2013 ..... Another New Beginning!

Autumn arrived as we left Manchester behind, bound for a fresh US adventure ...... beginning in 'Hotel California!' In fact our journey began in LA, after a hectic travel-day, comprising fifteen hours in the air and the worst airport bottle-neck that Washington could deliver! Landing in LA at 8:00pm, we collected our car and set off to join LA's legendary freeway system, where five or six lanes of bumper-to-bumper traffic are the norm! A night of almost comatose sleep ensured that we made an early start to explore this great (and very flat!) city. First item on the agenda was a short drive to Melrose and its historic Farmers Market, which was well worth the effort. Founded in the 30's, the area combines fashionable retail outlets with a traditional open-air market, offering an exciting range of international cuisine.

We soaked-in the atmosphere, under a blue skies whilst the temperature headed north of 'ninety' Our next target was Santa Monica Boulevard and the nearby pier, where we were reminded of Santa Cruz (and the film 'The Sting', which featured the Pier's big-wheel). However, the sight of a Goth beach wedding was a first!

Part of the Pier is under reconstruction and we watched as some guys manoeuvred heavy beams with not a lot of regard for Health & Safety!

We also met and talked with some cool and very keen bikers who'd just completed a run of Route 66, in aid of a cancer charity.

After the pier and board-walk we couldn't resist lunching at Bubba Gumps ..... shrimp, of course! Then, keen to pack in as much as possible we set off for Marina Del Rey, the worlds largest marina, residing a little way past Venice Beach. With a cool breeze and great vistas, it was a worthwhile visit, although its tourist outlets have witnessed better days. Reaching the tail-end of our first day and feeling pretty hot we decided to take in a film and let the satnav guide us to a nearby cinema, which proved almost impossible to find! Anyway, find it we did and closed the day by watching Elysium, followed by dinner at the California Kitchen. (The film gets a mixed review!) Our second day began like the first ..... hot and sunny .... and after breakfast we headed out to the Pacific Highway and Malibu. In particular, we homed in on The Getty Villa and it really delivered a 'wow factor'!

Its built in a gorge overlooking the ocean, for the purpose of housing JP Getty's collection of ancient antiquities and its design is based on a actual villas that were buried by Vesuvius in Pompei and Herculaneum. We tagged onto the garden and architecture tours and then settled back simply to make the most of being in that magnificent setting.

Eventually, enough was enough and we headed out towards another museum, bot soon fell foul of a satnav gremlin! Realising that we were heading into the unknown we pulled off the Freeway and almost immediately stumbled upon the Getty Centre and was soon parked three levels beneath it!! Well, since fate had led us there, we decided we should take a look around and took the shuttle-tram which snaked up the mountain to the uber impressive fine arts complex.

We were met with a truly spectacular set of buildings and gardens, overlooking the the entire city and giving a close-up of some fabulous Bel Air residences.

The content of the buildings more than matched-up to their external appearance. We stayed far longer than we'd anticipated and far less than we'd have wished to!

We eventually headed back to base, parked-up, and headed out to a local eating place for an early bird dinner ...... tomorrow the 'big LA tour!'