Day 30

Guess what I found!? I found the only hill LA has to offer! And guess what!? We walked up it!!

We were visiting the Observatory and Hollywood sign then going BACK to Rodeo for lunch at Villa Blanca!

We set off for the bus at about lunch, apparently in LA I love lie ins!? This was where I found my hill! I was getting a bit worried I would have been somewhere and not even climbed a hill!? But Griffiths Park saved the day and gave me a hill. Well it was a hill by LA standards, it was just a steady incline, easily enough walk especially through an unexpected neighbour of gorgeous houses! Snap snap snap (I'm sure I'm going to get in trouble soon!). After the hill getting slightly steeper we got to the top where the Observatory stood. What a beautiful building! It's on so many films but isn't done any justice to how nice the building and views are. It has 3 very large telescopes on the roof and the land over looks the entire city of Los Angeles with the Hollywood sign and trail behind it.

I never knew how much the observatory had to offer, I just thought it was where a lot of research went on and you could view the city from it, there's full exhibitions on, space information, space show, different once a day events with the sun. Fascinating!! There was information on life cycles of stars, galaxies, our sun and how it's estimated to only have 5 billions year left, only 5 billion!? Then there was presentations on tides, moon phases, seasons and the formation of the universe, it was all so interesting! I'd noticed when I'd entered the building there was a large tesla coil and as I was looking at one of the presentations I heard the man announce he was going to active it... How cool!! I'd always wanted to see one! Luckily there wasn't that many people gathered around so I had a great view! 

We walked down a level after reading about the formation of the universe to see a queue for something, well the British in me was telling me if there's a queue it must be good! So we just joined it to see what would happen! It turned out to be a show with two astrophysicists who spoke about the Hubble telescope, the famous photo it collated of the universe, they even created a comet! Which they said was from house hold products, but who has liquid nitrogen under their sink? Hmm? It was still fascinating even if they didn't let us touch it.

By the time we'd finished in the Observatory it was well into the afternoon, time seems to fly in LA! So we started on the Hollywood sign trail before making our way down to Villa Blanca for dinner now instead of lunch. People had told me you can't get close to it, you can't get close to it, well as I've said before, I'm not very good at listening to others I tend to just find out by myself. Well turns out, you can't get close to it!! We walked in the sweltering weather along a road with zero shade to find the exact same view as from the observatory! Now, I wasn't going to be satisfied with that, I could see a point in front of me that looked more centred and closer to the sign. I want to stand on that!! We some how managed to climb down this rock, on a very dubious looking 'path' which I think had just been formed by idiots like us thinking they can climb down rocks! But we made it! In one piece as well, only to find the view was almost EXACTLY the same. Where was this sign!? And why does it look the same angle everywhere!? By this point, we'd got a photo as close up as we could get (it was still a pretty surreal moment being stood in front of the Hollywood sign!), but we were hungry and in need of some luxury! So we began our decent...

Not before climbing down yet another rock!! As we made our way down the road there were two ways we could take. One was to go all the way back up to the observatory and down the otherwise side. No. Or there was a relatively short tunnel, with no lights and no side walk and a 'rocky path' the other side. Well I'm sorry, but I'm willing to run to risk of getting hit by a car than I am going back up that hill! So we just ran through it!!!

Ok, so Villa Blanca. It's a restaurant in Beverly Hills owned by Lisa Vanderpump off Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and every time I've seen it on the show I'm wanted nothing more than to go! It's full of beautiful waiters, crisp white table linen, soft lighting, big bouquets of flowers and very neutral colours but full of gorgeous decor! And it was exactly what I thought I would be! We walked in through the double glass doors to the reception where the girl seated us in front of the bar (and bar man) which was a fully mirrored gold bar fully stocked with Vanderpump vodka! It was amazing already and we hadn't even ordered our food! 

From the black, white and pink menu's we decided what we'd be having. For starters we shared a Lobster Bruschetta which was out of this world made from lobster, fresh tomatoes, capers and a balsamic reduction. For mains we ordered two risottos, mine was a mushroom, chicken and truffle risotto and fliss's was a seafood risotto piled high with huge prawns! Then for dessert we shared a delicious lemon tart with fresh raspberries and I got a Blanca Chocolate Martini which was UNBELIEVABLE! Made from Vanderpump vodka, baileys, chocolate and definitely 3x more liquor than any drink should have because I was pissed after it!

'Eating lobster and drinking chocolate isn't reality!?'

After spending a few hours in there, Fliss had to drag me out, it was too nice! I didn't want to leave! Especially not to go back to a damn hostel! So instead of going home we went to a cocktail bar on Rodeo! We're not going back to reality! Our waitress told us about a great cocktail bar that played live music every night and was just off Rodeo, so we were off to NIC's!

As we walked down Rodeo, some idiot flew down the street pedal to metal, am I back in Middlesbrough!? No your on Rodeo sir! HAVE SOME RESPECT!!

We toasted our cocktails to the penultimate night of our trip! I was drinking a 'I'm berry Russian' which had blueberry and vanilla vodka and fliss was drinking a tequila, mango and like drink - both equally as delicious, both equally as deadly! The live band playing that night were amazing and I swear they were listening to our conversation because each song they played matched what we were saying, that usually ended up sending us into floods of tears more than bursts of laughter!! I can't believe she's going!?

So yeah, after a whole load of money later (who knew fancy meals and cocktails on Rodeo would be expensive huh!?) we came crashing down to reality when we had to get on a bus, not even a common Rolls Royce, back home. That wasn't even the worst of it, I then had a very drunk guy get on the bus, sit in front of us, turn round and state 'Whats with your weird facial hair!?'. Riiiight, so guess my self styling wasn't that seamless... Except it was! I think he was just a bitch because he then said I had too much gel in my hair. Now please, we all know my hair is fabulous so we can let that one slide!

Goodnight!

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