Los Angeles

AAAAAAHH! I'm so far behind in my updates. It's kinda hard to update when you don't have internet access. Anyway, I guess I will continue with our LA visit even though I am now in Utah. Ok, so when we got to Glenn's house, she and her family were discussing all the different things we should do. They listed so many different things that we decided to just stay an extra day there! It ended up being good for us because we got to rest a little after 2 weeks (!) on the road.

Day one was our more tourist-y day of various parts of LA. We slept in some, and woke up in time to watch the U.S. play Slovenia. I'm still a little bitter about that call...Anyway, our first stop was Hollywood. We walked along the walk of fame, got bombarded by random people trying to sell tours (however Glenn was our private tour guide). We also stopped by the Chinese theater where the lucky few stars get to put their hand/footprints in the cement. We also saw the Kodak Theater (where the academy awards are filmed, and El Capitain (where all Disney films premier). We also got a view of the Hollywood sign, but never got particularly close.

Next we drove through Beverly Hills, Rodeo Drive, and Bel Air. We didn't have any of those star maps to figure out where celebrities live, but most of the houses are behind enormous brick walls, so it's not like you can really see anything anyway. From there we drove past UCLA and went to a shopping area nearby. Glenn took us to this place called Diddy Riese, where you can design your own ice cream cookie sandwich!! They had a bunch of different cookies and ice cream flavors to choose from, and it was only $1.50! So delicious!

A trip to LA wouldn't be complete without a visit to the beach, so we spent the rest of the afternoon on Santa Monica beach. Harrison, Glenn, and I ventured to go into the Pacific, but Melanie thought it was too cold. It was very chilly, but you get used to. We walked around by the boardwalk and the beach playgrounds and had dinner at a great restaurant near the Third Street Promenade. We finished our evening watching the sunset on the pier, then watching the Wedding Singer before bed (read previous post to understand significance of said movie).

The second day of our visit was Pasadena day! We stayed in the area to see what was going on. We stopped by the Norton Simon Museum (it's free for students with ID!), which is where The Thinker is. They had a lot of really cool and interesting artwork. Then we went to a Mexican restaurant for a taste of REAL Mexican food. I had taquitos and they were delicious! Next we went to this chalk festival around a shopping area. A bunch of artists made really cool and intricate drawings in chalk! I took lots of pictures. They also had a free concert series around the town at various locations as a part of the city's kick-off for their summer concerts. There were a lot of interesting people, including a man dressed as Darth Vader. A lot of people in LA just like to dress up as different characters and wander the streets. We were all a little tired from being out in the sun, so we went home to take a quick nap before we met up with another school friend, Drew, for dinner at Islands Burgers. I got the Maui burger. It had guacamole on it and it was delicious! We finished the night chilling out and trying to work out plans for the next few days.