The Getty
and Hollywood

We slept in, and left the hotel to go to The Getty. We arrived about 10:30, and decided to walk up to the Getty instead of taking the tram . We spent three hours, which also included lunch at their lovely cafe. We toured most of the museum, and walked around the outside gardens. The views of the greater LA area were gorgeous. The paintings and sculptures were also impressive.

When we first got there, we picked up a map. I went to a wall that was away from the visitors, and I leaned up against a column. Unbeknownst to me, the bust of J. Paul Getty was on it. One of the guards came over and asked me politely to not lean against it. I apologized, as I did not realize what I had done. After we looked at the map, we headed off. We walked past the guard, and I promised him that I would not lean against anything else while we were there. He laughed. We encountered him a few times as we crossed back into the main entry, and by the time we left, we had a new friend. Really nice guy. He wants to be mayor of LA so that there can be better north/south mass transit. It would mean some of the rich people would have trains in their backyards, but there would be better ways to get around LA.

Before heading back to the garage, I paid the $20 parking ticket, and then we took the tram down to the garage.

I wanted to see the Hollywood Walk of Fame. It was fun, seeing the stars on the sidewalk, and the foot and handprints in front of the Grauman Chinese Theater . There was a big open mall next door, so we walked around that. Got some ice cream at Ben & Jerry’s, stopped in the Hello Kitty store, and went in to a Lids store to get some gifts.

On our way back to the parking lot, we walked past the Loews Hollywood Hotel, and there was a beautiful GT Shelby sitting in the parking lot . I took some pictures and sent them off to a friend. He said that the car was worth between $250,000 and $500,000. And it was just sitting there! As we left the parking lot, I could only turn right, so the GPS took us through a residential area to get back to the highway. As you drove through the small winding hills, you could not always see around the corner. No cars were coming at us, so we did not hit anyone. That was a bit weird.

It was New Year’s Eve, but we were going to bed our normal time since we had to be up before the sun to get to Pasadena for the parade. We ate supper at the Banana Bay Restaurant. The Chinese food was really good. The pineapple fried rice with chicken was really good. It was a bit hard to find the correct parking lot though. The first one I pulled into was empty, but there was a sign saying that you would get towed. So, we eventually found the correct lot, and it was packed.