The Ballad of Jed Clampett

We drove across the desert between Las Vegas and Los Angeles in about 3 hours. There was not much between the two cities that qualifies as civilization, but it was still a very beautiful drive. The arrival in Los Angeles however was not. As we neared the city it became more congested, and with so many intersecting highways and interstates it was a tourists worst nightmare! Miraculously, we found our way to Biola University without too much of a fuss to meet Evan and Amy Schneider. We parked our Jeep on one of the side streets and walked towards campus. Just as we neared the school Evan met up with us. Amy found us soon afterward. They took us on a tour of their university. We saw the gymnasium, dormitories, cafeteria, sports complex, and a giant mural of Jesus all in about 15 minutes! The campus is quite small, but very pretty! After we finished the tour we hopped in Evan’s car and went to dinner. He and Amy took us to a pizza place called “Pie-ology”. It works just like Chipotle, in the sense that you start with a pizza and add your choice of sauce, cheese, and whatever number of toppings you desire! It was delicious, and made us wonder why there weren’t any of these in Colorado, especially in ski towns! Evan ordered a dessert pizza that was also really good. Amy recommended that while we were in L.A. we should try an Acai bowl, duly noted! Lauren in particular was very excited about this prospect and stored that nugget of information away for a more opportune moment. We drove back to campus and took a few photos to commemorate our time with them and then everyone dispersed. 

Amy had a scavenger hunt to go to for her adventure club, Evan had some work to take care of and we were going to stay with one of Chris’ friends/roommates from college that night. It took us about 30 minutes to get to Dan’s house and when we arrived we found that he had graciously prepared carne asada and ingredients to make tacos with! We ate with him and his girlfriend, Jamie, that night and then we got ready for bed. Dan wanted to put us up in his bedroom for the time that we were staying with him. We greatly appreciated the offer and slept very well that night, as Dan stayed on his couch downstairs. In the morning Dan left for work and we prepared to visit Universal Studios. Lauren’s parents had thoughtfully purchased us a 3 day pass to the theme park as well as reserved a nice hotel for us to stay in for two nights in L.A.! We were extremely excited for both! In the morning we made eggs and steak as per Dan’s suggestion and then headed out! We thought leaving later would help us avoid the traffic. We were right until we reached highway 101, which goes right through L.A., from that point on we were stuck in gridlock at 11:30 in the morning! Give me a break L.A.! Eventually we arrived at Universal Studios and entered the park. 

The first thing we did was go to the Hall of Horrors. If you know Lauren, then you know that she does not appreciate this kind of amusement at all! She wanted to go in because she thought it was a ride but found out as soon as we passed through the entrance that it was not! Chris was made to walk behind her with his hands on her shoulders the whole time. One would think that if you are scared of being surprised that you would prefer not to be the one in front, being used as a shield; but there was no talking to Lauren at this point, she was dead set on one thing, getting out! She squeezed Chris’ hands so tightly they began to throb about half way through the Hall of Horrors. It was very evident by Lauren’s tense movements, and shuddering that she did not like it one bit! Chris on the other hand was having a ball! He could not stop laughing at her antics throughout the haunted house, and every time she chided him for it, it only made him laugh more! At least she didn’t pee her pants! When we finished the Hall of Horrors we watched a show called “Water World” which was a lot of fun! The actors entertained the crowd before the show started by spraying members of the crowd with water when they weren’t looking! They also divided the audience into three sections and made them compete against each other to decide who could be the loudest. If they weren’t loud enough, they were drenched with water! The show started quietly with a background story and quickly escalated into pyrotechnic explosions, acrobatic dives, and an array of special effects! It was a lot of fun to watch! 

After the show finished we went to the mummy roller coaster. The ride progresses slowly at first through scenes from the movie and some creepy underground tombs and then accelerates to 45 mph in about 3 seconds before flying through the rest of the ride! You come to a sudden stop at the end and do all of it in reverse, and oh yeah, its all in the pitch black! The first time we did it was the best by far! In the picture Chris looked like someone had just punched him in the gut when the coaster accelerated and right next to him was Lauren with the biggest wide-open mouth smile she could make! Our emotions were perfectly juxtaposed! The next ride we did was the Jurassic Park log flume. The first portion of the ride is slow. The log winds through a river between large robotic dinosaurs while the Jurassic Park theme music plays. For the second part, they launch you into emergency evacuation mode and the only way out is to dive 54 feet right under the nose of a gigantic T-Rex! Lauren was the only one who got soaked on the ride! We know now what seat not to sit in! Once again when we looked at our pictures Chris still looked as though someone knocked out his breath and Lauren was having the time of her life! Up next Transformers 3-D! This ride was fantastic! Normally 3-D rides consist of a chair and a giant movie screen, and end up being kind of lame, but not this one! Transformer’s was on a roller coaster rail system and as you moved through the ride you were spinning in all directions and there were screens in many locations. It all added up to the best 3-D experience we have ever had! When we were done with that ride we went back to the mummy ride and did it two more times and then went to the Simpson’s 3-D ride. The line took forever even though it wasn’t very long and then once you were inside we stood around watching clips from the Simpsons, and we began to feel as though that was the ride! Finally we were put in a car. Then another Simpson’s clip came on and when it was over the car was hoisted up into the ceiling where the ride began. It was a 3-D roller coaster and was actually very good despite the line! It felt very realistic when you were dropping and turning on the coaster. That was the last ride we did for the day. We got back in the car and headed to the hotel. But as you may guess, leaving a theme park on a Tuesday night at the start of gridlock rush hour in L.A., is not good timing! We spent one and a half hours in traffic just to drive 30 miles to the hotel, and most of the progress was made after we got off Los Angeles’ delusional infrastructure system! On the way, we tried to hop into what we thought was an HOV lane, only to find out after our picture was taken that it was an HOV lane only for people with a Fastrak Pass! So that was fun, but so far no fines have come from it, and after calling Fastrak they said they would wave any fines we might get anyway. When we reached the hotel we were both worn out and very hungry from our eventful day. Lauren had been craving stuffed crust pizza, so we ordered one and some wings from Pizza Hut. It hit the spot! The Hotel was very nice, it had a sitting area with couches and a wet bar and a very nice bathroom! Lauren was so impressed that she decided to take some pictures of it! We watched a movie and relaxed for the rest of the evening before passing out in bed! We woke up refreshed and went down to grab breakfast. We got a late start but it worked in our favor. We drove to Abalone Beach to look at some tide pools, but the winter hours dictated that the beach wouldn’t open until 12 and would be closed by 4. We got there just after 12 and discovered that the tide was too high to see anything. We hung around the beach and waited until about 2 when the ocean’s level had dropped far enough that we could scramble along the sea cliffs and reach some of the higher tide pools.

 We were not disappointed by what we found! Waiting proved to be a wise decision since we found innumerable Sea Anemones, Sea Urchins, crabs, and lots of really cool orange, purple, and zebra streaked Starfish! We took lots of pictures and then headed back to the main beach area to take a quick dip, then we headed back to the hotel. 

That night we decided to grab some In-n-Out for dinner, and it was pretty good! For fast food it’s definitely our preference, but if you haven’t noticed a trend, on the occasion when we dine out, it tends to be cheap! At the hotel we watched a movie and then went to bed to have sweet dreams about breakfast! In the morning we woke up and went down to breakfast. After we ate our fair share we loaded up on some provisions for the trip! We planned ourselves a busy day which started with a visit to Venice Beach. Once we had parked the Jeep, we sat in the sand watching the surfers.

 After a while we started wandering towards the boardwalk. As we walked the boardwalk got increasingly weird. Lots of interesting characters were walking around or trying to sell us things we did not want. We passed muscle beach and were disappointed to discover that no meatheads were working out. There were however a few scrawny pale guys working out and one or two boxing that were pretty good! A lot of art was out on the sidewalk, and a lot of bums. There were some live musicians and lots of wandering salesmen, but overall it was a quiet day for Venice Beach. We did not see many street performers like we were hoping.

 At this point we had turned around and were heading back to the Jeep. Our next stop was the Hollywood sign and the Griffith Observatory. It took us about an hour to drive to the sign and when we got there we parked and easily found the sign for the trailhead. Things almost never go this smoothly for us. We planned to leave the hotel at nine and be at Venice by 9:30. Check! We planned to leave Venice at 11:30 and arrive at the sign by 12:30. Check! Then we had it in mind to hike to the sign and return to the car by 1:30, and this is where things got off track! We got lost in the maze of dirt roads and semi-trails on the way to the sign. Despite trying the only two ways we could find to reach the sign, it was always far away in the distance. We gave up hot, tired, and very thirsty! 

When we got back down to the parking lot we decided to check out the Griffith Observatory. Dan had recommended that go up there to get fantastic views of the city. We were not disappointed! The views atop the Observatory were phenomenal, not to mention the building itself! 

From the Observatory we drove back to Universal Studios to experience some of the things we had not been able to see in the first day. We did the Transformer’s Ride again, and then the mummy ride one more time, and then we took pictures with Bumblebee from the Transformer’s movie! After that we took the Universal Studios tour to see some of the movie sets for Jaws, King Kong, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, and many more! Along the way we experienced a 360-degree 3-D King Kong ride! It was really cool to be able to turn any direction in your seat and see a Giant King Kong climbing over the tour bus and fighting with several T-Rex’s! The tour took about 45 minutes and when we had finished we went on the Shrek 4-D ride, and later we found the minions from Despicable Me and took pictures with them as well! 

Then we left the park and endured two and a half hours of L.A. traffic to get back to Dan’s house! The traffic was a total nightmare, but once we arrived things got much better and we were able to relax a little bit more. Dan, Jamie, Lauren, and Chris all went out for dinner. Dan and Jamie picked a sushi place they really like and treated us for dinner. It was delicious! On Friday morning Stacey, one of Lauren’s college roommates, picked us up from Dan’s house and we all went to grab an Acai bowl. The bowls were as delicious as Amy had said they were! We didn’t eat ours until we reached Newport Beach though. We spent a couple hours on the beach with Stacey talking and hanging out. 

Soooooo good!! 

From the beach were able to see a dolphin swim near the coast! Stacey needed to work in the afternoon so at about 11:30 we left to return to Dan’s house and grab our Jeep. We took our car to Laguna Beach and played in the surf for several hours. The waves were rough and there was a pretty good riptide, so we had a lot of fun trying to body surf the waves only to end up doing somersaults in the water! The ocean was incredibly powerful in the particular cove we were in, and our faces may have been smashed into the sand once or twice. We threw our Frisbee back and forth and led each other into the waves so that that person would be forced to dive into an oncoming wave! 

When the tide receded a little bit more we went to look at tide pools and saw a ton of starfish! We were able to see one moving along the rock and another one actually lift its tentacles and move them to another location! They are pretty weird yet fascinating little creatures! There was also a multitude of hermit crabs fighting over scraps of food carried in by the advancing tide. These were the first tide pools Lauren had ever seen so she was incredibly fascinated with them! This day was one of the most relaxing and fun days we have had on this trip! 

After we took as many pictures as we could we headed back to Dan’s house. We needed to do a little shopping before our trip to Channel Island National Park. Dan and three of his co-workers (Alan, Jordan, and Tara) were all going to go there that weekend. Dan bought some brats and a few other necessities and then we went to REI so he could purchase a sleeping bag. It turns out Dan is pretty fast at making decisions like that, unlike Lauren or I! We were in and out of REI in less than 30 minutes and then we met Jamie at In-n-Out for dinner. After dinner we all went to Pink Berry frozen yogurt, and Dan paid for our pumpkin pie frozen treat! That night we packed up our gear for the weekend and watched a movie. Dan passed out before it was over so we quietly went upstairs and went to bed to get a good night sleep before the ferryboat ride in the morning! We had a lot of fun seeing and catching up with all of our friends that lived in the area, and although the traffic was miserable, L.A. provided us with some great entertainment and adventures!