Bright lights, City nights

So, as I said earlier, we arrived in LA Saturday afternoon.

Moving on to Sunday - we decided to spend the day at Disneyland!! So Auntie Beth, Baby, Ryan, Shar, and I all went, had a ton of fun and did a LOT of walking. We got soaked a few times, rode a ton of rides, thanks to Ryan. ;) Went back and forth from the two parks twice and got to finally see World of Color!!!! That show is so awesome and pretty!!! It makes me happy. =)

Shar and I waiting in line.

ZOMG! It's World of Color!!

Monday we went to visit LLU's Public Health dept since they're one of the schools I'm checking out for my master's degree...ended up taking a tour of the campus. And then I was able to talk to Dr. Belliard again and we had a great conversation! Crossing my fingers and praying that this is where I'll end up!


Afterwards I finally got to try In-N-Out!!! Hahaha. After the fail attempt three years ago, I can now say I've been there. =) 

After a quick nap of trying to recover from the previous day of walking everywhere, I met up with Ariana and went to La Minute which uses liquid nitrogen to make the ice cream. Super good! And light. Mmmm salted caramel. Anyway, I ate a lot and now I'm paying b/c my allergies are here to make my life less than fun. 

Stopped by Forever 21 so that Sharien could find shorts...while Ariana was trying to convince me to go to Taiwan with her. I totes would but it's conflicting with my other travels. Boooo. Stopped by Ariana's Aunt and Uncle's huge house and met them before heading over to the BBQ that Neil and Arvin were doing. Apparently a ton of ppl live in that area, so our small group became quite large with ppl stopping by. We were trying to convince ppl to go grunion running with us that night. We finally convinced Sid to go with us and went with him to his house to pick up his stuff...and got to meet all the cute doggies! Haha. When we got back, it was super cold and the group had multiplied. I got to talk to Amanda, which was really nice since she's in the field that I'm interested in and I got to see a bunch of ppl that I haven't hung out with in awhile as well as meet some new ppl, including the "West coast" Keri/Carrie. Haha. Apparently our personalities are very similar. The funny thing is that our mom's know each other! 
After the BBQ we all headed out to the beach to go grunion running. Ok, for those of you who haven't a clue as to what that is, it's when all these small fish, called grunions, flock - ok, maybe that's not the right word - gather on the shore to mate and lay their eggs....and they come in masses, so it's easy to catch them. The first time I went, there were so many! So I was really excited to go. Except for the little fact that there weren't any. =( It was so sad. Sigh. Well we at least got to go on the beach at night, which is always fun, and we also saw a dead seal on the beach which was not so fun. Haha. 


The next morning we all drove to LA after convincing Sharien to come with us to San Fran. Disclaimer: It's really hard to follow Ryan...esp in LA. I think I ran about 10 red lights...and I'm not even joking, you can ask everyone. Anyway, we're all alive and in one piece, which is what really matters. Ate at the Stinkin' Rose - yum GARLIC!! - drove past the Hollywood sign which is really not that glamorous and I was trying to tell my relatives the night before, drove up to Griffith Observatory and encountered a ton of cars and ppl b/c apparently Venus or one of those planets was lined up with the Sun that day so we decided to pass on that, and then we stopped by the Grove shopping center which had a nice little Farmer's Market nearby where Sharien and I got some crack smoothies. Ok, they're not really called that, but they might as well be b/c it was one of the best smoothie's I've ever had. Killed some time shopping and then met up with Ariana, Tiffany, and Sid...in Monterey Park AKA Asian town...or so it seemed. Lol. Ate at Noodle World where I ate fish ball noodle soup which is total comfort food for me. =) It was hilarious watching Baby, Ryan, and both aunties fighting over who would pay for the bill...it was like a show. Hahahaha.

Parted ways and drove to our hotel in Marina del Rey...got lost a bit and finally made it there. Shar, Baby, Sid, and I decided to hop on over to Santa Monica to see if there were any grunions there and to walk on the pier. There are some hardcore fishermen there....families included. Haha. It was fun watching them...and watching the one seal that kept on swimming back and forth...and watching Sid try to figure out how to use instagram. Hahahaha.


The next morning we were supposed to wake up early so that we could go visit Auntie Beth's relatives, who lived nearer to Loma Linda than to where we were in Marina del Rey, so that we could get to SF at a decent time. No such luck. Finally got moving at 11 and drove through more traffic and to her relative's house where they had "breakfast/brunch" waiting for us. I don't think I've ever had a breakfast like that...fried rice with tons of chicken and fried fish. Haha. It was delicious though and they're so nice!

After we left we stopped by Porto's a really great bakery in Glendale and tried out some of their stuff. Love the guava rolls!!

We FINALLY made our way to SF afterwards and took the 5, which is very much less scenic and much more windy. Our poor little car was being blown from side to side. I had to let Sharien drive for a bit because either my allergies or my allergy medicine was making me groggy. 

Ok, I'm going to stop there so that this post isn't a gazillion miles long. Part 2 will come soon!



Also, Blogger is being very stupid and not letting me put any captions on the above pictures. Blah.