Day 8: LA: Hollywood

Good morning to Germany! After the best sleep of this trip so far, my morning couldn't have started any better. With the elevator, whose safety certificate has expired only half a year ago this time, I went down to the first real breakfast buffet in the USA (if you leave out the 'breakfast' in San Francisco). Two slices of peanut butter toast, a bowl of colorful children's cornflakes, and a vanilla yogurt later, I felt ready for the day. Today, we're going to Hollywood!

My destinations today are located in the north of Los Angeles, while my hotel is more in the south. Since Los Angeles is huge, there is a really long distance in between. To avoid the traffic and especially the search for parking in Hollywood, I decided to use Uber again today.

The driver arrived quickly and we went through the city for half an hour. I have nothing against conversations, but Khosrow, the good driver, didn't stop asking me questions and engaging me in conversations for the whole ride. He probably knows more about me now than most of you. Well, at least I was able to improve my English a bit in practice...

At the end of the ride, Khosrow maneuvered us through the winding steep streets of the Hollywood Hills before dropping me off at my destination, Lake Hollywood Park. From there, you have a very nice view of the legendary Hollywood Sign, the surrounding hills, and the city.

From there, I walked down the recently busy Hollywood Hills. At the beginning, I walked through a small unpaved path in the middle of nature, then through the neighborhoods of the rich and famous.

Finally, my little hike ended on the Hollywood Boulevard. This boulevard is best known for the legendary Walk of Fame, where more or less famous celebrities are immortalized on stars in the ground for the common people to tread on.

There, you will also find the Dolby Theatre, where the Oscar ceremony takes place every year, and the TCL Chinese Theatre, in front of which numerous celebrities have immortalized themselves with hand and footprints on cement slabs. As a bonus, there are many moderately disguised Spidermen strutting in front of the buildings, trying to lure me into one of their dubious celebrity bus tours.

People constantly stopped to take photos of certain stars. Only one star managed to make me pull out my phone immediately. And that's the one of the legendary:

Engelbert Humperdinck. Someone who carries that name can only be destined for greatness! Wait... you don't know who that is? You don't know Engelbert Humperdinck, the legendary British pop singer who became famous in 1967 with the song 'Release Me' (definitely not copied from Wikipedia). That's really a gap in education.

Well, a few others, a bit less famous, managed to find their way into my phone gallery:

Okay, I admit, it wasn't fair to make fun of Engelbert Humperdinck. The good man is now a proud 86 years old and last year he lost his long-time wife to Alzheimer's. I want to make it up to him and I already know how:

From today on, my rental car, the black Nissan Versa, will bear the name Engelbert!

Since I didn't drive the car today, Engelbert doesn't know about his luck yet, but I will tell you about his reaction tomorrow.

After finishing my tour of the Hollywood Boulevard, I called another Uber, which took me back up the Hollywood Hills to the Griffith Observatory. The observatory, located at 300 meters height, was built in 1935 and houses a planetarium and a free scientific exhibition. The real highlight, however, is the beautiful view of the Hollywood Hills and the Hollywood Sign on the one hand, and the city of Los Angeles on the other. That was definitely the best stop on my two-day stay in the city.

Los Angeles is so big that you can't even imagine the city limits from up there. I've been to both New York and Los Angeles now, and if I didn't know better, I would never believe that New York has more residents.

Since I didn't have internet reception at the observatory, I walked down the hiking trail leading to the building in the opposite direction for about 3-4 km:

Arriving at the bottom of Griffith Park, I was then able to call the Uber, which took me back to the hotel in heavy traffic. Unlike this morning, we exchanged only two words during the ride: 'Hello' and 'Bye'. Very pleasant.

That's how my days in Los Angeles ended. A detailed conclusion and in particular a comparison with San Francisco will be provided in a separate post after my trip.

Thank you for your attention. Tomorrow, we're heading to the desert...

Leart