US (CA) vs SA driving licences

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Planning to be in the US for a while still, I figured I might as well try get a US driver’s licence. It makes life a lot easier, and means I get to leave my passport at home more often. Each state has its own testing procedures, and for California (CA), as a foreign driver, you are required to go through the whole process. That means write a theory based learner’s permit, and then do a practical driving test. If you’re from another state in the US and want a CA driver’s license, you are required to only do a theory test.

Overall I’ve found the admin side of things to be far better in the US, and the actual testing to be easier. Firstly I booked online for both my learner’s and driver’s tests. For the learners you can go in person any day and write the licence immediately, but will wait in queues. For the driver’s test I waited a week for the earliest booking. For the learner’s I probably sat about 40min waiting for my number to be called, 10min answering  multiple choice questions on a computer, and that was it. This website (not official) says there are 46 questions, and you can get 8 wrong. I don’t remember answering that many questions, but anyway, I passed.

Also the eye-test you do is amazing. None of this fancy machinery, no, they have a board hanging behind the counter, they ask you to read a few letters, close one eye, repeat, close other eye, repeat. That’s it. None of this struggling to make out vague squares, pressing your forehead up to try get closer.

Example of eye test board – source

When studying for the learners, at first I was a bit intimidated. The material is a 100+ page PDF referred to as the California Driver Handbook. I read it through once, then did some test questions. After getting a feel for the questions, I scanned through it again, memorised some values, and went and wrote the test. I got one question wrong.Unlike the SA learners test, the CA questions are much more straightforward, have more logical answers and were less less ambiguous. The material itself can also be read like a book, and not hard learned like the SA ‘pass your driver’s first time’ style books. And is set out for learning as opposed to the official eNATIS documentation, which is literally extracts from the National Road Traffic Act. The CA driver handbook explains the laws, why they exist, and goes on to give best-practices and consequences of not following the law (not getting a fine, but the direct result).It’s hard to say which is better. SA test makes sure you know the laws better, and sets a higher barrier to pass, but the material for the CA test was better, although the test was much easier. If you are under 18 years old, before you can get your licence you are subject to completing a driver’s ed course at school, and also a certain amount of hours driving (think 50 hours).

The driver’s test for CA is also easier. There is no pre-inspection like the SA one, you merely need to show that you know all the controls within the car: lights, hooter etc.

There is no yard test. That means no parallel parking, no alley-docking, no hill start, and no 3-point turn. At some stage during your behind-the-wheel test, you will be asked to pull up next to the curb and reverse three car lengths in a straight line. That’s as hard as it gets.

The on the road section is very similar to back home, with a list of actions you need to perform throughout the test, and a minimum amount of points you’re allowed to lose, with a list of instant fails. The test is slightly more relaxed, they are not as strict about order of things done. Handbrake never has to be used throughout the test. Push-pull steering method is lenient. You don’t need to check every mirror every time you do anything, but must check behind you when braking, check blind spots when turning, and constantly scan road.

You are only allowed to lose 15 points (compared to 120+ in SA), but the rules aren’t as strict. Personally I feel like it is an adequate test to ensure that someone can drive, and negates a lot of fluff in the SA test (although I understand the reasoning).

What I found funny out of the whole experience is that, besides the points I lost during the test, the only recommendation the tester had for me is that I drive too slowly. And that she hopes I will speed up in the future :)

Overall a relatively straightforward and painless experience, especially having already had a driver’s licence for almost 10 years.

Octane Ratings (in America)

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Besides Americans calling petrol gas (and gas propane, diesel is still diesel (when you can find it)), their octane ratings are different to what I was used to. Back home (in South Africa), the standard octane rating at the coast was 95, and 93 at higher altitudes. If I recall correctly my Audi’s manual told me to always use the highest octane possible, but at least 91.

So I was quite surprised when going through our Tucson’s manual and came across the statement:

Fuel Grade: Pump Octane Rating of 87 or higher

This seemed oddly low to me. When we went to go fill up at the gas station in the US, we were greeted by a choice of Regular, Mid or Premium fuel. Referring to fuel with an octane level of 87, 89 or 91 respectively. Another surprise, as by the coast in SA, all you get is 95. No choice.

At the end of the day, it’s actually rather boring. Basically there are different ways to to calculate a fuel’s octane rating, and different countries use different methods. It can be summarised like this:

US shows the average of the Research Octane Number (RON) and Motor Octane Number (MON) rating, which is the Anti-Knock Index (AKI) while Europe just shows the RON rating which gives a higher number than the MON rating – source

If you want to know more about octane, spend two and a half minute’s of your life watching this guy’s video. If you want to know more about measurement methods, RON and MON, check out Wikipedia.

But what it boils down to is an 89 Octane in the US, is actually equivalent to around a 94 octane back home. You also have price discrepancies between fuel grades:

Fuel prices at our local garage

We are also fortunate enough to live in California, who have the second highest gas price in America, after Hawaii. At an average price of $2.80 per gallon (ZAR10.17 per litre), it is $0.70 more per gallon than South Carolina.

Gas prices also fluctuate tremendously within a city. In South Africa, petrol prices are basically fixed, meaning you pick a garage by convenience. In LA, I can pay anywhere from $2.60, to almost $4.00 per gallon! That makes petrol almost as expensive as in SA!

Sony Noise-Cancelling Headphone review (MDR-ZX770BN)

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I’ve never spent money on headphones. That’s a lie, when I was like 13 I had a R100 Musica voucher which I used to buy a R150 set of headphones. They were great (nope)! I had to replace the headphone jack, and battle trying to solder those stupid coated wires they love to use in headphones. And then I had to do more soldering when the joints to the speaker itself got damaged. Thankfully after my 3rd year in university I got to stay in a room by myself, and was able to upgrade to a ‘decent’ set of speakers.

Anyway, basically I’ve never bothered about decent headphones. I could never warrant spending R1,000+ on a set of headphones, when my speakers cost less than that. Fast-forward several years, I’m earning a good salary. I have a lot of flying coming up. I despise airplane headphones. Emirates are okay, but Etihad, Lufthansa and Swiss Air are still using headphones that came with Walkmans in the 80s. I figure if I’m going to do this, I’m going to do it right. Then, after much searching, I find out that South Africa has a very poor selection when it comes to Noise Cancelling headphones. Like seriously poor. All I could find in East London were Beats (R4,000), and the guy in store wasn’t sure if any of their headphones had noise cancelling. He did show me a headset with a microphone that had noise-cancelling though, that was nice, totally what I was looking for.

These are not acceptable airlines.

So I decide to las it, stick to my ‘newly’ acquired R250 earphones (I got them in 2012, they’re still going strong, I don’t know how). Then I end up in Germany. Then I find out the allowance work pays is actually higher than what we had been paid out. This means I have ‘spare’ cash. They give us a set amount every day regardless of what we do with, if we don’t spend it, we can keep it, I saw it like a bonus. Time to do some shopping.

Man, the selection on offer was amazing. And I’ve found the same thing in the US. Prices were probably a bit cheaper than in SA. But the biggest difference is just sheer volume of choice. I visited the local Media Markt in Sindelfingen, quite a large store to begin with, and they have a wall covered in headphones. Brands I’d never heard of and more models than I’d ever seen before from brands I did know. So now the problem became choice. I limited myself by budget. But I still had a hard time trying to choose.

After much umming and ahhing, some online research, a return visit and a final count of my spare Euros, I settled on the Sony MDR-ZX770BN. And I am mostly happy.

Actual Review starts

I paid just over Euro 200 for a demo unit. It’s a wireless headset with Bluetooth (BT) connectivity, noise-cancelling (NC), a built-in mic and over-ear design (I can’t handle on-ear headphones). It comes with a volume rocker, and music playback control (all on the RHS earpiece). All of which works beautifully with my Android cellphone and tablet and surprisingly my windows based laptop as well.

Although wireless, it does come with a 1.2m audio cable which you can plug in. it has 3.5mm jacks on both ends, so shouldn’t be hard to replace if it gets damaged. While plugged in the battery will still be used for NC. If the battery dies, you can still use the headphones, just without NC functionality.Plugging the headphones in to charge immediately turns off Bluetooth and NC. But you can continue to use the headphones via the 3.5mm jack while charging, sans NC. In this review, the presenter mentions you can’t turn off the NC while listening with the cable. But you can. By just turning off the headphones.

On the left ear you find the 3.5mm plug and micro-USB charging port, along with the power and noise-cancelling buttons. NC is on by default, with the option to turn it off or ‘retune’ it. It has 3 different settings, and when requested will monitor background noise and select the ‘best’ setting.

Noise cancellation is interesting. When not listening to anything, and NC is on, I can hear a slight white-noise. Turning NC off, turns this sound off as well. Now I understand the concept of NC well enough, and don’t have enough experience with other headphones to know whether this is normal or not. It is an obvious noise however, that I will turn off NC off when listening to podcasts in a quiet environment.My only other complaint of any measure is the power button that I find mildly infuriating. It’s a very wide button, but it only works if you press it dead-centre. So often when I go for it on the side of my head, I’ll press down off-centre, and not be met with the customary ping of a successful power-up. Annoying, but not a deal-breaker.

Besides that I’ve been very happy with the headphones. The insulation is not perfect, but does a good initial job of removing background noise. Sound quality met my expectations and volume capability is far beyond what is needed. Honestly the wireless aspect has actually been a bigger thing for me than the NC. The NC is just a bonus that, in the right situation, works a treat.

I’ve done a fair amount of travelling and rough handling of the headphones over the last 6-months, and they’ve taken it like a champ. Just as good today as the day I bought them.

The speakers also have built in NFC connectivity which lets you link your compatible phone to them without any effort on your side. I didn’t initially get this to work, but retrying it now, it couldn’t have been easier.

As to the battery life, I have been happy with it. Only times I’ve been dropped are at home when I’ve just neglected to charge it. Claimed battery life is 19 hours BT on, sans NC, or 13 hours with NC. 24 hours with BT off but NC on. I don’t think I get that, but I did take a demo unit which could have been on the shelf for months.

I do wish there was an easy way to select which device it’d connect to at startup, as it always connects to the previous device. And if I’m not sure what device that is, it requires some scurrying around trying to find my tablet to disconnect it, or open the proper dialogue box on my laptop. The NFC with my phone does negate this to a certain extent, as I can always connect it to my phone immediately.

Sony also sell the same headphones without the NC for about $100 less.

End Review

The next day, in another shop, I tried on a top of the range set of Bose headphones, oh my goodness they were fantastic. Completely insulated sound, and amazing performance. While it made me a bit sad about my new purchase, their 400+ Euro price tag kept them way out of the range of me even considering them. Maybe one day, probably not.

Holidays! San Fran, Yosemite and Sequoia

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It’s the end of the year, and although I don’t have holidays per se, I took a break to have some fun while my wife is on holiday. Her and a friend attended a conference in San Francisco, so at the end of the week I joined up to form our touring group of four. With a new set of second-hand wheels, our trip was planned and ready to go.

San Francisco Bay, with Alcatraz in the background

I took the PCH1 all the way up from LA to San Fran to meet them there. I overnighted in Monterey at the HI hostel located near the aquarium. It was a beautiful drive, although it rained the entire way, including a few manoeuvres to dodge the fallen rocks. Definitely on the list to do again in the summer, with a number of national parks and other places to stay along the way.

Monterey also looked like a stunning town, and the Aquarium is highly renowned, also on the list for next time. I donned my rain jacket and made a few loops of the former fishing town, before withdrawing to the warmth of the hostel.

Down Lombard Street

The next two nights were spent at the HI hostel in Fisherman’s Wharf (north SF). Located on the grounds of a former naval base, this is a very popular hostel, located in a beautiful section of LA with great views over the bay, Alcatraz (not Azkaban) and the Golden Gate Bridge.

We did a lot of walking, but this let’s you see a lot. From the hostel we walked down to pier 45 to see an old submarine, from there we carried on to the top of telegraph hill to view the Coit Tower. All the way down Lombard Street, we climbed to the top of the Crookedest Street. From there we found a bus that took us to the Golden Gate bridge, which we promptly walked in both directions. From there we followed the coast all the way back to Fort Mason and our hostel.

Not particularly Golden, red yes.

We didn’t have much time in SF, and have left a lot to return to. We had wanted to visit Alcatraz, but this apparently requires advanced booking as demand is quite high. After the initial rain, the weather cleared up, and although it was cold, the sun shone all day. This weather persisted for the rest of our trip.

From San Fran we took a direct route to Yosemite National Park, and camped three nights at the Upper Pines camp-ground, in the Yosemite Valley. The campsite was probably about a third full and very cold, dropping to about -5C most nights, and not getting much above 5 during the day, being mostly in the shade.

Our new wheels in Yosemite and Sequoia

It wasn’t our first camping foray in negative temperatures, but the low daily average was something to contend with. On our first full day in Yosemite we did the short trail out and around Mirror Lake. At the base of the Half Dome, it was a cold dark hike, although flat, with a brief sunny respite for lunch. Stunning scenery and breathtaking landscapes were to be the order of the next several days.

The next day we decided to get out of the valley and into the sunlight and chose the steep and switchback full route to the top of the Yosemite Falls. Climbing about 800m, the route takes you up the western part of the falls offering some amazing views of the Upper Yosemite Fall and placing you up top with a view down.

Views atop Yosemite Falls

You follow the same route down, and as the sun set we were greeted with an array of new colours, lighting up the mountains around us. On our way out the following day we headed south towards Fresno. This gave us new views looking back over the valley with a view of El Capitan, Yosemite Fall, Bridalveil Fall and Glacier Point, truly a magnificent sight.

Shortly thereafter we had our first run-in with the law as our newly registered vehicle did not yet have number plates (perfectly legal for 60 days), and after a very orderly interaction with the po-po we were free to continue our journey to Sequoia and King’s Canyon National Park.

Yosemite Valley and Mirror Lake

Another beauty in it’s own way. Yosemite’s glacial basin made way for rolling hills, an increase in altitude and massive trees. Having visited in the summer, it was nice to visit again in the winter. We had expected colder than Yosemite temperatures, and thus booked into a cabin. Temperatures however increased between the storms, but our enjoyment of the cabin’s heating was no less diminished.

As we arrived we swung past the General Grant tree. Although snow-chain laws had been in place, and we were suitably equipped, the weather had improved to an extent that they were not required. While the General Grant is not as big as the General Sherman tree we had seen previously, it is suitably impressive. Later that evening while prepping supper, we were visited by a swarm of raccoons who proceeded to tear apart a nearby pine tree but seemed to mostly leave us alone.

Yosemite Upper Fall and view of the valley

After much debate on what to do the following day, we opted for a shorter hike to allow us time to drive through King’s Canyon. We chose and enjoyed the Big Baldy route. Taking you up to 2500m, this gentle route offers outstanding panoramas. With the snow-capped Sierras close on your one side, your view stretches out over the Central Valley with the peaks of the Coastal Ranges just sticking out in the West.

After a brief lunch break we headed back and on towards King’s Canyon, intending to drive to the Roads End, we were instead greeted with ‘Road Closed’ signs, and our map confirmed that the road closes in winter. As such we took a detour back past the Hume Lake (which is actually a dam) back towards Grant Grove village where our cabin was located.

Big trees in Sequoia

With a storm headed our direction, we decided to make an early escape via the General’s Highway, past the Sherman Tree, and out the Ash Mountain entrance. The CHP and park rangers had other plans for us though, and decided to close the road in anticipation of the storm, thus our nice long drive out was summarily curtailed within minutes of leaving camp. Understandable, but disappointing. We did at least experience a few light flurries of the impending snow as we dropped our altitude.

Although we really wanted snow on our trip so we could do some skiing, the warm and dry weather we were greeted with did make several aspects of the trip (like camping and driving) much easier and more pleasant (and drier). That being said, regardless of the weather you receive any of these places are a great place to take a holiday, and all of them remain on our list of places we want to visit (again).

Views of Sequoia

We were also amazed at the large portions of the parks which are not accessible from roads, but open to hikers to camp out in the wilds (best done in the warmer months).