Day 3 -- Los Angeles to Ventura

I suppose it’s fitting that our day is Los Angeles is spent in the car. Isn’t that what everybody does in LA?

 

We left the hotel around 9 a.m. and drove straight to Santa Monica for breakfast. When we lived here, Main Street was one of our favorite places to walk for coffee or bagels or ice cream. This morning we discovered The Place To Be, a little French coffee shop on Main, run by a charming couple from Bretagne, or Brittany. They served us fresh baguettes and croissants with tiny pots of jam, wedges of brie and pillows of butter wrapped up like Tootsie Rolls. The Bretons are known for their crêpes, and Natalie had the most amazing one: melt-in-your-mouth ham and cheese couched in a buckwheat gazette. 

 

From there, we drove around the corner to check out our old apartment near Ninth and Pico (the neighborhood looks exactly the same as it did 26 years ago), then continued on toward downtown. 

 

Thirty minutes later, we parked and entered El Pueblo de Los Ángeles Historical Monument: the birthplace of Los Angeles, where, in 1781, 44 settlers from northern Mexico established a farming community. There, we strolled along Olvera Street, a narrow lane lined with little stalls brimming with Mexican gifts, trinkets, crafts and sweets. And we visited the Aliva Adobe, the oldest home in Los Angeles, now a little museum with rooms done up in period furniture. 

 

Olvera Street

Avila Adobe

At the end of Olvera Street there's a little stand known for its taquitos
-- tortillas rolled around chicken or beef, then deep-fried.

Smothered in avocado sauce. So good!

It was just a five-minute drive from downtown north into Echo Park, where we cruised past house Dom’s House and the Toretto Market from the Fast and the Furious movies. Couldn’t resist.

 

And from there, it was only six miles up into the Hollywood Hills – meaning, close to 45 minutes in the car – to Griffith Park and the Griffith Observatory (the building is currently closed) for spectacular, sweeping views of the city, from downtown all the way west to the Pacific Ocean.

 

Then, we drove back down from the hills to cruise Hollywood Boulevard and then Sunset Boulevard in our sick Swagger Wagon. Starting at my old office at the Hollywood Arts Council (6671 Sunset) we rolled west through Hollywood ,West Hollywood, down the Sunset Strip, through Beverly Hills and then all the way down to Westwood and the UCLA campus.

 

At UCLA, we got out, strolled around, popped into the bookstore, then jumped back in the car to run the rest of Sunset all the way down to the coast. 

Then, we turned right, onto the Pacific Coast Highway.

 

After a quick stop for groceries at the Ralph’s in Malibu, we continued on another half hour to Leo Carrillo State Beach – where Keith and I got engaged 26 years ago – and we all dipped our toes in the water before jumping back in the car and driving another half-mile to Neptune’s Net, a well-known roadside seafood dive. 

After dinner, we drove another 40 minutes up the coast to Ventura and found Waypoint, a vintage trailer park where we have two units. The kids are in a 45-foot-long 1956 Spartan trailer with a luminous interior swathed in original honey-colored birch paneling. Keith and I are across the drive, in a 35-foot Spartan (also from ’56)  outfitted inside with sleek midcentury details.

Our place, called "The Navigator"

The kids' trailer, called "The Mansion"

This place is so fun and funky. I am tickled, and I think Clare is, too … She has run off to buy a s’more kit from the front desk and then beat Keith at cornhole. I think the other two kids are tired and grumpy after a day in the car; they are bickering over who has to sleep on the foldout couch.

Looks like Natalie lost and gets to sleep on the couch tonight. 

Tomorrow, we have to roll out of here early; we’re catching the 8 a.m. ferry out of Ventura Harbor to Channel Islands National Park. I’m sure the early wake-up call isn’t going to improve anyone’s mood. Here’s hoping that we all get a good night’s sleep tonight.