Day 20 - LA (day 2)
Today was an awesome day. Awesome.
We started the day by tooting down to The Grove shopping centre which is all outside and is done kind of like a village with fountains and stuff. We then walked next door to the Farmer’s Market which is ace. K spent some time in a sticker shop (boring). We got some watermelon slush drinks and went on our way.
The Farmers Market is about a mile away from the Beverley Centre and the street joining them (3rd St) has lots of wee shops on it so we wandered down it. It was too warm to go on the sunny side of the street though so we missed out a few things. The best stop was at Flight 001 which is a travel accessory shop.
When we got to the Beverley Centre we hit the food court, it was a step above the food courts that we are used to. I had pasta with pesto and chicken, they actually cooked the pasta from dried and cooked the sauce in a pan right in front of my very eyes. K had Japanese, noodles, sushi and gyoza - she was very happy with the selection.
After we had a wee peruse we jumped in a taxi back to the Grove. It was handy cos we left the car there all day cos it was next to the CBS Studios which was our next stop. We had to put everything in the car before we went to the studio cos you weren’t allowed to take any bags in.
We then went and queued outside the studio for a while, luckily it was in the shade. Then we went through security and then we sat on a bench for a long time waiting til we could go in. Finally, we went up to the studio to see the Late, Late Show with Craig Ferguson being filmed. It was pretty good, John Waters was brilliant - it was amazing to see him in the flesh (I am actually watching it on TV at this very moment). There was a brilliant bit where John was reading a bit of Craig Ferguson’s autobiography out loud and it was a bit about Kelvingrove park - ace!
After the show we got the car and hit the Sunset Strip where we sat outside Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf and had a beverage and did some prime people spotting. We were sitting next to another celeb but again we didn’t know who it was - but people were walking past giving her rounds of applause and stuff.
After that, K got to go to a big Comic Book store, she was like a kid in a sweet shop, I’m not sure how I feel about this new obsession - I have been in more comic shops this holiday than my whole life combined.
We then decided to go to Universal Studios City Walk for the evening. It is the bit next to Universal Studios where all the shops, restaurants, bars and the cinema is. It was brilliant, more neon than you could shake a fist at (why you’d want to shake your fist at neon I don’t know). We parked in the Curious George Parking Lot. K went crazy in a sweet shop - she was like a kid in a sweet shop! We went to the pictures to get tickets and there was some sort of screening on with a red carpet and press and everything but again we didn’t know who anyone was ! Anyway, we got tickets for Wolverine which was great and it had reclining chairs!!!!!!!! We had cinema snacks for dinner, popcorn where you got to put on your own melted butter, mmmmmmmmmm.
After we left there we went for a wee toot about Hollywood Boulevard but everything was closing . We drove down to pinks hotdogs (an institution) and queued for about 20mins to get a dog with chilli and sour cream to share. The last time we went we queued for about an hour and half so it was pretty good. It was about midnight though, shows how popular the place is I guess.
On the way back to the hotel we popped into the supermarket and bought some chopped up melon to get some all important vitamins.
Tomorrow we are going on a studio tour of Warner Bros which should be good, we get to see the set from the Gilmore Girls!!