the Falls and went in our first hotel. It was pretty nice but we didn�t have any meals, which was really bad because I was starving. Everyone changed clothe and then went to the enormous Falls. It�s a very nice place but it�s so much based on tourists that it desirous the whole atmosphere. It is unbelievable how much water goes down in each minute. So much water and it never ends. We had a boats ride really close to the Falls and it is like a big shower. We go ponchos because other wiles we would have been so wet. After the boats ride we went back to the hotel and had some time to meet other people. At night they had fireworks at the Falls and big lights so the Falls had different collars. I took some nice pictures. One thing is really weird there. If you see the Niagara Falls on TV you only see nature around it but that is totally wrong. The Falls are surrounded by houses and skyscrapers and so little nature. The pictures on TV are probably changed with the computer but well the time there was good. The next day we had 6 hour drive to New York City. The hotel where we stayed at was awesome but the area where it was placed in was bad. It was like a big trash cans, so much junk and broken houses. The next morning we had to wake up early because we had a big tour in NY. We started at the Rocker faller place where we saw a TV show live, I think it was good morning TV or something but the good thing was tat we could see Magic Johnston. That�s a famous basketball player who retired a couple of years ago. After the show we went to some other buildings and finally to Times Square where we could spend 3 hours. It�s amazing how many people are on the streets and so many cars. Everywhere were safety precautions which gave me a strange feeling. It�s odd to have no �privacy�. After a long day we drove other Times Square again but this time at night. It feels like day because it is so bright, everywhere lights. For the next day were the Stature of Liberty, Ellis Island and Ground Zero planed. It was kneed to see all this stuff because you can always see these �buildings� on TV and now I can say I was there. Ground Zero is a rally strange place. The streets a cleaned up but the buildings around are still not remodeled. Everywhere are construction fences and they already started to build a new building where the twine towers were. It is a strange place. You still meet people who tell you how it was like when the plans crashed in the buildings, and all the pictures around the place. Each corner had a couple stands where you could by pictures or other memory things. Overall NY was a nice place to be but I could never live there. At the end of the second in day NY we were back in the bus and on our way to Washington, DC. After 40 miles a girls suddenly said that she is missing her purse so we had to drive back to New York to pick up the stupid purse. At first day in Washington we visited all the memorials of the presidents and the wars. It was nice to see all the famous places I knew from the TV. For the second day we planed to have a tour in the capitol building. We had to wait over 1 � hours to get finally a tour guide. It was nice to see the inside of the building but we only saw three rooms and that was way to short for a wait of 1 � hour. After the capitol we went to the White House where the president arrived. I saw the helicopter but not the president. After the White House we went to a couple of museums and then back to the hotel to pack our stuff because we were leaving early the next day for Orlando. As the drove down to Orlando it dot hotter and hotter. The climax in Florida is so humid, I could never live there. On the first day we went to the Kennedy Space Center. It was a big area with only a few building. It was really interesting to see how they prepare the shuttle and then finally send them of. The Space Center is on a peace of land sticking out of Florida so everywhere was water in which we saw alligators. Of the next day we had planed to go to Cocoa Beach. I was disappointed because the sand was really stony and we didn�t have any waves. I still had a good time. We played a lot of football and I got a little bit tan. Everyone got burned so it was nice that we could jump in our cold pool after we were back. In the evening we had to decide if we racer would like to go to Disney World or Universal Studios. I decided to go to the Universal Studios which was fine. It was nice to see all that stuff there but it was so crowded. The next day we hated to New Orleans. We had to wake up early but no alarm clock went of in our room so we slept in. We woke up when suddenly someone knocked on our door. So we packed our stuff and went to the bus where everyone was waiting for us. It was kind of embarrassing but we didn�t get in trouble. It took us 15 hours to drive to New Orleans. New Orleans is a hugh city. It�s really dirty and there is probably a lot of crime but I like the city. On each corner you can see street bands playing Jazz, it nice to listen to them. New Orleans is humid that you are always sweating. But you probably get use to it very quite, I didn�t like it. I could never live down there. We had only one day in New Orleans where we visited everything. We saw the French Marked, some nice buildings, the Mississippi river and the typical street band. I went around with one of my friend and suddenly we where on this street where only bars and strip clubs were. It was odd to see because there were everywhere weird people who try to sell us alcohol or some try to get us in their strip bars. Yooo that was New Orleans. The next morning we started our long drive back to Des Moines which took us about 21 hours, a long drive. Overall the trip was awesome and I�m so glad that I could travel with all this cool exchange students. I can only recommend everyone to go to the east coast of the United States, it something different, different than Europe.
