Surfin' USA

Our final two days of travelling saw us decamp from the crazy world of Hollywood...and move to the even crazier world of Venice Beach and the surf beaches of California. We had reserved a room in a beach side hotel at Marina Del Rey, about 10 minutes walk from Venice Beach boardwalk. This area was quite affluent and the harbour is the largest small boat harbour in the world with capacity for around 6000 boats. As far as the eye could see were moorings with pleasure yachts and small boats of various types and sizes.

Marina Del Rey harbour

After checking in our bags at the hotel we decided to walk to the beach itself, firstly stopping at a colourful restaurant for a light snack. 

Mrs B wondering if I'd ever finish my pancakes....

Mrs B. had a slice of carrot cake whilst I ordered blueberry pancakes with fruit, buttermilk and maple syrup thinking this wouldn't be too filling. I had temporarily forgotten about US portions - but was reminded they could be somewhat generous...when two dinner plate sized pancakes appeared in front of me together with mountains of fruit. Suffice to say I didn't feel hungry for quite some time!

After this mountain of food we carried on walking along the Venice Boardwalk. Venice Beach has been a surfing centre for some time but the area was also established in the 1960's as a centre for hippie counter cultural activity. Although partly gentrified the area still has plenty of alternative life stylers, street performers, fortune tellers, artists and a range of weird, wonderful or just downright crazy exhibitionists.

Venice Beach from the Boardwalk.

Marijuana 'doctors' just past the ice cream stall

Venice Boardwalk

One of the crazier street performers...

Our walk took us past past all of the weirdness - and took Mrs B. out of her comfort zone. In LA medical marijuana is legal, and there were a range of Green Doctors mixed in with the other stalls attempting to entice people in for a consultation...in exchange for $40.00. Neither of us felt we needed any medical advice - and a fresh lemonade was much cheaper anyway!

After about a mile we went down onto the long sandy beach with the Pacific surf crashing down and walked along the shore watching swimmers and surfers.

Venice Beach looking towards Santa Monica

Returning to the boardwalk we came across two large street murals by a Californian pop artist, Rip Cronk. The first, called Homage to A Starry Knight, is an affectionate pastiche of Van Gogh whilst the second included the artist himself appearing to hang from the side of a building.

Homage To A Starry Knight

'Venice'

We decided that we'd had enough craziness for the day and headed back to the calm of our hotel and to search for a place to eat, for our penultimate evening meal.

Beach side setting of our hotel

A nice quiet and peaceful evening was planned and after a meal we retired to our spacious hotel room to pack our bags, read, watch a bit of TV and generally chill out. At 9.10 pm Mrs B. was dozing when there was a tremendous rumbling sound and the room started shaking. It lasted for about 20 seconds. Such was the noise and movement I immediately realised we'd experienced an earthquake....and it wasn't Mrs B. snoring. Switching on the TV confirmed there had been a 5.1 earthquake and the epicentre wasn't that far away. In earthquake terms 5.1 is moderate..but there had been some minor damage. Fortunately no one was harmed by it. It seemed ironic that we'd left New Zealand without experiencing a single tremor in more than 2 months of traveling and then arriving in LA we'd experienced their strongest earthquake for about 20 years after only 3 days. 

Our final day dawned and having finished our packing we set off to find somewhere to have breakfast. Just around the corner was Joni's Coffee shop, clearly popular with the locals. It was a Sunday morning and it was packed but we found a table ordered coffees and breakfast. Once again the portions were epic. A mushroom and spinach omelette, complete with fried potatoes and toast was enough to feed a family. It was just my order. 

Now you may have wondered why an area of Los Angeles is called Venice. It's all down to the vision of an early 20th century property developer, Abbot Kinney who was fascinated with the Italian city of that name and decided to develop the area and build canals of his own. He constructed his own version of Venice in 1905 but over time many of the canals fell into disuse and by the late 1920's most had been filled in and tarmaced over. Some survived and in 1992 they were completely restored. After our filling breakfast we felt the need for some exercise and went to see the canals. Only a block or two away from Venice boardwalk they are little oasis's of calm. Flanked by low rise homes in different architectural styles the compact area has narrow walkways flanking the canals making for a very relaxing walk.

The Venice Canals...and a Californian gondolier!

Our flight out from LAX wasn't scheduled until late evening so we stored our bags at the hotel and set off to see a bit more of Venice on our last day. 

Working our way through the streets we found our way to Abbot Kinney Boulevard. This street is choc full of designers, art and craft shops as well as hip restaurants, bars and cafes. 

Classic Americana

Abbot Kinney Boulevard

After a leisurely stroll and a stop for a delicious mint lemonade and apple/cinnamon cake we arrived back on the boardwalk. With lots of time we decided to carry on walking and headed towards Santa Monica content to let the skateboarders, cyclists, Segway users and roller bladers wizz past whilst on the beach the sunbathers and surfers were out in force. 

Eventually we reached Santa Monica pier. This is over 100 years old and was a typical seaside pier with fairground rides and amusements. I spotted a police car on the pier, complete with surf board.

Only in California...

The pier was bustling with people and colourful. Walking out towards the end gave stunning views in both directions. Santa Monica beach was to the north and back to the south was Venice Beach both full of people enjoying the Californian surfer lifestyle.

The view back to Venice Beach from Santa Monica Pier

Santa Monica Beach

I hadn't realised the pier was also the end (or start) of Route 66 until seeing a large sign advertising this. It prompted thoughts of another road trip...

Without really realising we'd walked more than 4 miles, soaking up the sun and enjoying our last few hours before the time came to complete the last leg of our round the world trip. We headed back towards our hotel by a slightly different route passing Santa Monica City Hall which was a lovely building and then, on Ocean Avenue, the Hotel California! 

Santa Monica City Hall

You can check in here...not sure if you can leave though.

I somehow managed to lose Mrs B. as we walked back along Venice Beach (this wasn't deliberate) but we managed to find each other at the end of the boardwalk. Our final meal was at an LA restaurant chain called the Cheesecake Factory located close to our hotel. The food was tasty but again the portions were huge. I opted for a light herb crusted salmon salad thinking it wouldn't be too filling. Wrong again! We shared a portion of their cheesecake but perhaps by this time my taste buds were a bit jaded as I didn't think it was anything special. After settling the bill we returned to collect our bags, ordered a taxi and set off for the airport. We checked into our flight with Virgin Atlantic which was overnight and we got good seats so managed to doze during a long but thankfully turbulence free flight across the Atlantic. We arrived at Heathrow on time and it was lovely to see the two smiling faces of our wonderful daughters, Helen and Sarah, who had come to collect us. This was especially nice for Mrs B. as we'd landed on Mothers Day. Sarah drove us all back home managing to squeeze everyone and everything into her tiny Nissan Micra (called Ethel) - a marvel - it must somehow distort space/time. 


And so our travels were over. In 3 months we'd left one continent and visited three others, experienced different cultures and gained memories to last a lifetime. We had spent no more than 4 nights in any one place (and that was only once) and had embraced a nomadic lifestyle. There was always something interesting, exciting and new around the next bend in the road. The welcome we received and sometimes unexpected kindness offered by strangers, who were so willing to share the beauty of their countries, made our travels so much more immersive and fulfilling than if we'd been passive travellers. 

Only one question remains to be answered: Where to next?