After an epic 10 hour journey from the festival to Los Angeles (6 hours of which was spent in the festival car park), we finally made to our couchsurf host’s house. The person we were staying with had almost 200 reviews on his profile, so he was by far and away the most prolific host that we met!
We were only in LA for one full day – we were hoping to be back from the festival early enough to do something on the Monday evening (especially since it was Emma’s birthday), but that went out the window when we only left the festival grounds at 7pm, having queued in the car park since midday. By the time we finally got to where we were staying, all we wanted to do was go to sleep, and explore LA the next day.
Luckily we were staying within walking distance of one of the most iconic sights of the city – Venice Beach. Walking anywhere in LA is practically unheard of, so it was incredibly fortunate that we were so close to the number one place that I wanted to visit whilst we were there, and we could get there relatively easily.
The weather was beautiful as we walked up and down the beach, looking at all of the stalls selling Venice Beach t-shirts and novelty sunglasses. We took our time wandering along, checking out all the sites including the famous muscle beach, which was a very strange experience – lots of topless men doing weights outside, not something you see every day!
There was also a lot of beautiful graffiti along the sea front, including this amazing interpretation of Van Gogh’s Starry Night:
Going to Venice Beach only took a few hours, and it could easily be seen in a lot less time, but we were still recovering from the festival and we didn’t have access to a car (apart from getting an Uber) so we weren’t really that fussed about doing that much. Being in LA for a couple of days was the perfect amount of time to recuperate from all the travelling we had done so far, and to prepare ourselves for Chicago, and me for New York.
I would definitely go back to LA one day, and spend more time there – I want to see all of the museums, and Sunset Boulevard, and everything else there is to see, but there just wasn’t time whilst we were there. I’m still very glad that I saw what I did of LA though, and I can’t wait to go back.
thisisisrachel 