Santa Monica and Los Angeles City

On our tour of Los Angeles, our first stop was Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills and Sunset Plaza where all the hippies used to hang out. We visited the hotel where Pretty Woman was filmed, The Beverly Wilshire. The restrooms were quite elegant. I'm not sure why they put up with tourist coming in and checking out the place. I was surprised at how few people were out on the streets walking around.

The next stop was Grauman's Chinese Theatre where we saw all kinds of make believe stars wandering around with the crowd. We walked to the top of the shopping area adjacent to the theatre and took pictures of the famous Hollywood sign. We ate at Johnny Rockets restaurant in the mall area. It was nothing special - a hamburger is a hamburger.

Our bus then climbed the hill to the overlook where we could see some of the stars' homes. We didn't drive by any of them. This was disappointing but was proclaimed by the tour guide to be our exciting, extra special grand finale for the tour. I think he just wanted to get off early on Friday afternoon and was itching to ditch us and skip the last hour of our tour. Don't take LA City Tours; take Gray Line Tours.

Since our tour was cut short we decided to drive to the Farmers Market in Hollywood. This was much more exciting than the tour. Mark went to CBS Studio and got tickets for The Price Is Right show while Joyce and I shopped and ate. I've never seen such a huge selection of every kind of food and fresh vegetables and fruits that I could imagine. That was fun; don't miss it when you are in town. You could spend a good part of the day just wandering around and talking with folks.