I am back babbbby!
Hi everyone,
We returned from an eleven day trip in Southern California, which was beyond awesome. Let me just dive right in!
We started off our trip in Los Angeles. We landed in the mid-afternoon, grabbed our rental car and started straight away with dropping our things off at our hotel. The drive from the airport to the hotel was a lot of fun. The girls noticed a lot of differences between Massachusetts and California. The streets we took couldn’t of been more typical of LA either. They were lined with palm trees that nestled between colorful mini bungalows all close together. All I could think of was Tim Burton with his description of growing up in Burbank, CA, with all the homes the same.
The drive to our hotel was about forty minutes. We stayed at the Omni Hotel right in downtown LA, Bunker Hill District, which was the perfect spot for what we had planned. Those of you that know LA know that downtown used to be a barren land just of high rises, now there is so much going on!
Our first planned stop was for some lunch at the Grand Central Market, which is located about a five minute walk from the hotel. BUT! Along our way, from the back door of the hotel along California Plaza, we bumped into the Angel’s Flight Railway. This is a funicular, a pretty old one too, which travels from South Grand Ave to South Hill Ave, and vice versa. The cost is a dollar each person each direction, and we thought it was super cute, so of course, we had to take a trip. Which turned into like three trips, because we took it later on in the evening.
The Market was fantastic. It is located inside a giant garage adorned with the coolest neon signage locating the vendors all around. The place was BUSTLING! Every turn was a new vendor and a new face. My girls and I just couldn’t get over how much LA celebrates the diversity of style, which was a show in itself. We saw one look after another of one genre to a totally new one. The expression around downtown was electric, that is the best I can describe it. Loved the feeling in the market.
You could find literally anything to eat or drink, from coffee to cocktails or German sausages to Vietnamese pho, it was the perfect spot for us. What was on our minds? Tacos! We always want tacos, to be fair. So we split up to find exactly what we wanted. We ended up separating into pairs, grabbing carne asada tacos from Tacos Tumbras a Tomas for our youngest and I , and shrimp/octopus tacos from La Tostaderia for our oldest and husband. And Mexican Cokes..because these are the best sodas on earth. The tacos were too darn good, and so BIG! I ordered one taco for each of us, the carne asada ones, but the taco could’ve been split into three! Thankfully, the taqueria gave us both an extra tortilla so we could share with everyone.
From lunch we took another ride up the street with the funicular to get to our next planned stop, The Broad. The Broad, said as brode, is a contemporary art museum that is free to the public, but reservations are needed to get in; especially for special exhibitions. The Broad has some of the most iconic installations, like the statue of Michael Jackson with his pet Bubbles and a lot of pieces by the late, great Andy Warhol. It is definitely a must see if you are an art fan or not. It was a fun place to walk around. Plus, we took a break before our timed viewing of the Kusama mirror exhibit to visit next door. The Broad is next to an iconic architectural building, the Walt Disney Concert Hall!! You have no idea how excited I am that I have just typed out to you that I was at The Broad and Concert Hall; I have always wanted to see these places in person!
After we got our fill of art and culture, we realized we were still full from lunch, but wanted a drink and snack. So we took a trip back down to the Grand Central Market for drinks and ice cream. We took the stairs down this time! At night this place was even more fun! The neon really popped in the ceiling, and the fashion didn’t disappoint. We grabbed ice cream from McConnell’s for everyone but me. I love ice cream, but not as much as my family. I don’t think anyone likes ice cream as much as these three. What I do like is wine, so I grabbed my husband a rose cider and myself a NZ sauvignon blanc.
As the market scene started to die down, around 10PM, we decided that with the time change it was time to hit the hay. We grabbed our last funicular ride back up the hill to our hotel. When we got to the front door of the room, we found cookies and milk for the girls, it was so thoughtful! We raced right away to get into pjs, which is my favorite time of day, and watched some TV before heading off to sleep.
And THAT was our first day in LA.
Next up is day two, which is packed with lots of sights from Pasadena, the Pacific Coast Highway and Koreatown!
And yes, I changed up the look of my blog. It needed a new look, just we all like a new outfit. 🙂
Valeria Out Loud 