I was still in Los Angeles, but hadn’t made it to the Pacific Ocean yet, so my friends and I decided to have a little beach day at Venice Beach. Cami, Grayson, Tamra and I all drove our homes over, and lo and behold, we found a tiny street where we were able to fit our rigs. We gathered our animals, which consisted of four dogs and a cat, and headed out to the beach. It was a chilly, cloudy day, but it was still nice to be there together.
We found a spot down near the edge of the beach. Maggie was off leash, but I was skeptical of letting Sophie off since she doesn’t always listen. I decided to give it a try, and it went surprisingly well. Grayson and I brought our paddle boards down. I was hoping to get the dogs used to it, but Sophie wasn’t having it. Maggie, however, was fine. As we were practicing in the shallow water, a giant wave came, knocking us over. My pants and half my sweatshirt were soaked, and it was rather cold. Maggie shivered, but seemed unfazed as she stepped back onto the board.
I almost wanted to go back and put on warm clothes, but Grayson suggested that we take the paddle boards out into the deep water first. Sophie stayed back with Cami, but Maggie went with me. Everything was going smoothly until I tried to turn back for Cami to take a picture of me. At the same time I turned, a wave came, and splash, I felt the icy ocean consume me as Maggie and I plunged into that deep water. Luckily, we are both strong swimmers, and got back on the board easily. Poor Maggie was very unhappy though, and laid on the board sulking.
We paddled around a boardwalk, and as soon as we rounded the corner, we saw dolphins jumping in the distance. We paddled along the shoreline until we came to a little, secluded beach. Nobody else was on it, and it was surrounded by a fence, which would be perfect for the dogs. We stashed our boards and went over to get Cami. We brought all the dogs, passing them each over the fence, and hung out in our little paradise. Tamra then came and joined us with her cat, Monster. We spent the rest of the day relaxing on the beach and paddling around while all four dogs ran free, having a blast. Every once in a while a sea lion would appear in the distance, doing flips.
While driving to the beach, I had unfortunately made the mistake of leaving my moon roof open again. This time, instead of it just cracking, the whole thing flew back, breaking completely, leaving me with an open ceiling concept, which almost sounds nice—until it rains. We stayed in the area one more night, and unfortunately for me and the inside of my bus, it misted until morning. We enjoyed the private beach again the next day before heading back to Elysian Park, which was our “home base.”
Jorrie was coming into Los Angeles by bus with his dog Kyoshi to stay with me for a week. I picked them up early in the morning from the bus station, and it was great to see him and show him around the city. We enjoyed the parks, and Sophie enjoyed having Kyoshi, one of her best dog friends, around.
Jorrie had found a museum that was free, and I invited the crew along. I drove Jorrie, Cami, Grayson, Lauffrey, and Tamra in my bus, and we parked quite far from the museum since there was no free parking closer.
The walk ended up being the best part of the whole outing. The buildings were amazing, and we goofed around and laughed the whole way there.
We even got to see the two level part of LA, which I didn’t know was a thing until then. There was a part where the street split and below the street and all the other buildings, you could see another level of street. It didn’t seem real, but there it was, right in front of my face.
We finally arrived at the Museum of Contemporary Art. Once inside, we spent a lot of time in a little area where you can create your own art, which was most likely set up for children, but we enjoyed it.
Eventually we decided to walk around since the museum would be closing in 45 minutes. Most of the art was paintings, but there were also some sculptures. Museums are okay, but you can’t touch anything and have to be quiet, two things I’m not so good at.
After the museum we wandered back to the bus. It started raining, which was unfortunate since I still had a hole in my roof. Everyone in the back got a little wet, but they didn’t seem to mind.
We had been talking about having an ice cream party for a while, and this seemed like the perfect night. We stopped at Vons, a grocery store, and gathered all sorts of sweets. We had three kinds of ice cream, cookies, cookie dough, brownie mix, chocolate pieces, chocolate fudge, strawberries, and whipped cream; everything we could possibly need.
When we got back, I threw a tarp on my roof, and we had the ice cream party in my little bus. There were six humans and four animals in there. It was crowded and cozy, and made me feel warm and happy inside.
We used two small waffle irons and a donut maker to cook the brownies and cookie dough, then all ate until we had stomach aches and thought we might throw up. It was glorious.
I met back up with Jon Paul the next day, and he helped me fix my moon roof. Since he had built the bus, he already knew what to do. We did the first part in the Home Depot parking lot, and luckily for me, my new batteries were enough to run a miter saw. We put the frame together and painted it, but had to wait until the next day for the paint to dry before we could attach the plexiglass and install it.
The following day I met Jon Paul at his apartment. We worked on it right in the street. We got it fully installed, which I was super grateful for, especially since it had been rainy the past few days.
Jorrie and I decided to take a day trip to Hollywood. We wanted to hike in Griffith Park with the three dogs to the famous Hollywood Sign, and see the Walk Of Fame. I drove my bus up winding hills and luckily found a tiny spot to park. There were a few different parts of the park where you could see the sign off in the distance, and I was ecstatic, but I also wanted to see it up close.
The hike up to the sign was a little over a mile. We eventually made it to the top, which turned out to be quite disappointing. You weren’t able to get up to the sign itself, only stand at a fence way behind it where you could only see the very top of the back of the sign. The view from earlier, with the sign in the distance, was way better, but I was still happy we’d done the hike.
Afterwards we drove into Hollywood. Surprisingly I found a spot to park right on Hollywood Boulevard. We walked along, looking at every star, but I didn’t recognize most of the names. Still, it was way more fun than I would have thought since I love doing little touristy things.
We stumbled upon a movie being filmed, but unfortunately couldn’t figure out what movie it was. There was a nearby street with two empty chairs randomly set up facing the road, so we sat for a while and watched the production from our front row seats. It was mainly just old cars driving back and forth but it was still fun.
We explored all the touristy stores and malls, giggling as we ran about. I even ran into Darth Vader, who gave me a lightsaber, and we battled in the streets.
We met a lot of locals as we explored the street. One was a guy named November who had been out with his friends. We ran into him again as we wandered back to the bus. He had become separated from his friends, and needed to charge his phone. We invited him back to the bus to charge it, and hung out for a while. We ended up giving him a ride to a bus station.
Jorrie and I decided to head out to Venice beach. Although I had just been there, he never had. We parked on a side street like before, and went out to the same private beach again.
As we were walking with all the dogs, a woman approached us. “Oh my, your little family is so cute, and you look just like a hippie Cinderella!” she proclaimed, and insisted on taking our picture. We enjoyed the beach and the boardwalk, along with exploring all the surrounding stores.
We decided to stay there for one more night. We were awakened early the next morning by an abrupt knock on my door, and the dogs started going wild, barking. I wasn’t feeling it, so I decided not to answer. They continued to aggressively knock, and shouted that I had to come out. I peeked out my window to see someone with a vest and a badge. I figured it was the police, and that I definitely wasn’t going to answer, but made the mistake of making eye contact with one of them when I peeked out.
They proceeded to walk around the bus knocking on every window while yelling that we couldn’t park there, we had to move, and that they knew we were in there. I didn’t care that they had seen me, and also knew I had the right to be there, so decided to wait them out. At one point the guy knocking even stated, “You legally have the right to be here, but neighbors called and complained, so we want you to move.” That was hilarious to me. Why would I move just because someone else wanted me to? They even offered to help me with housing, which I found ironic since they were knocking on my house.They begged me to just stick my head out the window and talk to them, and then stated that if I didn’t, they would have to call the police. That made me wonder, who were they if not the police? Maybe just parking enforcement or a neighborhood watch? After about half an hour they gave up, yelling through the window that they would be back in half an hour, and we had better be gone. We stayed there for another three hours without issues and got to explore a little more before we left.
We went back to our park and spent our last day there hanging out with all of our friends. It was the perfect way to end my time in L.A. That night, I took Jorrie back to the train station, and the next day I was back on the road again, saying my goodbyes to the city as I traveled north.
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