Los Angeles and Santa Monica.
Friday, October 11
A good day in Los Angeles. with great weather. I know many people don’t seem to like L.A., but I’m not sure why – other than its traffic and related smog, of course. The town has lovely architecture and buildings, iconic streets lined with high palms, a fabulous history, a multiethnic community, wonderful cityscapes and even more wonderful landscapes as Los Angeles is a city embedded in and surrounded by canyons, mountains, beaches, and the Pacific, and multiple downtown locations as the city is so large and has so many different districts and communities. I love it, and I like the weather.
We started out in one of my favorites, and my third visit during this journey, Laurel Canyon, where we drove around a little and then ate lunch at my very favorite, the Laurel Canyon Country Store.
A leisurely drive east through the city to the fabulous Griffith Park, another great L. A. attraction and asset, and a walk up to the Observatory, which not only is itself iconic and beautiful, but also offers great views of the city, with the skyscrapers rising vaguely out of the smoggy haze.
Then to the Farmers Market, in Fairfax, not too far from Canter’s Deli, where I visited a few weeks ago. I tried to get to Phil’s Deli and Grill yesterday, so wanted to come back and try again for a t-shirt, but also wanted to visit the Farmers Market as I visited years ago with a local friend (who I shame-facedly have not visited in either of my trips to L.A. this time, although would like to), and remember really liking the market. First, though, I did stop to take another photo of Beverly Boulevard.
Actually, the Farmers Market seems like more a giant food court, although it does sell meats, produce, clothing, and other goods, but predominately it seems like an extremely diverse food court, with all sorts of enticing foods. It is a great place, vibrant and very dynamic, and reminded me a bit of the market along the Ramblas in Barcelona, or Lexington Market in Baltimore, full of goods of all sorts, very inviting, colorful, and full of life and energy. It is a great place.
Phil’s Deli was actually in the Farmers Market, and although the staff were all wearing those Phil’s T-shirts, they didn’t have any for sale. Too bad.
The entire area around the Farmers Market is well developed and nice looking, and exiting out of the back of the market we walked down toward The Grove, an outdoor shopping mall, also good looking and filled with people, and also with a very good vibe.
We enjoyed the Farmers Market and the Grove, but then headed toward Santa Monica. I would rather have gone back through Laurel Canyon and then Mulholland Drive to Santa Monica, but google maps took us the quicker way, which was still nice, heading south through the city, and then west. Santa Monica is not somewhere I’ve been to, other than passing through it when I was here in 2020 and rented a Ducati Scrambler for three days, but never really stopped off in Santa Monica. Igt looked great though, and is.
The first thing we visited was the hustling and bustling Santa Monica Pier.
As we came off the pier, the sun starting dropping lower in the sky, across the ocean horizon. Very beautiful.
It would be easy to spend more time in Los Angeles, at least another day and probably more like two more days, not to mention more time for surrounding areas, lovely in themselves, like Santa Monica and Venice, and time in the canyons, like Mulholland. Lots to do out here.
Tomorrow, though, we’ll head up the coast, spending the night in San Simeon, just past Cambria, and pass through and visit Solvang, just a little inland, on the way.