We found a shower that worked! Hallelujah! There’s three bathrooms in the place we’re staying so we just tried out luck with another. Which was clearly the key. Seeing the person fixing the shower was apparently a figment of my imagination. After that joyful discovery of the morning we were off to Venice Beach. The original plan was to go to Venice, cycle to Santa Monica, maybe stop by a few shops then head on to our basketball match. But we got caught up in Venice Beach listening to music, I got to pet some doggies, Callum duelled a chess wizard and time just sort of ran away. So our timeline got a bit messed up but that’s okay.
Venice Beach is actually such a nice area, a little offbeat but probably my favourite part of Los Angeles (that I’ve seen). It contains such a weird mix of people that there’s always something new to see. Be it a man declaring the end of the world, some people selling you weed dressed completely in green, men with giant muscles and tiny heads, street artists, musicians.
Also Callum did manage to fit in a gym. Unfortunately (ahaha) we didn’t have time for a work out. The gym was Golds Gym, for those not in the know this is good Ol’ Arnies gym. The “Body Building Mecca” of gyms. We wandered back a few streets from Venice, found the gym wandered inside debated over how long we had and if we could’ve had a workout. Then we grabbed some merch they were selling, yes the gym was selling merch. Grabbed the mandatory Instagram photo and departed. I’ve promised that next time we’re in Los Angeles we can go and have a workout there. So let’s hope we’re here again far enough into the future that Callum has forgotten that promise. Saw a girl sleeping on a park bench outside in the sun – I have a feeling that would be me if Callum wanted us to have a “work out”.
From Venice Beach we rented some metro bikes and rode on to Santa Monica. It’s been a while since I’ve ridden a bike I will admit, but I’m definitely going to blame the bike for my wobbly rising. The only problem with Metro bikes is that although they’re plentiful in Venice not so much in Santa Monica. Santa Monica seems to have every other kind of share bike, Hulu, Breezebike, privately owned ones, but no Metro parking areas to drop it off. So we trekked it into the city a bit and found a place. We’d given up on Santa Monica and wandered the shops for a bit. I also may have left a bag of shirts in the basket of my bike which resulted in a mad dash back to them to the bikes to find the bag lying on the ground the bike rented out. We then realised the time and caught an Uber back to the B&B to throw on a jacket, ditch the backpack and start walking towards the Lakers game.
I’m not much of a sporting fan, not that that will come as a surprise to a lot of you. But going to this basketball game I come away so surprised, and a little disheartened, about how normal it apparently is to boo the other team. The poor Denver Nuggets got boo’d out by the crowd, and it was encouraged by the stadium (more on that later). It just doesn’t really seem to be in the spirit of good sportsmanship especially when the home team fans seem to be 20x that of the away team. Callum has been telling me too that apparently this is the norm at our footy games down under (never been, again not a sports fan). Maybe I’ve got some ideal notions about sport but booing the other team for doing well just doesn’t sit right with me.
On another note I did maybe happen to fall asleep during the game, but in my defence you could tell who was going to win and I was tired. I’m pretty impressed with myself though. It was rather loud in the stadium between the crowd and the sound effects. Yes, sound effects. A never ending stream of noises that were apparently supposed to pump up the crowd. Every time the LA Lakers had the ball there would be clapping (voices says “clap your hands” and then clapping that would slowly speed up), We Will Rock You (but just the thud, thud, thud) on loop, and other ridiculous sound effects. When the Nuggets had the ball it would be sound effects to Boo them, or cheer on the Lakers (people for example started shouting out “defence, defence, defence” but more like dee-fence) this would’ve maybe been okay except that basketball games are pretty fast paced. The ball flicks back and forth so quickly you almost get whiplash from the sound effects that were struggling to catch up. It was a weird unnecessary extra that I think both Callum and I could’ve done without. Silence I feel would’ve been the best option, if you have to have something commentary of the game, and if not that maaaaybe music. But cheesy sound effects? No thank you. So it was a weird experience but a good one. Glad Callum picked that as something for us to do whilst in the US. After the Lakers game we basically ended up back at the B&B and fell asleep. Exciting evening, I know. One day left in LA then on Tuesday we’re off to Mexico. Tomorrow it’s shopping and Universal, then maaaaaybe a movie in the evening. But we’ll see how we go.
Travel Bee 