Day Tripping -- Laguna Beach, PCH, and Palos Verdes

One of the things I want to do while out here is to take some day trips to various areas around LA. So today I decided to go down to Laguna Beach. One thing I wanted to do the first time I came to LA was to drive down the PCH and stop at all the beach towns on the way to San Diego. Although I made it to San Diego, it took longer than expected, so we didn't get to stop at the beach towns to explore. So today I decided to go back to Laguna Beach and walk around a bit, then meander my way back up the PCH through the other beach towns.

This is the beach area, which was not very big compared to the other beach towns. As you can see, it was pretty crowded. I kind of forgot that it was Memorial Day Weekend. :-) They were having a little town fair, with a few arts and crafts tables and a man on stilts with orange pants and a Venetian-looking mask. There were lots of people playing volleyball and basketball in addition to just playing in the ocean. You can see it was another cloudy day, but the sun broke through at around 3:30.

These are some of the houses on the hills above the town.

One of the fancy cars I saw, but most of them were huge SUVs. What do people in Laguna Beach need a Hummer for?! I found this town to be ultra-trendy, super-expensive, and the people were not very friendly. Overall, not my favorite town so far.

This beautiful church was probably the highlight of the town for me.

Another highlight was this view from a path that wound up a bluff.

I found someone to take a photo of me!

This is Huntington Beach. I took the photo from my car because in order to get out, I would have had to pay $10 for entrance into the state park! But you can see what a wide expanse of beach it is. The bad part is all the oil rigs just offshore. Blech! I drove through Newport Beach just before this, and that was my favorite, although I couldn't find any easy place to pull over and take photos. The houses were beautiful and it had a pretty marina and bay.

Then I drove through the Palos Verdes Peninsula, just south of Redondo Beach. I didn't realize it consisted of 3 neighborhoods: Rancho Palos Verdes, Palos Verdes Estates, and Rolling Hills Estates. I liked the first two the best. They were beautiful, with stunning houses and views. There were schools and shops in here, too. Apparently, the Trump National Golf Club is in here, too, although I did not drive by that.

I loved how the sunlight shone on the water where it was breaking through the clouds.

There was a small park in Rancho Palos Verdes, called Point Vicente. I saw a sign for a whale-watching center and immediately made the turn off! It happened to be at the same place I was heading anyway -- towards a beautiful lighthouse I had seen surrounded by palm trees. Unfortunately, the center was closed and I did not see any whales. But there was a nice walking path and some gorgeous views. I'd like to go back sometime when it is not so cloudy.