I am wayyyy behind on blogging. So I’m just going to dive right in.
At the end of October, my mother-in-law and I took a quick trip to Los Angeles to attend the French assembly. It was so much fun! We went a couple of days beforehand to be tourists.
We arrived at 7:00 a.m. on Thursday morning and picked up our rental car. I had forgotten how completely horrible Los Angeles traffic is. It took us 2.5 hours to get from the airport to our hotel. About 20 miles. Of course, we were right in the middle of rush hour traffic.
Once we found our hotel, we didn’t check in (it was too early), so we found a place to eat breakfast instead. Then we drove to Hollywood. Because….why not? We walked all up and down Hollywood Boulevard.
We saw the stars on the pavement. I always take a picture of Vivien Leigh’s star:
We saw the Chinese theater.
We saw the Jimmy Kimmel live building.
Then we decided to take a 2-hour bus tour through Hollywood and Beverly hills. It was fun! We saw some pretty fancy houses, mostly belonging to celebrities.
First we saw the Hollywood sign a bit closer though.
And some views of Los Angeles. Sorry these pictures have a weird tone….there was some kind of filter on my camera that I didn’t know was on. Oops.
The Hollywood Bowl.
And then some houses in the Hollywood Hills.
Jason Statham:
Katy Perry:
Quentin Tarrentio:
Part of the valley….lots of TV studios down there (including Warner Brothers, where my favorite show on the planet was filmed: Gilmore Girls!).
Then onto Beverly Hills:
Ellen DeGeneres gate ha ha:
Ringo Star (see the stars on his gate?)
Apparently Mr. Starr is super friendly and if he happens to be outside when the tour bus stops he will come and shake hands and sign autographs. Unfortunately, this didn't happen on our trip.
The Osborne house where the Osbornes lived when their TV show was filmed. Christina Aguilera lives there now.
Tom Cruise. Can you believe that he raises a flag at his house when he’s in town? And when he’s out of town he lowers the flag. On this day, the flag was raised. He thinks he’s the queen of England I guess.
Lucille Ball’s former home.
The house where Michael Jackson died. He was renting it for $10,000 a month.
Rodeo Drive. Lots of stores….Hermes, Vera Wang, Prada, Louis Vuitton. Oh, and a Rolls Royce.
After our pretty full day of being a tourist, we finally checked into our hotel. It was so cool! Very retro. Beverly Garland (of My Three Sons) and her husband owned it and now their son owns it.
Every night outside they play a movie on the big screen by the pool. They have actual beds out there and pillows for people to get comfortable.
The first night we watched Back to the Future.
On our second day, we drove a fantastic breakfast place recommend to me by a friend called the Blu Jam Cafe. Their specialty is crunchy French toast….it’s French toast coated in corn flakes, then fried and served with diced strawberries and blueberries and a vanilla rum sauce. Oh my goodness. It was amazing! We also ordered omelets.
After breakfast we drove to Santa Monica. We walked along the pier. We rode the Ferris wheel. We laid on the beach and read our books. We had drinks. Then we watched the sunset.
Saturday we made our way to Mira Loma for the assembly. It only took about an hour, which was a nice surprise. The assembly was wonderful! Over 600 in attendance. Four were baptized. The assembly hall was great. Very nice and comfortable. We enjoyed our lunch outside by the fountains and palm trees.
Saturday night we grabbed some Mexican food to-go and ate back in our hotel room. Then we made our way downstairs to the pool and we watched Jaws on the big screen while sipping a drink. It was a great end to our little mini-vacation!
