Welcome to America...Los Angeles Week 1

The time had come…

On Tuesday night we were all packed up and managed to get everything into 3 bags under 23kg. We made the trip to the airport said our goodbyes to Dee’s Mum and we’re off. The first leg of the trip, the red eye to Brisbane was quite a long one. The lovely lady behind me decided she would flip out and start boxing the back of my chair. She was obviously not happy that I was planning on getting some sleep during this first leg. Arriving in Brisbane we transferred over to the international terminal to get on the flight to Los Angeles. The kids were doing quite well as they had managed to sleep most of the flight from Perth. The 13hr flight was fairly uneventful mixed between sleeping and watching movies it didn’t seem to take that long.

Before our flight out to LA

Arriving in LAX we were expecting a long delay getting through border security, it may of been that we arrived early in the morning but the lines and process moved very quickly. Within no time we were standing outside the airport trying to work out how to get to our Airbnb. Our phones had not yet connected to the network so decided to catch a cab. After the 45 min trip with a quick stop to let Kobe spew we were at our home for the next 2 weeks. Unfortunately there was a slight mix up and place wasn’t quite ready. We dropped of our bags and went for a walk of the neighbourhood, to scope out where to buy groceries and train in the area.

Wednesday morning we decided we would head up to The Academy Beverly Hills. This is Rigan Machado’s club a 8th degree red black belt who is well known as a coach to the stars as he has many famous students such as Ashton Kutcher. As soon as we walked in the doors Rigan immediately recognized us from the multiple times we had met at the Will-Machado Gatherings. The kids were so excited to see him again as he always took the time to talk and mess around with them when at the Gatherings.

Rigan Machado with Lilly and Kobe

During the class warm up my rib was feeling fine until I squatted and felt a “Crack and Pop” and excruciating pain. “You have cracked your rib cartilage something I have done many times before. You need to rest, you can’t train or do anything for weeks” Rigan said. This was what I thought had initially happened but had hoped the torn muscle diagnosis was right. Not the best thing to happen after landing in LA but was glad it happened again in the first days not the following week which would drag out the recovery time longer. By the looks of it I won’t be training until the end of August. Anyway enough about that and back to the good stuff. Dee trained with class and had a great time going over different guard attacks and concepts after the class had finished we headed back home to rest as the jet lag was really kicking in for all of us and I needed to rest my injury.

Family with Rigan

Thursday would be the first day that the kids would get to train. As The Academy didn’t have a kids Jiu jitsu program we decided to walk into the club down the road from where we were staying. At Beverly Hills Jiu-Jitsu Club we were greeted by Marcus Vinicius Di Lucia. Straight away he recognized the Bjj Globetrotter logo on our t shirts and invited the kids to join the day’s class. It was great to see the kids finally on the mats having fun.

Lilly and Kobe training at BHJJC

After training we headed to the La Brea Tar pits where Lilly and Kobe learnt about fossils and tar. They had a great time and loved the saber tooth cat exhibits or a Kobe calls them “Blood Fangs”. We then had a look at some of the the shopping on offered in Beverly Hills before heading to the Wholefoods shop to get some groceries.

Checking our La Brea Tar Pits

Friday started out much the same but this time Dee trained at BHJJC this time with Vinny Di Lucia. Vinny showed some very nice cutting armbar attacks and setups and focused on making sure Dee didn’t miss a detail which was great! The rest of the afternoon was spent down at Venice Beach where we checked out the buskers, muscle beach and the skateboarders before walking up to Santa Monica Pier and riding the Pacific Wheel.

Dee Training a BHJJC

Muscle Beach

walk from Venice Beach to Santa Monica

Santa Monica Pier

Saturday was kicked off by a 10am kids class and 11am Adults class at BHJJC. The Kids again had a great time and enjoyed Vinny taking their class. After the class the kids would give a small kangaroo or koala to their training partners. It was good to see the Kobe and Lilly interacting with the kids and the comments “wow, you’re from Australia!”. The Adult class was intense as the World’s Masters is coming up they were starting to ramp up the conditioning. It was painful watching Dee, because laughing was hurting my ribs and after about a week of taking it fairly easy and jet lag the struggle to skip with some sort of finesse was escaping her. After class we headed up to Hollywood boulevard where we checked out the chinese theatre and sights. We grabbed a meal at Hooters and then checked out Ripley’s, Guiness book and the Wax museum before heading home.