Family trip to LA

This is the first of many posts about my recent trip. 

Each year, my family takes a cruise somewhere. Previously, we've done short cruises from Galveston to Cozumel. This year, we picked a week-long out of LA. We spent two days before boarding in Santa Monica because we'd never been before.

We flew out on the Friday after Christmas and arrived around 2 pm LA time. The flight was mostly uneventful, but I did sit by a stranger. Ew. It was weird when we landed because we didn't have to go through customs. I haven't skipped customs in years!

We took a cab to our hotel and found it shortly after. You can't miss it. It's turquoise!

It was built in 1933

This is the peephole in the door

After finding our hotel and charging our phones an additional 2%, we headed to dinner. First we walked to 3rd Street, but there was no food there. We walked back to the Ocean Avenue and found a yummy place with fish. Mine still looked like fish.

I wanted to stop here, but my parents said no :(

Our hotel has a sign!

After dinner, we headed to the Santa Monica pier. I desperately wanted to ride the rides and get midway food.

The Pier!

The pier marks the end of Route 66. I want to drive it someday.

We got some credits to ride a few rides and then we embarked on a journey to the ferris wheel. 

From the ferris wheel

selfie 

selfie

The ferris wheel was so cute

Roller coaster time!

We had to wake up a bit early on our second day in California because we were taking a bus tour of LA. It was fun! Instead of writing a lot, I'll just post the pictures and describe what was going on/what we saw.

All of us were sitting near each other in the van

Our first stop was Venice Beach.

So it's true...White men can't jump! This is where they filmed that. 

CrossFitting at Muscle Beach

We spent about a half hour looking at houses. Most weren't too extravagant, but some were massive.

Bill Cosby

Dan Akyroyd

We got to walk up and down Rodeo Drive, but I don't think anyone did any shopping. It was such an expensive street. There was supposed to be a Bugatti, but we couldn't find it.

The Wilshire Hotel, right off of Rodeo Drive. 

Lunch was at the Farmers Market

Gluten free cookie!

We got to spent some time wandering around The Grove after lunch.  I saw no celebrities.

Griffith bought the mountain this place is on and wanted to make it awesome, but tried to kill his wife because he thought she was having an affair. The sheriffs told him to either donate the mountain or they'd take it by force. He donated it to the city and got this place named after him.

Hollywood!

We walked up and down the Walk of Fame as well. I didn't see many good stars, but I saw a lot of people I'd never heard of!

The beginning of the walk is home to Elvis and the Beatles

If there is one thing I learned during my two days in Los Angeles, it's that people have no sidewalk manners. Does "Keep Right" have no meaning anywhere? I can't imagine London with people just walking wherever they wanted. It would be madness.