Summer tales II – Hollywood and Santa Monica

I am recapping the wonderful times that I had with my family here in the States this summer.
See all related posts under the category:  summer tales.

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We started today (7/1) off with breakfast at ‘The Busy Bee‘, a 50’s Diner on Main Street in Ventura where J took me for the first time many, many moons ago. My sister remembered the cafe from her first visit to the US in 2004 and so of course, we had to go back there!

Afterward, we drove further south to explore the Los Angeles area. I know, we would have needed much more time to do all the things I wanted to show my family in the city where we once lived for a little while, but we just had too much on our agenda to spend an extra day. So, we ended up doing what people do when they come to LA for only one day… we walked the Walk of Fame (and I found the relatively newly instated NKOTB star!),

ooh-ed and aah-ed at the Hollywood sign,

the kids met Spiderman and we admired the Grauman’s Chinese Theater and Dolby Theater.

Then we drove to Venice. My Mom and I took the kids to the ocean right away because they were in desperate need of getting some energy out, my Dad, sister and BIL explored the Board Walk for a little while before joining us.

Then we drove over to Santa Monica. It’s hard to believe that this is where we lived a few years ago (and I feel like I didn’t really take advantage of it while it lasted), but it’s still nice to come back here and feel a bit of a sense of home.

We walked on the beach, the kids enjoyed the many swings, rings and other acrobatic equipment, and then we walked over to the Santa Monica Pier.

We didn’t really know where we wanted to go for dinner and ended up wandering around 3rd Street Promenade in hopes of finding a restaurant without long wait times (for some reason we always ended up having a late dinner despite traveling with two kids under 7). We got lucky and found a table at Barney’s Beanery, which looked kind of bland from the outside, but turned out to be a really cool sports bar on the inside. My BIL was pleased! :)

Definitely a place I have to keep in mind for future visits!