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Travelling From Coast To Coast Aug 2023: Day 4 - Echo Park Swan Boats, Grammy Museum, Boxie Studios
Day 4: Thursday 10th August 2023
Today was our first accommodation move (of nine in total.) Mat and I were up early to get everything finished off. Besides getting ready and packing, all we really had to do before we checked out was either wash up or put the dishwasher on (according to the property instructions) and take out the trash. It was quick and easy as we’d stayed on top of everything while we had been here. We left the house about 7.15 am which was just about on time as per my plans. Our automobile: ![]() We had enjoyed our stay here in Toluca Lake / Magnolia Park (google maps shows it as Toluca Terrace) and it was a great base for visiting the places we’d been to locally especially Universal Studios, Warner Bros Studios and Beachwood Canyon / Hollywood Sign. I’ve said it before but this AirBnb was relatively expensive because of the private pool which along with the location was our favourite thing about the property. Because of the cost, we couldn’t justify spending more than three nights here but I would recommend this AirBnb to anyone visiting the Burbank / North Hollywood / Hollywood area in particular as long as they were able to make decent use of the pool facilities to justify the cost. One downside of using AirBnbs was not being able to store luggage after checkout and before we were able to check in at our next location at 3 or 4 pm. We needed to do something with all our stuff so we could get on with our day as we weren’t prepared to risk leaving it in the car. I had done some research into this a couple of months before the trip and came across multiple luggage storage services which I didn’t know were a thing until then. Looking at locations that would work for us, it seemed like Bounce had the best available sites for us so that is who we used to store our luggage with both today and after checking out of our next property. After that we would be in hotels which made things a lot easier and cheaper (free in fact.) Anyway I had decided to store the luggage closer to where we would be staying next so we wouldn’t need to come all the way back west at the end of today’s activities. I had picked out a UPS location through Bounce (the website tells you whether the location is a store, hotel, cafe or UPS store for example when you book) firstly because the address worked well for us, and secondly because this particular UPS store had pretty long hours so we wouldn’t be waiting for them to open to drop our stuff off and therefore wasting time or rushing to get back before they closed. Their hours were 7 am - 6 pm weekdays. I actually hadn’t booked it until the day before because I wanted to be sure of our plans and more importantly the number of bags before I confirmed a reservation, but I knew from checking regularly that the locations didn’t ‘sell out’ so leaving it until the last minute was fine. In order to make packing up eight times as easy as possible, I had put everything into packing cubes when we’d unpacked on the first night. I hadn’t packed into packing cubes before we left the UK because putting our clothes in them takes up more space and I can’t then get everything into the cases. Because I didn’t want to take everything back out of the packing cubes again, I knew we were going to struggle a little to get everything into the cases as tightly as we had for our transatlantic flight. In the end I decided that we’d be okay if we used our hand luggage bags and probably one additional bag. I stupidly hadn’t thought about bringing an extra bag before we left home so didn’t have anything suitable. I’d seen on Bounce’s website that bags needed to close e.g. with a zip to be handed over which made sense as the risk of losing things when using something like a carrier bag would be higher. So at Universal Studios the previous evening, Mat and I had spent about $40 on the only bag we could find that would probably work which was annoying to say the least. Therefore we had booked for nine bags. There is no price difference between suitcases and small bags, so each bag was $5.90 each for the day. It’s also a per day charge so we paid the same with the plan to leave them there from near opening to close than if we’d just dropped them for a couple of hours. On top of the cost per bag there is a charge of around $15 total for insurance. $68 is obviously not an insignificant amount of money but we were happy to pay it for the peace of mind of not having to worry about having luggage in the car during the day. We set off for the UPS Store and it took about 15 minutes. Sidenote: while planning this trip, when I was looking at distances between places, I always took into account the longest time google maps would give me based on traffic at the time we were due to travel. In reality, we very rarely encountered any of the famous LA traffic during our two weeks there. I don’t know if we were just lucky or the roads were quieter as it was still the end of summer but we usually always arrived in the shortest estimated time. I knew that the UPS Store I had booked had recently moved to a new location in the neighbourhood. I trusted that the Bounce app and my email confirmation would be up to date with the new address. When we arrived it became clear that this was not the case as the property was closed up with ‘We have moved’ signs in the window. I popped the new address into google maps, which was the one I had stored into my planning document (should have just trusted myself) and a few minutes later we were pulling up into the little car park by the store. We were in the East Hollywood / edge of Silver Lake border, and it was definitely a little more rough around the edges here than where we had come from. However, it didn’t feel unsafe and…I don’t know, I just love the character of LA so I’m probably not as objective as your casual visitor but I still really liked it. We dragged all the cases and bags from the car into the little UPS store. At first the guy behind the desk seemed a bit grumpy that we’d shown up but he chatted to us a little and mellowed during the conversation. He gave us luggage tags and we left a lot lighter than when we’d walked in. We got back in the car and set off for breakfast which was only about a six minute drive away. The restaurant, Millie’s, was on Sunset Boulevard at Sunset Junction. I knew parking wasn’t great around there so I was a bit concerned we’d struggle a bit, or at the very least Mat would get super stressed. Just before we got to Millie’s we spotted a strip mall and Mat wanted to try and park there. There were signs that clearly said you could only park there for the businesses in the strip mall and threats of fines and towing so that was a no-go. The second plan was to park on a side street but the one we tried was really busy with residents’ cars and was also really really steep as per a lot of streets in Silver Lake so wouldn’t be easy to parallel park into. The street parking on Sunset didn’t seem that busy with it being just before 8 am so I said we should just try and park outside the restaurant itself. We pulled up outside Millie’s and there were about four or five staff members outside just setting up the outdoor tables and opening up as the restaurant was due to open at 8 am. Mat got out and asked one of the staff members if we were good to park there and he said we were fine and went to set up a table for us while we faffed about unloading ourselves from the car. I knew that Millie’s was a really popular place for breakfast and it had quite a few good vegan options so we were definitely going there on the trip. Today seemed like the best day now that we’d moved into this area of the city. I also wanted to avoid coming on a weekend because a) it would be a lot busier and they don’t take reservations and b) they only serve hash browns Monday to Friday which would have been a deal breaker for me. Millie’s was a lot more ‘casual diner’ than I expected it to be. Their website leads with a photo of their other newer location in Pasadena which is a smart light-brick building. This, the original Millie’s, opened in 1926 and the exterior and interior are more in keeping with the area. Sunset Junction and Silver Lake in general feel like more of a down-to-earth, not-trying-too-hard, rough-around-the-edges kind of cool than other parts of the city like West Hollywood for example. The decor inside was pretty casual and the place was tiny; they only have six tables and eight seats at the bar, plus some outdoor tables. As I said, we’d arrived at 8 am and by the time we left, the outside and inside was full. ![]() Oh it’s our car again: ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Unfortunately they don’t serve alcohol so no breakfast Mimosa for me today. I got a black Americano which was a little too strong for me so I drank half and Mat finished it off, along with the double espresso and orange juice he ordered. Seren got an apple juice and besides my half a coffee, Freya and I both just stuck with tap water. ![]() Mat chose the vegan Cali Benedict which was plant based eggs, tempeh bacon, sliced avocado, mixed greens and vegan hollandaise sauce all on an English muffin. I went for the Vegan Mess which was plant-based eggs scrambled with sauteed veggies and vegan cheese, topped with pico de gallo, guacamole and vegan sour cream. Both our entrees came with either hash browns or fruit. I of course chose hash browns and Mat went for fruit because he’s weird and doesn’t really like potatoes. Mat’s breakfast: ![]() ‘Egg’ close-up: ![]() Seren got vegan blueberry pancakes. There were three serving sizes: single, short or full. Freya chose a variation of the chocolate chip regular pancakes with strawberries and nutella drizzle (I think it also came with banana which she asked to be left off.) Both girls went with the ‘short’ portion as they claimed to be really hungry. The short portion turned out to be two pancakes and neither of them managed more than one so should have just gone for the single serving. ![]() ![]() It’s probably no surprise given what’s happened with the meals I’d eaten in the first two days of the trip, but I believe I may have made a bad menu choice yet again. The vegan mess was really good, don’t get me wrong, but looking at the menu now online I see a Mexican version of what I had that omits the sour cream and toast and adds jalapenos, ranchero sauce and tortillas. Which would have been much more up my alley. So I either wasn’t awake enough to spot it on the menu or it wasn’t on the printed menus they gave us. My breakfast: ![]() As I said, my breakfast was good. I had an experience that occasionally happens as a vegan eating out where it didn’t ‘taste vegan.’ When the guy brought it out, he said ‘vegan mess’ and after eating a few bites I politely checked with them again that it was definitely vegan and they were adamant that it was. It just tasted a bit buttery to me and the vegan cheese didn’t taste familiar. I do believe that it was vegan; the egg was definitely plant-based and I think it was just a brand of vegan cheese I hadn’t had before. In my experience, American vegan cheese tends to taste more like regular dairy than UK vegan cheeses do. I did see either a yelp or google review in which a vegan customer said Millie’s doesn’t use a separate grill for vegan items compared to meat and she could taste ‘meat grease’ in her food so I wonder if it was cross contamination from not separating the cooking processes of vegan and regular items. I’m fairly relaxed about that kind of thing to be honest as I think if you aren’t, your options are much more limited. So that possibly explains why it tasted like dairy to me. It was really good food but that did kind of spoil my enjoyment a little. Everyone else loved their breakfast and we will definitely return on our next visit to Los Angeles. Total including tip was $106.73 which was pretty standard for a restaurant breakfast during the trip. We all made sure to restroom before we left as it’s necessary to go when the opportunity presents itself when you’re spending a day touring a city. We didn’t want to get caught short and end up having to use some horrific public restroom in a park out of necessity. Well that’s the case for Freya and I at least. My husband and eldest daughter have bladders the size of thimbles and in actual fact would be using a manky park restroom about an hour from now. The inside of the toilet door. My husband takes very interesting photos: ![]() The next spot on the itinerary was a three minute walk away. The girls moaned that I was making them walk somewhere (how evil of me) and we all made sure to slink quickly past the car in case the staff questioned why we were leaving it parked outside the restaurant after finishing up there. We were technically perfectly entitled to do that as it was regular street parking, so we didn’t need to worry, and in any case we would be leaving in about 15 minutes. ![]() I hadn’t told Mat and the girls what we were going to see and it was quite fun keeping it a surprise as we walked along Sunset Boulevard. I definitely think the expression ‘no one walks in LA’ is true to a degree; even in a proclaimed walkable area like Silver Lake / Sunset Junction there were very few people walking along the street besides people around bus stops compared to what you would experience in a comparable area filled with restaurants, shops and residences in Manhattan or Brooklyn or London for example. But of course pretty much everyone has a car here or uses buses / Metro / Uber. ![]() Three minutes after we set off, we arrived at our destination, Micheltorena Stairs. There are a lot of staircases like these around certain parts of the city because lots of Los Angeles is so hilly. Silver Lake has lots of them and so does Beachwood Canyon where we would do a really challenging stairs hike later in the trip. So pretty. The girls obviously moaned about having to climb halfway up for a photo. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() We walked back to the car and set off for our next destination which was less than ten minutes away. ![]() We were actually running ahead of schedule by about an hour. I’d overestimated how long we’d be at Millie’s and how long it would take us to drive to the places we’d been so far this morning. As I said, the traffic wasn’t as bad as google maps had told us to expect it to be. I’m thankful we did have this extra time available as we needed to find street parking when we arrived in Echo Park. From what I’d seen in google reviews, that can be a challenge which is one of the reasons why I’d booked our next activity for the morning when it would be quieter. I knew there was street parking pretty much all the way around Echo Lake. We drove all the way around and did faff a bit as Mat was looking for a space big enough that he wouldn’t have to parallel park into. I think we had pretty much hit the sweet spot between residents going out to work in the morning and people visiting the park arriving a bit later in the day. So there were definitely open spots, but we managed to pass a few and not stop in time. Eventually we found a space that worked on Echo Park Avenue and parked up. We checked the sign and it seemed we were good to go. I think it said something like ‘No parking Tuesday 10 am - 12 pm Street Cleaning.’ As it was Thursday morning just before 9 am we were confident we were in the clear. There were definitely cars here that had people living in them and I did wonder whether the owners generally move them quite a bit, only move them for street cleaning, or don’t actually do that and get ticketed. Echo Park is a pretty cool neighbourhood close to Downtown. It’s a little cheaper to live than Silver Lake and the residents skew younger. It definitely feels that little bit more edgy but not in a bad way. The park itself had a big problem during the pandemic with homeless encampments taking over the area. When the park and lake were eventually cleaned up and the encampments removed, a metal fence was erected around the park. This was removed a few months ago and now the entire park doesn’t have a barrier separating it from the street. Despite this, the park has stayed clean and safe. The whole area is beautiful. I love the combination of lake / palm trees / skyscrapers in the background, it’s absolutely my thing. Stunning. We walked down off the street and into the park towards our destination which was luckily only a couple of minutes walk from the car. We had parked on the right side of the park without knowing it. We were renting a swan boat on the lake. Everyone had been very much on board with this when I’d suggested it as it looked super cute and is pretty iconic. The boat rentals are run by a company called Wheel Fun Rentals and since reopening after the pandemic, it has been necessary to book the boats in advance. I had booked our rental for 10.12 am as that’s what came up when I searched for 10 am. It was $14 each for Mat and I and $7 each for the girls (up to 17 years.) It came out to about $41.50 after tax which I think is really good value as it’s an hour’s rental. We definitely found on the trip that some of the cheaper / free little things we did were amongst the best. We spent less on our activities today than on tickets for our expensive day at Universal Studios the previous day and I definitely enjoyed today way more. I think all of us would pick the highlights of today over yesterday as a whole. So as I said we were probably about an hour and twenty minutes early for our booking but I didn’t expect this to be an issue as the email confirmation said being a bit late or early was fine. Also we could currently see a total of one boat already on the lake so it’s not like all the boats were currently in use. We got to the dock, the guy checked us in and I had to sign a waiver. Mat pointed to where we were parked and said ‘We’re ok to park there aren’t we?’ to which he replied, ‘Yeah street cleaning isn’t until 10.’ We weren’t worried because we were sure he’d got the day wrong as the sign said street cleaning was Tuesday, not Thursday. We had a little chat with him and he was quite no nonsense but in a funny, sarcastic way which was amusing. He handed us all life vests as those are mandatory and we all had a laugh that he’d put Mat in an extra large despite him only being a medium in clothing. In Mat’s defence, the jackets definitely came up small. The guy took us down to the water and held the boat so we could get on. He told the girls to get in the back and pointed out that they were the passengers and Mat and I would be doing all the work. And then we were off. I put Freya in charge of photography as there was less chance of dropping a phone in the water from in the back, plus it was not like she was needing to pedal or do anything else apart from relax. I also told Seren to put her phone away as she’s always dropping it and we didn’t want it ending up in the lake. Ironically her phone got badly water damaged beyond repair later in the trip but not from dropping it in a lake at least. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Pedalling around Echo Park Lake was fun but it was also super hard work on the legs. We took a couple of laps around the whole lake. We enjoyed hanging out with the local ducks and moorhens, and taking in the scenery. During our ride, there ended up being about four or five boats on the lake in total which was perfect. It wasn't easy to change direction so with so few boats on the lake we had time to change course when we found ourselves with another swan in our sights. I don’t think it would be as easy if all the boats were out on the lake. I made sure that Freya had taken some photos of the fountain and Downtown LA and stuff before Mat and I were too tired to continue pedalling. We did have a couple of short breaks where we let the boat float and gave our legs a rest. We both have quite strong legs as we walk a lot and I do resistance training but man, it was hard work pulling four people around in one of those boats using just four pedals. After about 40 minutes on the lake we decided to call it a day for the sake of our quadriceps. We had all really enjoyed the experience for sure but Mat and I couldn’t manage another 20 minutes of pedalling. Well we could but we probably would have struggled to walk for the next couple of days which didn’t sound ideal. We pedalled back to the dock and our friend helped us back out onto dry land. We commented on how sore it was on the legs and he replied ‘It’s leg day!’ He told us to drop our vests in a big container on the dock and then head out through the cafe. ![]() As we walked into the cafe, the guys behind the counter greeted us and were all ‘Do you want a coffee or snack after that workout?’ and repeated about it being leg day. Mat heard the word coffee and was all over it. We also got a bottle of water to share and the total for both was $6.90 including tip. Love that the place is called Boat House Bistro when it’s a little unassuming park cafe. ![]() ![]() The sky had brightened up a little bit while we were on the lake and it was much warmer than it looks in the photos. It was probably in the low twenties. As hinted at earlier, Seren and Mat wanted to use the park restrooms which were just across from the cafe. Seren made Freya go with her. I spent a couple of minutes just taking in the surroundings. By this point in the trip I had clearly fallen completely in love with the city and remember just feeling so happy and grateful being stood there in this pretty park, enjoying the lovely weather and being excited that it was still so early in the trip and we had so much more to look forward to. ![]() ![]() Continued below...
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Michelle ![]() Instagram: michelle_smith7868 ![]() All My Trip Reports Are Here **Including New December 2021 and August 2022 Trip Reports in progress and 2020 Trip Report Now Complete. New Los Angeles / Orlando August 2023 and Los Angeles July 2024 Trip Reports In Progress** |
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A few minutes later the others came back from the restrooms. The restrooms had, as expected, been extremely grim. I love this city but I’m not about to use a park restroom here and I felt particularly sorry for Freya who had been dragged along for the ‘experience.’ We took a couple of photos and then wandered back along the street to the car. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() It was 10 am at this point so we were still very much ahead of schedule considering our booking here wasn’t actually due to start for another 12 minutes. Next on the agenda today was visiting a church in Koreatown. It was just over a ten minute drive away. Now, I must admit I was not 100% confident that this part of the itinerary was going to run smoothly. It was definitely one of the only things on the trip I thought might not work out yet it was Freya’s number one ‘must do’ of the holiday. Immanuel Presbyterian Church is known in our house as ‘The Helena Church’ as it was where My Chemical Romance filmed the music video for Helena. I have to admit to having spent a disproportionately large amount of time planning this very small part of the trip. If you do any research into Koreatown, one of the first things you’ll learn is that parking there is apparently a nightmare. I had also read that it wasn’t a great neighbourhood. However, visiting the church was something Freya and I really wanted to do so I spent a lot of time researching parking lots as close as possible to the church that were safe and actually run by proper companies. In the end I had made a list of three that although pretty expensive, looked like they would work out. I think I had somehow built the area up in my head to be like some super sketchy unpleasant and unwelcoming hellhole, having read a good few reddit posts about crime in the area. As we pulled up at the first car park on my list I realised that Koreatown appeared normal and pleasant. We passed the church as we turned into the parking garage on the opposite side of the road. So far, so easy. The car park was at 3333 Wilshire Boulevard and they had helpfully painted the address inside the garage: ![]() We walked out of the perfectly fine parking garage and out onto the perfectly fine street. The church is really beautiful. It was built in 1929 and was listed as a Los Angeles Historical Monument 20 years ago. ![]() ![]() As well as being a community church and working with food banks to hand out food to the needy every week, Immanuel is available for filming (it’s been in a Spider Man movie, a John Wick movie and an Eminem music video too) and also hosts proper concerts including big names such as Snow Patrol, Echo and the Bunnymen, Mazzy Star, Hozier, Jenny Lewis and Damien Rice, plus candlelight orchestra concerts and even an Emo festival. ![]() The church is open daily from 7 am until 4 pm and I had seen online that the staff are happy to welcome visitors (and My Chemical Romance fans) in. The only potential issue would be if there was an event such as a wedding or funeral on when we showed up as of course we then wouldn’t be able to go in. There was actually going to be a candlelight orchestra concert that evening which was Beyonce songs and I had suggested to Freya that we do that instead so we were guaranteed to be able to get inside but she didn’t want to do that because a) she doesn’t like Beyonce and b) she wanted to look around properly and take photos which we wouldn’t be able to do during a concert. She had a point. I knew the office around the side of the church was where we would need to go to speak to staff about access. I think it was a buzzer situation and we asked the staff member if we could please have a look at the church. They took us into the office inside where we met another member of staff. Both of them were lovely and very welcoming. The lady took us through to the church (nave? sanctuary?) and they turned on all the lights for us. She explained where we were allowed to look around (the foyer at the back of the church and the main area) and gave us the basic rules. She said ‘You’re My Chemical Romance fans, right?’ She said that they love having fans come to the church but they expect people to be respectful and that last week they’d had an ‘incident’ which was upsetting for them because they didn’t want to have to stop opening their doors to fans. Why are some people the way they are? Ugh. The lady then left us to it and Freya and I spent about ten or 15 minutes with our jaws open excitedly taking photos. The whole place is absolutely stunningly beautiful. We pulled up the music video on my phone to compare how the church has changed in the 18 years since it was filmed. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The stage (chancel?) looked different in size and had a different carpet but that was about it really. Old, classic, beautiful churches don’t really change much I guess. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Freya and I went out to the foyer area to take some photos as the video uses shots from the street all the way through to the altar so includes the foyer and the internal doors. Obviously the doors to the street weren’t open so the foyer area looked darker but it was great to be able to step out there too. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The lady had mentioned when telling us the rules that they take donations and there was a paypal QR code in the church that we unfortunately couldn’t get to work. So when we got back to the office we asked the security guard, who at this point was the only one there, if we could leave a cash donation. He got us a donation envelope which we filled out and just as we were leaving it on the desk, the lady returned so we thanked her very much for welcoming us in and then headed out. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() We took a few more photos outside and I felt like pinching myself as I couldn’t believe just how smoothly the whole thing had gone. Koreatown was lovely, parking was a breeze, the church staff couldn’t have been more welcoming, and the church itself was even more gorgeous than it had seemed on video. We were so grateful we’d been able to explore it at our leisure. I’ve said it before but this trip really was one ‘wow’ moment after another and I still cannot believe all the amazing things we got to do and see, including landmarks like this that I’ve wanted to visit for absolutely years. I made the comment to Mat at some point in the trip that the things I had been worried would be really difficult to see / do or wouldn’t work out went way better than expected, and a couple of things that seemed easy in advance were the tricky things on the trip. There really were only a few things though such as Beachwood Cafe a few days before for example, and Universal Hollywood and Disneyland being way busier than expected making them a bit more of a challenge to tour than expected. Our next ‘thing’ wasn’t until 1 pm and it was now only 10.45 am. I was amazed at how efficiently and smoothly things had gone so far this morning. We’d checked out, dropped our luggage in a different part of the city, had breakfast, done a little photo op, ridden a swan boat and ticked off a major (for us) music landmark all before 11 am. I had been expecting it to be more like 12.30 pm by this point so had made a note in my planning of a couple of lunch spots but none of us were hungry yet with it only being a few hours since breakfast. So we had some spare time and I knew just the way to fill it as there had been something else I had been trying to fit into this day which didn’t seem possible timewise. I had even considered ditching the swan boats for it but I’m so glad I didn’t as a) we loved the boat ride and b) we actually had time to do it anyway. I’ve mentioned it before but Taylor Swift was currently in town on The Eras Tour. As anyone who followed the tour will know, a lot of the cities she visited were doing things like temporarily renaming buildings for her, and some local businesses were kind of cashing in on the tour with things like Taylor Swift themed cocktails / coffees. I had read an article probably less than two weeks before our trip detailing some of the special events Los Angeles businesses were hosting while Taylor was in the city. There were three that looked great and that I had suggested to the girls. They really wanted to do them and it would have been a shame to miss them as they were one-off experiences. Unfortunately each one meant spending more money than we probably would have done if we hadn’t gotten involved, but I reasoned that they were special, unique experiences that were only available for a limited time because of us being in the city at the same time as Taylor. And, as I said when I made the case to Mat, originally we were going to go and see one of the concerts while we were here. Well, we were until we saw the ticket resale prices rise to beyond stupid amounts. I think when I started looking they were in the $300s each and within 10 days of me first looking, they were starting at $600 ish plus crazy fees for terrible seats almost behind the stage. We’d seen Taylor in Tampa during the Reputation tour five years earlier and paid $350 total for four tickets. That was cheaper than what we’d paid for similar seats to see her at Wembley stadium a month before Tampa. Talk about out of control capitalism. The good news is that by the time we arrived in LA, I’d managed to get some really good tickets for the tour in London next year for way less than we would have ended up paying to see her in LA. So we didn’t feel like we were missing out by not seeing her in Los Angeles and we were certainly saving money seeing her in the UK rather than the USA. I can’t believe how insane US ticket prices have become. Anyway…with this extra time on our hands I suggested that we do the one thing of the three that I hadn’t booked, which was to go to the Grammy Museum. They had a special pop-up exhibit for six weeks or so which had opened a few days before to coincide with her shows at SoFi Stadium. The exhibit was called I Can See You (Taylor’s Version) and basically featured 11 outfits and two instruments which were all worn / played during the original Speak Now era. They are also the outfits in glass cases in the recently released I Can See You music video. The Grammy Museum was less than a ten minute drive away. ![]() ![]() ![]() I knew it was at LA Live and that there was a huge parking structure so it would be nice and easy, so Mat was happy about that. We drove down there and ended up going around the block twice as we missed the parking entrance the first time. Second time we were all good. ![]() Freya was peckish and wanted a snack from the vending machine in the car park. It’s always a good idea to feed Freya when she’s feeling hungry as it can turn to hanger quite quickly. So we got her some nacho cheese doritos. She ate them on the way to the museum entrance which involved going up an escalator with these important safety instructions: ![]() To get into the Grammy Museum we had to head outside onto the street and around the corner. LA Live and Crypto.com arena across the way (where the Lakers, Kings, Clippers and Sparks play) are new buildings in the South Park area downtown. It all looks shiny and new and there are lots of restaurants and bars in the area as you would expect for an area benefiting from lots of leisure tourism and regularly hosting sporting events. We entered the building and purchased tickets on the spot. They were $18 each for Mat and I and $12 each for under 18s. I had actually considered the Grammy Museum as a place for us to visit when originally planning the trip as we’re all huge music fans, but there didn’t seem to be much in the way of representation for any of our favourite artists so it didn’t seem worthwhile. The reviews online seemed to imply that there wasn’t an awful lot to see at the museum in general. However, this special exhibition made the pretty reasonable entrance fee worth it for us as Taylor Swift fans, and of course we could have a look around the whole museum for that price so much better value with the special exhibition on. We took the elevator up to the top floor as it’s a work-your-way down situation and had a look around the regular exhibition. It is definitely small but has some interesting artefacts. Michael Jackson Thriller jacket: ![]() Elvis’s shirt: ![]() Whitney’s dress: ![]() Beyonce’s dress: ![]() Jimi Hendrix’s bass: ![]() There were some interactive listening thingies: ![]() And then we arrived at the entrance to the Taylor Swift special exhibition. ![]() ![]() ![]() Continued below...
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Michelle ![]() Instagram: michelle_smith7868 ![]() All My Trip Reports Are Here **Including New December 2021 and August 2022 Trip Reports in progress and 2020 Trip Report Now Complete. New Los Angeles / Orlando August 2023 and Los Angeles July 2024 Trip Reports In Progress** |
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...continued
As I said previously, there were 11 dresses and two instruments in the display and it was in a pretty small space. However, there were quite a few Swifties in here (most of them in Eras Tour t-shirts so probably in LA for the shows if not locals) so it took a few minutes for us to get up close to everything. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() A photo of the set-up from the music video featuring the outfits on display here: ![]() ![]() Shakira, Shakira: ![]() This is a Taylor outfit from the permanent collection: ![]() And her shoes: ![]() Freya and I went to restroom and I bumped into my boys on the way out: ![]() ![]() Handwritten Taylor Swift lyrics: ![]() And again: ![]() By this point Freya and I had run out of ‘museum attention’ which we both struggle with at every museum / gallery, but the others were looking at everything in close detail. There were some instruments and equipment in this same section that had the lyrics and it was right up Mat’s alley. Seren also wanted to read every label on everything. Freya and I eventually headed down to the gift shop in the foyer to wait for them. It’s very small so it didn’t take long to wander around and there wasn’t really anything available related to our favourite artists. While we were there, there was a steady stream of people entering in Taylor Swift tour t-shirts. We heard a staff member say to someone that the exhibit was bringing in hundreds of people a day. Because we were there just hanging around by this point watching what was going on, I noticed that the three staff members were struggling a bit to stay on top of admission and gift shop purchases (mostly Taylor Swift stickers and postcards, the only Taylor items they had in the shop). It was clearly busier than anticipated and they were evidently understaffed. I felt bad for them as they looked a bit stressed having to keep their eyes on what was going on as there were no entrance barriers or security tag gate thingies here so it was all on them to make sure people were actually paying. A teenage school party turned up too which didn’t help. When Mat and Seren came down, they also wanted to have a look around the shop so we had to wait even longer before we could finally leave. Seren bought a couple of postcards and badges as she struggles to exit a shop without spending money. It was about 12 pm by the time we left. ![]() We decided it was time for a Starbucks as there was one next door. I can’t find a receipt so not entirely sure what we had but Freya definitely had a vanilla frappuccino and Seren definitely had her usual iced vanilla oat latte. We also got some tap waters. I’m going to assume I did get a coffee (black Americano) but I possibly did not (I know this is edge of seat stuff.) ![]() ![]() We sat outside on a little wall to drink our drinks as we had a few minutes before we had to head off to our next thing. As I said before, this area is really nice and new with lots of restaurants and bars. There were lots of people around and they seemed to mostly be either local workers or convention guests but there were a few tourists too. ![]() It was a 25 minute walk to our destination which was booked for 1 pm, so at about 12.20 pm we headed off to give ourselves plenty of time. We were heading to a photography studio where the two resident photographers had set up some Taylor Swift Era’s Tour photo ops. What I haven’t mentioned so far today is that Seren was not behaving particularly congenially towards today’s plans. It had been an increasing battle as the day went on to encourage her to ‘just get on with it’ as she was moaning and huffing and generally being a stroppy teenager. We’ve talked about it since we got back and she regrets not throwing herself into the holiday in places (some things like Disneyland she was fully on board with.) She says she was struggling with her mental health and missing her new boyfriend. When discussing this particular day the other day, she said ‘Oh yeah that was a good day!’ When she very much did not act like that was the case when we were there. She had been the most interested and involved of all three of them when planning the holiday, and before the trip, her teenage strops had been well and truly over two years ago. So it had all come as a bit of a surprise that she was belligerent and often obstructive when we were trying to get on with the plans, not to mention frustrating. So today she had been fine through breakfast, had moaned about the swan boat in advance but was okay once we were there. She had been grumpy and disinterested at the church (despite her originally being the one who got Freya and I into My Chemical Romance.) She had basically taken a couple of photos and then sat in a pew with a face like thunder while Freya and I were taking it all in. She’d been okay at the Grammy Museum because she likes museums but things had very much deteriorated by the time we were ready to start this walk to the Fashion District. Her issue was a) she hates walking b) she didn’t feel safe in Downtown Los Angeles and c) she didn’t want to do the photography shoot anyway, despite having been excited about it when we booked it. So after a few minutes of ‘conversation’ we said we were doing the walk now and she could either come or she could sit there for the next couple of hours. She followed slowly behind us and after a few minutes, Mat hung back to walk with her. The walk to Boxie Studios was really straightforward, basically we took two streets from the Starbucks to the door of the studio. As we got walking, I was surprised to see some lovely historic architecture. I think Downtown LA gets a bad rap as it’s not a traditional downtown like you find in most cities. It’s more sprawling and has different areas. The historic architecture is possibly therefore more thinly spread and some areas of Downtown are more modern. So it’s possible to watch videos and movies shot downtown and not see any of these beautiful buildings I guess. But it was a very nice surprise. Yet another area of Los Angeles that I loved, and one of a few that was much nicer than I had anticipated from other people’s opinions I’d read. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Continued below...
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Michelle ![]() Instagram: michelle_smith7868 ![]() All My Trip Reports Are Here **Including New December 2021 and August 2022 Trip Reports in progress and 2020 Trip Report Now Complete. New Los Angeles / Orlando August 2023 and Los Angeles July 2024 Trip Reports In Progress** |
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...continued
We could tell when we had got into the Fashion District as there were lots of fabric wholesalers and little independent clothes stores (that makes it sound nicer than they were to be fair; they were discounted places rather than boutiques.) One thing we noticed today was spray painted ads on the sidewalks which kind of makes sense with people looking down at the ground while they walk. ![]() Like elsewhere in the city, there weren’t many people walking about but we enjoyed our stroll to the studio (well three of us did.) We arrived at Boxie Studios at about 12.45 pm so waited outside for five minutes or so since the previous session would still be happening and we knew there wasn’t a waiting area space. ![]() ![]() The building across the street: ![]() The instructions said that if the door to the studio wasn’t open, to call and they would come down and get us. It wasn’t so we did, but in between us calling and the guy coming down, two people came out who had finished their session so they let us in. We met the guy (one of the studio owners), Jason, in the foyer as he was showing other guests out. He took us into the elevator (one of those old industrial ones with a metal sliding door) and we headed up. He asked us if we were seeing the tour while we were in LA and I explained that we weren’t but we had tickets for London next year that were a lot cheaper and he said ‘I’ve heard that.’ When we got to the studio entrance upstairs, Jason handed us over to Brittany, the other owner, to fill out some paperwork and she gave us an intro. We were the first to arrive for our session along with another couple, and with people from the session before just leaving, it was kind of changeover time. The sessions started on the hour for 45 minutes so we were in that spare 15 minutes. Brittany said we could get started though which was great as we would then hopefully get through all the sets efficiently before the other attendees arrived. Each session was supposed to have a maximum of 10 guests. As I said previously, Mat and I weren’t going to be having photos taken so technically there would be less people using the sets in our session, but since the girls were under 18 they needed to be unaccompanied. The girls didn’t really want to take selfies so it worked out pretty well that they kind of each had a dedicated ‘photographer’. There were eight Taylor Swift sets plus a ball pit which is always available as part of the studio. There was also a rail of costumes and a few props. Brittany told us we were free to use anything and that there was a bathroom in the hallway to use to get changed. Two of the sets required a ladder as they were up high and we were told we had to get Brittany or Jason to help us up and down. We were each given a lanyard and then we got started. Well Freya and I did. Seren was still moaning so she hung back a little. Freya and I moved around each of the sets and she was absolutely loving it. Brittany and Jason were playing Taylor Swift songs and Freya was really happy. We moved from set to set and she used some of the props. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() By the time we got to the second storey sets, a couple of other parties were also using them so there was a bit of faffing and waiting. Our session technically had 11 participants. The couple who had arrived with us were taking the experience very seriously. She had brought costumes (which they suggested you did) and she kept going out to the bathroom to get changed. Her partner was a photographer and he had special permission to use the ladder himself so they didn’t have to wait for Brittany and Jason to help them. Then there were two more parties of two, one who were the same as us (parent photographer and child) and then two groups of two friends who took photos of each other. Those four therefore took quite a bit longer on each set, hence the waiting around. The eleventh person was an older woman on her own who ended up getting Brittany to take all of her photos at each set for her so the rest of us were actually all relying on Jason for ladder access to the sets so it became a bit of a bottleneck. I was too scared of heights to go up the ladder to take the top storey photos so Mat did those. ![]() ![]() Besides that I ended up taking all of Freya’s photos and then going around with Seren again who had mellowed and decided to get into it after ten minutes or so. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Mat spent the time he wasn’t required playing with Brittany and Jason’s adorable puppy who, if I recall correctly, was three months old. She was a bit timid but friendly and she just wandered around the studio inquisitively. ![]() He also wanted to get in on the modelling a bit: ![]() Because we’d got a head start and didn’t have to wait for any sets to become available until Ladder Wars, we were all done within about 35 minutes. I asked the girls if there were any sets they wanted to go back to, which they did, so we took a few additional photos and then grabbed some water from the water cooler provided. It was fairly warm in there which we’d been warned about with it being an old building with no air conditioning, but there were fans set up and we didn’t find it too bad. This sign was outside the restroom. ‘Food or Starbucks’: ![]() When we were finally ready to leave at about 1.45 pm so we said goodbye to the lady herself. ![]() Jason took us back down in the elevator and we bumped into some of the next group coming in. Honestly, I know I’ve said it enough times but we were definitely witnessing the effects of Swiftonomics. Los Angeles was certainly making dollar from Taylor being in the city. I’m really glad we did the Eras Experience. It was a special, one-off thing and we have all of the photos as a take-away from it. But it was expensive at $25 plus tax each. I would have felt it was decent value if it was just the girls because as I said, it’s a unique thing and it was very well done. Had it been next summer, we could have sent them in together with Seren being 18 and saved over $50. Although it was lovely to watch them enjoy themselves in there and Freya ranks it in her top five LA experiences which, considering we did so many things across twelve-ish city days, is high praise indeed. We walked the 25 minutes or so back to LA Live… ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() …and fancied a sit down and a drink after all that photography. Yard House was calling our name so we headed inside. We were surprised to find it was really busy in there despite it being 2.15 pm on a Thursday afternoon and there being a distinct lack of people outside. It appeared they were all in here. There were a few parties waiting but luckily for us they took us straight through to a table, possibly because we’d said we were happy with a high-top since we were just having a casual drink and not trying to eat a meal. ![]() When we sat down at the table, the girls announced they were hungry which is definitely a specialty of theirs. Handily for them, we’d been given food menus. We ordered drinks, a gin and tonic for me and a zero alcohol beer for Mat. ![]() The girls just had water. Food wise, Freya got a cheese pizza and sweet potato fries, and Seren got sweet potato fries and edamame. By this point Seren was in the best mood she’d been since at least the Grammy Museum so it was nice to sit and relax for a bit with everyone in high spirits. In fact I ordered a second gin and tonic. We struggled to track down our server when we were ready for our check so it took us a bit longer than we would have liked to get out of Yard House. Having a delay with the bill when you’re trying to leave a restaurant is a pet hate of mine but it didn’t dampen the experience here as I really enjoyed our time at Yard House plus I was in a good mood after such a brilliant day. I should probably mention that the food was expensive here; $8.49 for the sweet potato fries, $9.49 for the edamame and $16.99 for the pizza. The gin and tonics were only $10.49 and that was for Aviation, so a premium gin. I feel like the drinks were reasonable but the food was not, although the girls enjoyed what they ate. We took the remainder of Freya’s pizza with us and she ate it for breakfast the following morning so getting two meals out of it makes it slightly better value. Once we’d paid the check it was about 3 pm. We headed back to the car and drove back to the UPS Store to collect our luggage. ![]() It was all pretty efficient and straightforward picking it up. A tiny place like this UPS store doesn’t really have actual space to store the luggage despite offering the service. All our stuff appeared to have spent the day sitting behind the counter. I wasn’t particularly worried about it as we didn’t have any valuables in there besides my cranky old ipad and there were staff behind the counter all day, but just mentioning it in case anyone is expecting a locked, secured facility when booking with Bounce. In a few days time, we stored our luggage again with Bounce but chose a hotel. They did lock our stuff in their luggage room but they didn’t really have space for it as their luggage room was full to the brim when we put our stuff in. As I said, Bounce doesn’t work based on capacity or anything and I guess it’s just extra income for the storage site but can give the staff a bit of a headache actually having to do something with people’s stuff when they have limited space. From there it was a short drive to our next AirBnb in Los Feliz. I think this was our first view of the Griffith Observatory of the trip: ![]() We immediately loved Los Feliz as we were driving through it to our destination. It’s very residential with lots of beautiful, classic LA houses and it’s more expensive property wise than Silver Lake next door but still cool. There are a couple of main streets full of restaurants etc and it’s very walkable. And the biggest benefit of all is that it has Griffith Park on its doorstep. What’s not to love? If I was to live in Los Angeles (I can dream), it would be a toss-up between here and the Toluca Lake area we had just come from for sure. Once we got to the property things only got better. I had booked a lovely space that was the basement of the owner’s family home. The owners had been friendly and efficient from booking, the property was really good value for money (cheap even for Los Angeles), was in a lovely, quiet cul-de-sac with driveway parking and it was even nicer in reality than it had seemed in the photos. It was more minimal than the previous property which was more to our taste, and it had a lovely outdoor space with seating and a pergola. Inside, the main living area was set up with a sofa bed for the girls and there was a separate bedroom for us. The bathroom was gorgeous too. I would 100% recommend this AirBnb and we are absolutely rebooking for next year. We had arrived about 4 pm and had a drinks booking at 5.15 pm down the hill in Silver Lake. First mission was to book an Uber which initially was a bit stressful as Uber were saying there were no vehicles available. But we eventually were successful with our request for a car at 4.45 pm. Slightly more challenging was rummaging through everyone’s suitcase trying to find a change of outfit and shoes and being ready to leave within 45 minutes of arriving. But we just about did it. Just over 10 minutes later we pulled up at our destination, De Buena Planta on Sunset Boulevard. We had absolutely loved the look of this place when I’d discovered it via a vegan LA instagram page. It isn’t a completely vegan place, I believe it used to be but they now describe themselves as ‘plant forward’ rather than ‘plant based.’ In the summer they have this amazing looking garden area where they serve food and drinks (they also have a similar patio / garden space in Venice but we preferred the classic LA meets Mexico look of the Sunset Junction one.) We had been really keen to go here but google reviews seemed to suggest the food wasn’t great and it was better to visit for just drinks and chips and salsa. So the plan was to go to De Buena Planta for Happy Hour drinks (Happy Hour is 4 - 6 pm weekdays) and then go to another pub restaurant for actual dinner that was about a ten minute walk along Sunset Boulevard in Echo Park. ![]() We arrived about 5 pm and the hostess took us through to our table. The place was as beautiful in person as it was in photos and I was very happy. It was also pretty busy as the Happy Hour is a decent deal with half price drinks pretty much across the board. The only downer was that Seren was back in her bad mood and Freya wanted to chat to her and play Top Trumps with her so she was a bit sad. ![]() ![]() Ugh I wish I could be back there right now. ![]() ![]() As part of the Happy Hour, they gave us a portion of the Chipotle Lime Fava Beans (on the menu for $6) and we also ordered the chips and salsa trio. The salsas were salsa verde, molcajete and mango-habanero. ![]() Continued below...
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Michelle ![]() Instagram: michelle_smith7868 ![]() All My Trip Reports Are Here **Including New December 2021 and August 2022 Trip Reports in progress and 2020 Trip Report Now Complete. New Los Angeles / Orlando August 2023 and Los Angeles July 2024 Trip Reports In Progress** |
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...continued
All of it was delicious, especially the salsas. My children have a very frustrating habit of saying they don’t want any chips and then when they arrive they scoff them (dry, without the salsa) leaving us with just salsas and no vessel to administer the sauces into our mouths. We ordered another round of chips and salsa and as the girls were still going strong with the dry chips, we ordered some extra chips which were $4. ![]() Drinks wise, Mat got an Oaxacan Old Fashioned and I had a Garden Mojito. Both were excellent and strong too. ![]() ![]() For happy hour the cocktails at half price were $7.50 each so a really good deal for Los Angeles (or anywhere really given the quality.) We had the same again. Freya got a Mexican Coke which she actually quite enjoyed (they didn’t have regular Coke or Diet Coke.) ![]() ![]() Seren just stuck with tap water. After our two cocktails, Mat didn’t want a third. I got a Rum Punch which isn’t on the menu anymore so I don’t know what was in it except rum. It may have been a special actually. ![]() ![]() ![]() Seren cheered up half way through our time here so she and Freya played some Top Trumps. I love that they still do that. It’s only on holiday in restaurants and bars and it’s something they started doing about ten years ago when we bought them some Harry Potter Top Trumps for situations like this and they’ve just never grown out of it. ![]() I realised at this point that the drinks were stronger than I thought and I decided to order a non-alcoholic cocktail to try and neutralise them or something. I got a Mediterranean Tonic which had non-alcoholic gin, lemon-thyme syrup, orange blossom and botanical tonic. It was tasty. Freya got a second Mexican Coke. ![]() ![]() We settled the check at 6.55 pm to give us enough time to walk to our dinner destination. It was $120.20 including tip. This was also including a $3.58 ‘health and wellness’ charge presumably to pay their staff healthcare. As discussed in previous days’ reports, this is disliked in LA because restaurateurs aren’t paying these costs themselves. I’ve seen the sentiment online that if margins are tight, just put the food prices up a dollar or two rather than expect customers to foot the bill for staff health insurance and I tend to agree. $120 isn’t terrible for five cocktails, three soft drinks and two appetisers but since this was ‘just’ drinks and we were heading to dinner after..well, maybe we should just not have bothered with dinner. Although Mat and I hadn’t had any lunch so…late lunch maybe? The ‘shouldn’t-have-bothered-with-dinner’ idea turned out to be a good shout but we’ll get to that. ![]() Google Maps had said it would take about 13 minutes to walk but it took us a little longer with crossing streets and stuff. We walk pretty fast so I’m surprised it took us about four minutes longer than google maps had predicted. LAPD were doing a drink driving checkpoint along Sunset Boulevard: ![]() ![]() ![]() We arrived a couple of minutes past our 7.15 pm reservation. We checked in and the host took us through to the back room. Mohawk Bend used to be a silent movie theater built over a hundred years ago. History wise, it was impressive. In terms of ambience, it was a bit flat as there weren’t many other patrons besides a family birthday party and a few couples on dates. The back room was really quite dark although it was nicely decorated. But I realised pretty quickly that I much preferred the setting at De Buena Planta and that maybe we made a mistake by not just spending the evening there. ![]() ![]() Mat still wasn’t feeling another drink so he and Seren stuck to tap water again. I got a New Amsterdam gin and tonic and Freya got a Diet Coke. ![]() Seren ordered a vegan cheese pizza, Mat chose a soba noodle salad, Freya got fries and I went for fries and the Buffalo cauliflower from the appetisers. Fun fact: Buffalo cauliflower was invented here, so it had to be done. Mohawk Bend is another place that began as a fully vegan establishment and had added non-vegan items over the last few years. I think some restaurants have felt they had to do that to widen appeal post pandemic with rising costs and increasingly difficult operating conditions. ![]() ![]() Blurry pizza (honestly I must stop trusting everyone else to take their own food photos) : ![]() The food was awful. These were perhaps the worst fries I can remember having anywhere. They were extremely overcooked. They may have been triple cooked chips) but they were just hard and tasted burnt. Freya and I could only manage a few each. The Buffalo cauliflower wasn’t much better but part of that I think is that I don’t really like Buffalo sauce as it’s a bit too savoury for me. Seren’s pizza was grim too. Mat liked his noodle salad but was too full on chips and salsa to really enjoy it. Our server was really sweet and we were all tired and just wanted to get out of there so we didn’t mention the food being bad, we just said we didn’t have much appetite. We’re a bunch of wimpy people-pleasers, what can I say? The prices were really steep. $8 each for the fries, $22 for the pizza, $23 for the noodle salad and $17 for the buffalo cauliflower which I feel I need to repeat was an appetiser. The gin and tonic was $11, so much more reasonable than the food. Our total was $102.38 before tip. Which still would have felt expensive for what we got if the food had been good. In fairness, the food reviews hadn’t been amazing for this place either but I had thought it would suit us better than De Buena Planta food-wise with it being simple American / pub food with lots of vegan options. But as I’ve already said, we should have just stayed at De Buena Planta and ordered a couple of tacos or something as we weren’t especially hungry after the chips and salsas anyway. So a bit of a planning fail. While writing this today, all I could think was that we shouldn’t have bothered going to Mohawk Bend. And maybe this was a common thought, as having looked up the menu today I found the place actually closed down about a month ago. Which is sad. It was clearly a popular place for at least half of its 12 year life. But from reading comments online it looks like it went downhill and the pandemic and rising costs didn’t help things get any better. It is a fantastic venue though and I hope someone creates something amazing in its place. We had paid our rather large bill by 8.20 pm and headed outside to wait for our Uber. ![]() ![]() Our driver was extremely speedy behind the wheel so I’m sure we must have made it home in half the time it took to get down to Sunset Boulevard, even though we had further to go with Mohawk Bend being in Echo Park. Once we were back at the house, the girls went to bed and I did some unpacking. Again. It was nice to have a relatively early night, especially with an early start (as always) and a hike planned for the following morning.
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Michelle ![]() Instagram: michelle_smith7868 ![]() All My Trip Reports Are Here **Including New December 2021 and August 2022 Trip Reports in progress and 2020 Trip Report Now Complete. New Los Angeles / Orlando August 2023 and Los Angeles July 2024 Trip Reports In Progress** |
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Aw another great day you have managed to fit so much in! Shame about dinner tho. Can’t wait to read more!
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AoA/RPROct 2014, New York Aug 2015, SSR/Cabana Bay/RPR/Poly March 2016, DLP June 2016, Las Vegas March 2017, DLP July 2017, Vero beach/Yacht Club Oct 2017, DLP March 2018, Dubai April 2018, New York Dec 2018, DLP July 2019, Lapland Dec 2019, Dubai Aug 2022, Disney Magic Sept 2022, Dubai Oct 2022, RPR/AKL/Coronado springs/Contemporary April 2022Lapland Jan 2023, New York, Vero beach, Yacht club and Wilderness Lodge Aug 2023 |
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Apprentice Imagineer
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Your trip reports get better by the day!
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Thanks so much, yes we definitely kept ourselves busy 😂 And yep it was a shame dinner wasn’t great but luckily it was one of only two or three dodgy meals in two weeks.
Thanks for reading and commenting ![]() Aww thanks so much, that’s very kind of you ![]()
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Michelle ![]() Instagram: michelle_smith7868 ![]() All My Trip Reports Are Here **Including New December 2021 and August 2022 Trip Reports in progress and 2020 Trip Report Now Complete. New Los Angeles / Orlando August 2023 and Los Angeles July 2024 Trip Reports In Progress** |
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Imagineer
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Loving your reports.
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