Day 16 (July 19): Hollywoodland

Total Driving Distance: 143 miles (trip total: 4,391.5 miles)

States Traveled To: California

Main Activity: Exploring Hollywood, Venice Beach, and In-N-Out Burger

It had been almost a week since I went for a run, so I got up nice and early and went for a run around the beautiful city of Pomona. It was already pretty hot so I kept it short, but I did happen to run by a classic car show happening at one of the city parks. I ran back and forth a few times and checked out the sweet cars.

When I got back, we took showers and packed the car. Since we had no idea what we were going to do that day, we bought a cup of coffee at the KOA general store, plugged in our laptops in the game room, and did some research on what to do in LA. I also wrote this blog post (you can see how far behind I was back then).

There were two things that we really wanted to do while we were in LA: 1) walk around Hollywood 2) do something really really fun. Since we didnt have enough money for DisneyLand, we decided that we would hit up Universal Studios (which neither of us had been to). But that was the next day. Today was Hollywood.

Whenever we told anyone that we were going to Hollywood, the first thing they would say is "Ooh, tell us if you see anyone famous." I didnt really care if we saw any celebrities I didnt think we would, but little did we know that today was the premiere of G-Force, hailed by critics as

"Not even remotely as bad as it could have been. Because, let's call a spade a spade: "sentient guinea pig spies" could easily have been just about the worst movie ever made."

and "Most youngsters at the screening I attended were not amused -- not even by the usually giggle-evoking flatulence scenes."

and "The single most terrifying moment [in G-Force] is hearing the world will be destroyed in 30 minutes. Therein lies the possibility that the film will drag on for another half hour."

After parking our car behind the El Capitan Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard, we walked around to the front of the building to find a crowd of people lined alongside the Red Carpet for G-Force.

We actually managed to get somewhat close to see the major stars of the film. Someone mentioned that Nicholas Cage was the "star" and another guy kept screaming for Hannah Montana. So the best case scenario for the hundreds of people lined up was that one of those two would show up.

Sadly, they never did. But we did get to see the following people:

• Jerry Bruckheimer
• Flo Rida
• Sam Rockwell
• Jon Favreau
• Bill Nighy
• some girl from the Disney Channel
• and our main man from The Hangover, Zack Galifianakis, seen below

After a while, people started getting more and more aggravated by the heat and the crowds so we left. There was a man standing near us whose daughters were sitting on the ground in the middle of the crowd who kept trying to push Liz out of the way. "What's happening?" his wife yelled to him across the crowd. "This lady's gonna step on Katy!" he yelled back. I can assure you, Liz was not going to step on Katy.

We walked around Hollywood Boulevard for a bit, checking out all the famous sites, the Chinese Theatre, the Egyptian Theatre, the Walk of Fame, the wax museums, and of course, the numerous Scientology churches. Creepy. We saw people dressed as different characters, from the Joker to the Transformers to Harry Potter (who looked about 30 years old).

We walked past Michael Jackson's star, were a boy dressed as a young Michael Jackson was trying to make money. The star was covered in mementos, letters, and possibly trash. There was also a full orange Gatorade.

The last sight I wanted to see was the original Capital Records Tower at Hollywood and Vine. It was the first circular office building, designed to look like a stack of records. Something exciting was going on inside (we could see people crammed in the first floor), but we did not investigate.

On the way back to the car, we passed a classy-looking hookah lounge and decided to stop for a smoke. For those unfamiliar with hookah, it is a water pipe (not a bong) that you smoke flavored tobacco (shisha) out of. It is very popular in the Middle East and among our friends. Please do not think it is marijuana or something illegal.

The guy and the girl working at the lounge were extremely friendly and recommended the flavors of guava and white grape made by our favorite brand of shisha, StarBuzz. It was delicious. We smoked for an hour or so, relaxing in the comfortable chairs and listening to good music (Santogold). They gave me a Monster Energy drink and Liz a Pepsi to drink while we smoked. It was fun to people-watch out the front doors, especially when every other person would stop to stare at what was going on inside the lounge. I really think that most people who have never seen a hookah before think we are doing something illegal.

On the way out of Hollywood, I wanted to drive past a mural to one of my favorite singers of all time, Elliott Smith. After he died in 2003, the front wall of the recording studio where he worked (also seen on the cover of his album, Figure 8, which is amazing) became a place for fans to write about him and his music.

Now would be a good time to mention that we had once again made the mistake of wearing flip-flops in a place we should have assumed would be dirty. I think this picture will prove testament:

Our next stop was Venice Beach, about a half-hour drive from Hollywood. Venice Beach was just south of where we had been the previous day at Santa Monica Beach, but they were two very different beaches. While Santa Monica had been more family-oriented and conventional, Venice was more bohemian and hippie-ish.

We arrived at the beach just in time to see the sun set. As we walked along the beach, we noticed a huge crowd gathered near the water. In the middle of the crowd were five or six guys playing all different drums and percussion instruments. The music had the whole crowd dancing and cheering. The sun setting behind them made this one of the coolest experiences of the trip.

For some reason, three police cars came driving out on the beach to break up the crowd. I still dont know why they had to come out there, but I guess they were doing something wrong. It took them a long time to break up the crowd, partly because girls kept blocking the paths of the cars and dancing in front of them.

That night we had planned to stay with our first CouchSurfer, Nhi, who lived in Pasadena. On the way to her house, we stopped at the famous In-N-Out Burger, a beloved burger joint only found in the west. I got a double cheeseburger and onion rings and Liz got a regular cheeseburger with fries. We finished it in about five minutes (we hadnt eaten in a while) and immediately regretted eating so quickly, because our stomachs hurt for the rest of the night. When we talked to one of our friends from California the next day, we found out that we were supposed to order "animal fries" off of the secret menu for a better meal.

We reached Nhi's house around 10:30 in gorgeous Pasadena. She let us in to her wonderful home, showed us to her spare room where we would be staying and asked us if we needed anything else. We talked about CouchSurfing for a little while (she had hosted many couchsurfers) and told her all about our trip so far. We immediately felt safe and incredibly welcome in the home of someone we had just met and was already our friend.