Los Angeles

I had never been west of Las Vegas and I really wanted to visit California, so we booked a trip to the Los Angeles area over Spring Break.  

We found a neat little B & B house in Venice Beach, just a stone's throw away from the beach and not too far from Santa Monica.

Venice Beach House, built in 1911, stands in stark contrast to the surrounding, more modern buildings.  The property has a nice garden with outdoor seating areas and there are only a few rooms so it provides a quiet stay.  This place gets 4.5 stars on Yelp and, after our stay, we concluded that we would definitely stay there again.

Our first order of business was to explore the surrounding area.  It was a little chilly for our Texan blood, like maybe 65.  

The Pacific Ocean!

Surfers!

This bird was not scared of anything #thugbird

Neat houses on the beachfront between Venice Beach and Santa Monica

Baywatch!

We found some jelly shoes!

Venice Canals was just a short walk from our B&B.  This place is so pretty!

California seems to have many weird and wonderful plants that I have never seen before.  It was almost like visiting a different country.  For the benefit of Andrew's mom, here are a few!

Bird of Paradise? 

This tree looked like it had balls of cotton hanging from barren branches.

 

I'm sure Dr. Seuss was inspired by a walk along Venice Canals.

I had also never seen such tall palm trees.

From our area of the beach, you could see the Santa Monica Pier in the distance, so a visit to the funfair became Mary's top priority.  

 I was super happy to see that the administration of this entertainment facility catered to everyone, including my nursing infant!  How terrific and what great service, a Nursing Mother Station!

Huh? Wha?  This is the Nursing Mother Station?!  It's a plastic chair sitting between the trash can and a toilet.  If it wasn't so comical, I would be quite offended.  

Shaking my head, Santa Monica Pier. Embarrassing.

So, we nursed here instead.

We drove Mulholland Drive and Sunset Boulevard.  We also took the Pacific Coast Highway up to Topanga State Park.

 Terrible picture, but you can just see the ocean in the distance.  

Topanga State Park is a great place to visit; amazing views off the tourist track.  On the way back down, we ate at a quaint little mountain Italian restaurant.

Random cute pics

We spent an afternoon at the Getty.  Admission is free, but you will pay a nominal fee for parking. An afternoon is really not long enough to cover the Getty, but we saw what we wanted to see and really enjoyed the grounds.

Mary soaking up the audio guide

Downtown L.A. in the distance

We took an architectural guided tour.  It was interesting for about 20 minutes, then we broke off and did our own thing.

Mount St. Mary's University in the distance

A visit to the Grriffith Observatory is well worth the time.  

Southern California’s gateway to the cosmos! Visitors can look through telescopes, explore exhibits, see live shows in the Samuel Oschin Planetarium, and enjoy spectacular views of Los Angeles and the Hollywood Sign

The views are quite spectacular, and a little smoggy.

Next time we come, we'll take this photo with a bigger Finley.

Rebel Without a Cause was filmed here

So, we re-created the scene

I wanted to see the stars in the sidewalk, so we drove to the Hollywood Walk of Fame.  As it turns out, this is a pretty sketchy part of town and is probably the place you want to visit to buy your t-shirts, L.A. mugs and magnets.

For Lea

For my mam

Mary wanted a photo of anyone she recognized.

On returning to the car I was appalled to find that we had been ticketed!  Then I realized I had paid the wrong meter (I subsequently contested the ticket and it was dismissed).

Doesn't this kinda-sorta look like it could be the meter for the silver car?

We ate a yummy dinner at a German Beer Garden.

On our last day, we headed back to the beach.  The temperatures during this trip were perfect and it was refreshing to stay so close to the ocean.  We were sad to leave, but will definitely be back!