La La Land, Day 2

Hotel swimming pool on the roof

Driving in LA takes time. Time for the traffic and time for the vast distances this city covers. The traffic wasn’t tooooo bad. The GPS lady would sometimes note the heavy traffic ahead and recalculate a new route for us. We discovered that she didn’t take into account the fact that we could travel in the car pool lane, which was often much clearer that the main lanes. She would try to take us out into the city streets, which were very much stop and go, with heavy traffic. At least on the freeways we would be at a constant 40 miles per hour, even at the worst.

Some of the on and off ramps are a little confusing and a couple of times we had to backtrack. Sometimes we chose a different route to the one the GPS selected – sometimes to try a different road so that we’d see different parts of LA, and sometimes because I felt her plan was flawed (traffic). She would often say ‘recalculating’ so often that I thought she might give up completely! It was an asset to have a good map to give us a broader picture of where we were.

After sleeping very well last night (very tired after a Wednesday that seemed to go on forever), we set out for Santa Monica. We found a carpark and walked to 3^rd Street Promenade – I have been here twice previously and really enjoyed the restaurants and shopping. We ate at an outdoor café (America doesn’t seem to do breakfast very well) and then shopped a little. Our dollar is worth more than the US dollar at the moment, so it’s hard to ignore all of the fabulous stores. Their sale stuff is perfect for us as we’re a season behind, too.

View from the Santa Monica Pier

 
It was another spectacular day in LA – hot and blue. We wandered down to the Santa Monica Pier, already busy with tourists. There are souvenir and food stalls lining the pier, buskers, and a bar/restaurant at the end. We took photos and enjoyed the view and the people watching.

Under the pier

At 3.30pm we departed for Disneyland to see G dance prior to the Grand Parade at 6.40pm. We imagined that would be plenty of time, and that we’d have hours to look around. Wrong. It took til 6pm to get there (should have been a 1 hour trip) and then 30 minutes to park, take the shuttle, get tickets and get in. We made it in time, which was the important thing, and saw her dance brilliantly down the streets of Disney, with the biggest smile on her face.  Very proud and excited for her.

The trip back to the hotel was swift and we made it across the road to Hooters for a late dinner. The girls were decked out in teeny orange hotpants, long legs with white bubble socks (anyone who lived through the 80’s should know what I mean) and a variety of tight t-shirts. They were very friendly and efficient, and we ate wings (one of their specialties) and some very tasty nachos, whilst watching college football on the big screens.