LA...Day 5-6

Sunday 2-22

Hollywood Sign

The day started with an attempt to go the Griffith Park Observatory to get some photos of the Hollywood sign but, the park was packed. Luckily in my research, I had noted that Lake Hollywood Park also provided nice shots of the sign. We did not make it all the way to the park, but pulled off to the side of the road to get some photos. It was raining at a pretty good pace and figured it was not worth walking around in the rain for a few hours to get the best shot.

Walt Disney Concert Hall

We visited the Walt Disney Concert Hall since there were good reviews. We did the self-guided tour, which was very boring. In hind sight we probably should have just waited around for the twenty minutes or so and went on the guided tour, it probably would have been more interesting.

There were not a lot of restaurants in the area that were open but we did find a place called Redwood Bar & Grill. It was very dark and kind of dirty with a sunken pirate ship theme. Surprisingly the food was decent, despite the not to clean feeling the place gave off.   

Santa Monica Beach

After lunch, we headed to Santa Monica. Along the way, we saw a lot of celebrity cars heading to the Oscars. We even saw the check-point by the Dolby Theatre (formerly the Kodak Theatre), which is right next to the historic Chinese Theatre, as we drove by.  The famous Route 66 ends in Santa Monica, so there was a lot of souvenirs. The Santa Monica pier was nice. There are free tours available at the Santa Monica Pier, but we were not there at the correct time.

Venice Canals

Near Santa Monica is Venice Beach. We did a drive by of the Venice Beach – it did not look very nice compared to Santa Monica. The nearby Venice Canals were really cool though!

Monday 2-23

Oscars @ Dolby Theatre

A few weeks prior to the trip, I decided to try to get tickets for a tv recording, needless to say I probably should have looked sooner. I was able to get stand by tickets for The Price is Right. People with actual tickets showed up, so after waiting around for about an hour we headed back to the car. The staff did ofter to give vouchers for a future filming, or possibly get us into the afternoon filming (they shoot two eposides a day and they last like 5 hours each!).

We then headed to the Walk of the Stars, which was still dolled up from the Oscars the evening before. I was luckily able to find my favorite star, Matt Damon’s star. It was in the barricaded off area, but close enough to the edge to get a photo. We checked out the footprints and handprints in front of the Chinese Theatre – again I was able to locate Matt Damon!

Chinese Theatre

Staying in the shopping center/parking deck we had lunch at Dave and Busters – it was good. We got our parking validated at Dave and Busters so parking was slightly cheaper, amazingly it was not too much. We have been at other places were parking was a lot more. From the third level of the complex, there was a decent view of the Hollywood sign.

Matt Damon Hollywood Star

We then drove to Pasadena. We stoped by the Norton Simon muesum – it was just okay. It was $12/adult, but free parking. Unfortunally, the gardens were closed due to rain. Next, we drove by the Rose Bowl Stadium, but we couldn’t get too close since there was an event being torn down “Air + Style”. We stopped by Dots cupcakes – yum! Pasadena has a very nice downtown area, but it seemed that you had to pay for parking everwhere!

Since it was rainy we just chilled out for the rest of the afternoon and packed up to head home.

Before heading to the airport, we had some pizza at Maria’s Italian Kitchen - it was tasty. The free bread and dipping sauce were good also.

To end the evening, we dropped the car off and made it to the airport. It was a good thing we had the address of the car place – we didn’t see any signs staying were to return cars were located like most airports have.