Cruisin' USA in a Hyundai: Los Angeles and the Carmageddon that wasn't

We were a little worried about our trip to LA, since it was falling right on Carmaggedon weekend! In case you didn't hear, last weekend the California DOT shut down LA's largest freeway and the result was predicted to be a life-as-we-know-it-will-never-be-the-same sort of weekend-long traffic jam. I'll save you the suspense, it was a big fat nothing:

Carmageddon as seen from the roof of the Hyundai.
This is a view of us driving down what was supposed to be one of the most jammed roads in LA on Saturday in the middle of the hoopla. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! I could've parked on the road and no one would have noticed.

Court and I soldiered on, of course, hoping for the best. Our first stop--Hollywood and Beverly Hills, where we were intent on seeing "swimming pools and MOVIE STARS!" Like the expert tourists we are, we decided the best way to see Hollywood was to fork over too much money to take a bus tour around the city. It was actually a lot of fun, but I think our tour guide was full of crap, pardon my french.

Nice Guy. Very entertaining. Totally full of crap.
So this guy really was hilarious. He had our whole bus, which was full of Norwegians, believing that we would see tons of stars just driving around in their cars waiting for us to photograph them. He kept saying things like:
"Remember, snap your pictures first and look at them afterwards!!"
"If you get that shot of Britney Spears with noodles hanging out of her mouth at a cafe and sell it to TMZ you could make a couple extra grand!!"
"They will act like they don't want their picture taken and get all mad, but they're the ones makin' millions of dollars, not you!"

(Example Photo)
"OH! Is that Victoria Beckom????!!! Snap it first and look at it later!!!"
No, it's just a random white girl in a Lexus. Half of my pictures look like this. What a sucker!

Look closely, can you find the Hollywood sign over Court's left shoulder?
....and Waldo under a bush on the left???

Close up, in case you didn't see it.
Checked that one off the list.

Some smiling idiot tourist in front of the LA skyline.

After taking a long tour through the Hollywood Hills, Bell Air, Rodeo Drive, Sunset Strip, etc., we headed back to Hollywood Blvd. I took about a thousand pictures of random houses and cars and people on our tour, which I am not going to post. If you're interested in seeing them, come over and hang out some time when we get home.

Grauman's Chinese Theatre
It's where they have all the cool movie premieres....

And it's where stars have put their foot/hand prints.
We love Tom Hanks. Small hands, though.

Just kickin' it with the big man like I always do!

I love the Beatles.

That was about it for Hollywood. That night we headed to Pasadena and went to see the new Harry Potter with Taylor, who graciously offered his couches to us for two nights (Thanks, Tay!), and our best buddy in the whole wide world, Jay Putnam, who will soon be a Tar Heel with me and Maddison! The Movie was beyond unbelievable. You MUST see it!

The next day we checked out Pasadena, drove through LA and headed for the beach for the entire afternoon. It was a great way to spend the day--people watching, reading--just kickin it easy.