October 2018 | Los Angeles, California
(Originally posted on May 11, 2020)
Hello! Today’s blog post is one of my favorite kinds to write: an itinerary!! We went to Los Angeles a couple years back and I believe it was our first family trip that I planned out. Los Angeles had always been on my bucket list, especially because La La Land (one of my fav movies) takes place there. I think we were able to fit a lot of the highlights of LA so I wanted to share our itinerary! I’ve also attached some tips at the end from our experience in California’s iconic City of Angels 🙂
↳ Day 1:
Our stay: Kimpton Hotel Palomar Beverly Hills. We checked in the night before at the Kimpton Hotel Palomar in Beverly Hills. The style was eclectic to say the least, and we enjoyed breakfast at the hotel most mornings. The skeeball machine in the lobby was a lot of fun!
Disney California Adventure Park: We got up bright and early to make the drive from Los Angeles to Anaheim. We left a little past 7 AM and it took us about an hour to get there. We chose to visit Disney California Adventure Park instead of Disneyland as California Adventure Can, as the name suggests, only be found in California! If you visit, make sure to ride the Incredicoaster, the Pixar Pal-a-Round (a ferris wheel with swinging cars), the Grizzly River Run, and the Guardians of the Galaxy Tower of Terror!
↳ Day 2:
LACMA: the Los Angeles Contemporary Museum of Art is home to Urban Light, often seen as an icon of Los Angeles. LACMA also has various other unique exhibits, such as Metropolis II and Miracle Mile (both of which are ongoing exhibits), among other limited edition displays. One of my favorite parts about this museum was how there was something interesting for all ages here. Metropolis II, a miniature city, features 1,080 tiny cars zipping around (the sculpture can launch a whopping 100,000 cars an hour when running at full capacity!!) and a small art studio lets little ones paint or draw. For older kids or even adults, their interactive exhibits (we saw 3D: Double Vision when we were there) are a super cool way to learn about art.
La Brea Tar Pits: A very short walk from LACMA, the La Brea Tar Pits are a group of tar pits in which over 3.5 million fossils have been found. Though we only visited one of the excavation sites and not the actual museum, it was very cool to see how they unearth the fossils of ice age creatures (mammoths, sabertooth tigers, etc.)!
OUE Skyspace LA: Our last stop of the day was OUE Skyspace LA, a skyscraper and observation deck in downtown LA. It offers beautiful views all around–we could even see the Hollywood sign in the distance! Skyspace LA is also home to a glass slide that wraps around the side of the building. Though it’s a little intimidating to slide down when you can see the skyline under you, I promise the views are well worth it! Their interactive displays also taught us a lot about the history of LA and the buildings we were seeing around us.
↳ Day 3:
Hollywood Walk of Fame: No visit to Los Angeles is complete without walking the Hollywood Walk of Fame! See the names of your favorite stars on literal stars lining the sidewalks 😉
Griffith Observatory: We tried to visit Griffith Observatory (an iconic landmark of LA + featured in La La Land), but couldn’t find parking so we had to abandon that part of our itinerary. If we were to ever visit LA again, I would love to watch the sunrise here and visit the planetarium!
Del Frisco’s Grille: We stopped for lunch before heading to Santa Monica Pier at this restaurant right next to the iconic pier arch! I had some great fish tacos (totally recommend if you visit).
Santa Monica Pier: One of my favorite parts about our trip to Los Angeles was walking around Santa Monica Pier! The vintage-esque buildings are so cute and we even saw a sea lion swimming in the water below the pier (he was certainly loving all the attention he was getting)! There are arcades, tons of restaurants, and rides if you want to spend more time here, but we enjoyed just walking around as well!
Santa Monica 3rd Street Promenade: A couple of minutes away from the pier, 3rd Street Promenade is a great place for some retail therapy–you know we had to get some in this trip!
Sunset at Venice Beach: To finish off our trip on a lovely note, we watched the sunset at the famous Venice Beach. I do love me a good California sunset!!
And that was the end of our trip! We drove back to LAX to catch our flight (does anyone else think of Miley Cyrus’ “Party in the USA” whenever LAX is mentioned)? Anyway, I have left a few travel tips below if you are planning on visiting LA!
↳ Tips for your visit:
- Rent a car!
We found it very useful on this trip to rent a car for the entire duration of our stay. Especially on the last day when we drove our luggage around with us, it was very helpful to have our own car so we wouldn’t have to carry everything with us wherever we went.
- Look for parking beforehand
Being the busy city that LA is, parking can be scarce! To reduce parking-induced-stress and prevent having to drive around the area in circles, I recommend looking up nearby parking lots before you reach a destination. Google Maps usually works just fine for this!
- Get places early!
Learn from our Griffith Observatory Experience and get to places early when you can. LA is very tourist dense and the rumors are true: traffic is absolutely horrible!! Having a planned out itinerary and knowing where you want to go next can also help maximize your time in the city.
I hope that this little guide was helpful! Even if you don’t follow my itinerary directly, I definitely recommend getting your stay mapped out so you can make the most of your trip! Los Angeles is one of my favorite cities and I hope to go back soon ☀
