A Day/Night in Hollywood...

My boyfriend is a huge fan of Rodrigo Y Gabriela.  So when he heard they were coming to the Hollywood Bowl he promptly bought tickets.  He had never been to the Bowl so I got us a hotel for that same night explaining he'll thank me later.  Any of you who have been to a show at the Bowl know what I'm talking about.  (Parking, crowds, zillions of people trying to leave through a little friggin funnel...NOPE).

I had also mentioned to him a while back that I've always wanted to do the Hollywood Sign hike.  I know it's cheesy but I've lived here all my life and never done it!  So - he suggested since we got a hotel - how about we go up early that Sat and do the hike in the morning.  Great suggestion!  Oh - and of course he was mentioned there was a different Hollywood Sign hike than what I was thinking - the harder one.  Of course.  But he told me about the hike and it included the Wisdom Tree.  This tree was the only tree to survive the 2007 Hollywood Fire and below it is a trunk, and logs and it's supposed to be a pretty cool little spot!  I was in!  

We rolled out pretty early Saturday morning and headed up.  The day had predicted high 90's but we arrived to super foggy.  Now this was a blessing and a curse.  The blessing - we didn't have the hot sun blazing down on us.  The curse - we couldn't see any of the beautiful views and it was muggy as hell.  

As we started up we walked through a beautiful neighborhood with some gorgeous homes - um hello!

Now  - this hike is pretty tough.  It's all uphill and there are some spots you have to scramble a bit.  I cursed myself for forgetting my knee brace but actually kept up pretty good!  

1st Foggy View

In a way shorter time than I expected we came upon The Wisdom Tree!!

Hi tree!!

I took off towards it, so excited.  The boy apparently took a photo.

Wisdom Tree

A pile of log books, writings and poetry in a box at the base.  My OCD want's to come back with a nicer box and organize all of this.  Sadly there was some trash around the area.  I mentioned we should come back up here with a trash bag. 

Didn't realize he closed his eyes!

Peak marker

Getting ready to log my entry!

I asked a fellow hiker to take our picture since we usually just have selfies.  Cute yeah?

So rad!  Even though it was foggy it was really pretty.  I love finding neat places like this that I never knew about!  I swear sometimes I just have no idea what's actually around me.

'Merica 

Now - I'd like to point out - this was also International Geocaching Day!  This meant if you logged a cache on this day you get a little souvenir in your app!  The boy isn't as into this as I am, but he was perfectly fine with me looking for at least one.  And there was one right down the way from the tree.  I scurried off and found it super fast!  The hint - SPORIB (Suspicious Pile Of Rocks In Bush) totally helped me out!

Yay!!

Logged and left a dragon!

SPORIB

My souvenir showed up right away!

I was so stoked!  After this we headed off to the 2nd (harder) part of the hike that would take us to the back of the Hollywood Sign.

We did it!!

Was going to panorama but there were alot of people...

So here ya go

As we were walking up

Trying to catch the view when I could

I was so excited to actually check this off my bucket list!  I just wish we could see more of the view.  Oh well.  The hike back was pretty brutal but felt great to get quite a work out in!  The boy suggested I start using hiking poles since coming down steep hills like that are torture on my knee.

Hollywood Lake!

Hi babe!

Scrambling up  - but smiling!

Afterwards we were quite a sweaty duo and decided to find a very casual cafe to grab some breakfast.  We got done way earlier than we planned so we hit up Cafee Etc, a super healthy yummy little place.

Our next plan was to just go chill at Lake Hollywood Park until it was time to check into our hotel, but when we headed up there it's apparently a super touristy spot to take a picture of the Hollywood sign.  SO MANY PEOPLE!  So - we decided to skip that.  When we found our way off the giant hill (We may have got a little lost and had another Pat/Jami unexpected adventure) I pulled over and called the hotel.  They said we could park until check in which would probably be a bit earlier.  Fantastic.

So - we headed over.  Parked.  Walked down the way to Highland Mall and grabbed a drink at Hard Rock Cafe.  After this our hotel was ready so we checked in and cleaned up.

Look how cute!

Later on we grabbed dinner a great little sushi joint down the way then it was time for the concert!

LA Phil

The amazing duo

Bowl Bitches

They played their 1st few songs with Gustavo!

They are so fucking brilliant

The boy watching his faves!

I'm personally not a huge fan of the Hollywood Bowl but damn are the acoustics fantastic!  It also really is beautiful outside.  The LA Philharmonic played 1st and was just beautiful.  Conducted by Gustavo Dudamel who is absolutely charming!  He then returned to play the 1st few songs with the pair and it was fantastic.  Rodrigo and Gabriela were of course just amazing.  I cannot stop watching Gabriela's hands!!!!  They didn't do any metal covers like they usually do, but played a lot of new stuff.  So great!  Pat wishes he got closer seats, as this is a band you want to see up close but it was still fantastic.  We also were surrounded by cool people which isn't always the case, so grateful for that.  We had a few drinks (They actually have really good wine!) and enjoyed a beautiful evening.

As we were leaving we ran into some old friends from Chapman!  So cool and great to see them!  We all walked out together and chatted.  Then Pat and I got to walk right into our hotel and the $$$ I dropped on that was made worth it.  No crowds.  No cars. Just right there! Ha!  That is so the way to do it if you see a concert there.

Sunday morning we were up and out.

Great time for sure!