A trip to the beach

Jet lag is still playing havoc with our sleep patterns and both of us were awake early. We headed into Westwood village and found a coffee shop to have some breakfast. I opted for the in use eggs with potatoes and mum had some pancakes with maple syrup. We both chuck in a shot of caffeine to help us get through the day. 😁☕

Mum decided that she wanted to go to church and so I dropped off at Westwood Methodist church in time for the 9:30 service. This was the church that we've been to a couple of times back in '88. I went back into Westwood village and sat having another coffee soaking up the sun.

Today we were to meet back up with Marcia, who used to work with dad when he was at UCLA. I'd managed to track Marcia down (with my amazing sleuth-like abilities 🤣 aka Google related searches). Marcia disappear at 11:45 and we drove to Venice beach to eat. Marcia had booked to send at the Rose having had recommendations from her daughters colleague. The sun was out and I really enjoyed my burger well. Mum and Marcia both had the breakfast burrito.

After this we drove through Venice beach and Santa Monica and stopped to see what we thought was the California heritage museum. The museum was actually not quite what we'd expected and we realised we'd ended up in the wrong place, but there were a couple of houses built originally in the late 19th century which had been moved intact to the current location. It was a bit of a hodgepodge of original environment and a flea market upstairs.

Marcia then drove us around along the coast a little bit before heading back towards where we were staying showing us some of the neighbourhoods on the way. Finally, we stopped at an area with a number of museums including the la Brea tar pits. This is an area which had been developed in the early 20th century for oil and had left behind tarpets which on close for inspection contained hundreds and hundreds of thousands of bones of animals that had roamed the area up to 40,000 years ago. We went through the museum and then had a wander round outside but by now it was getting a bit chilly and the museum was closing so got back in the car and Marcia drove us back to our hotel where we had a couple of glasses of wine in the wine hour.

We eventually settled on a place to eat that was in walking distance from our hotel. After a quick change, we headed out to walk to the Skylight Gardens at 7:00 p.m. we walked along Santa Monica boulevard and then into Westwood village. The restaurant had a range of beers and ales on tap, including Old Speckled Hen!

We shared a starter of coconut prawns which were delicious and then I had a rib of beef while mum had lasagna wash down with some red wine. However, by 9:00 p.m. I just couldn't keep my eyes open and so we paid the bill and walked back to the hotel for an early night.Read more