Los Angeles

We went to Hollywood!! This was the part of our trip that I was looking forward to the most. We headed to L.A. where Stephen served his mission so he could show me around some of the places he lived and visited. We took a VIP tour of Warner Bros. studio that lasted two  hours. It was pretty cool to see all the backdrops and fake cities, buildings, parks, etc... that Hollywood uses in their movies and television shows. We didn't see any celebrities although we got word that Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunas was nearby. We got to on set of Friends and Pretty Little Liars to see how it all works. They were filming Pretty Little Liars and we could've gone over there to watch them, but by the time our bus came back around they taped off the street so we couldn't go by to watch it, bummer.

We also went to the props and costumes museum which was pretty cool to see the actual costumes batman, Harry Potter, Friends, and many more celebrities wore, and to see how big or small they are in real life. We also saw some the famous cars used in movies.

 Dukes of Hazzard

 Scooby Doo

 Old Batmobile

 The Weasley's flying car

After our tour we headed to the Hollywood walk of fame. This place was crazy crawling with all sorts of people: lots of people dressed in costumes. We saw several spiderman, Star Wars characters, Mickey and Donald Duck, etc... people who were trying to sell you their CDs that would "one day make them famous", lots of tourists like myself, and people trying to get you to go on tour uses with them. I have no idea how long the walk of fame goes for. We walked several blocks on both sides of the street looking at names until we got too tired and I got blisters on my feet.

These are a little hard to see. Julie Andrews

Michael Jackson

 Johnny Depp!!

 Sylvester Stallone

 Sandra Bullock

 Stephen didn't find any stars he wanted his picture with. We passed by George Clooney and couldn't find Brad Pitt :( So behind him is the famous Hollywood sign.

I was a little disappointed I didn't at least get my picture taken with Mickey in Disneyland, so I found this Mickey who took a picture with me. I graciously thanked him and started to walk away when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around surprised to see Mickey following me. I looked at him and without saying a word he rubbed his fingers together and showed me some money in his other hand waiting for me to pay him. Haha, I had no idea I was supposed to pay him to get my picture with him. I wondered why all these weirdos wore costumes walking the street posing with tourists!

 Forest Lawn

We left Hollywood and wound up at Forest Lawn in Glendale. This is a huge, and I mean HUGE cemetery where celebrities and other people are buried. It's over 300 acres with several mausoleums, chapels, and other buildings. Plots are thousands of dollars $25,000 and up. It has original and replicated works of art of Da Vinci, Picaso, Styka, Braque, and Ledger. There is a replicated Christus, and statue of David, a stained glass window of Da Vinci's Last Supper painting. This was the first thing we saw. They had a 10 minute spiel about who created it and where the idea came from and then they unveiled the window. It was really pretty.

The first thing I saw when I walked into the mausoleum with the stained glass was a huge statue of an angel over someone's grave. I read the name on the grave and noticed she died last year, and I thought to myself, wow this lady must have been really loved." Then I realized it was Elisabeth Taylor's grave, haha, no wonder.

The highlight of the cemetery was the crucifixion and resurrection paintings. The Crucifixion was done by Jan Styka and is the world's biggest oil painting at 45 feet tall and 195 feet wide. It took him several years to complete the work, and when it was done it was lost for 44 years and damaged until the owner of Forest Lawn found it, and had Styka son restore it. We weren't allowed to take photos in any of the buildings so you'd have to go online to see a picture of it; It is purely amazing. The other painting was of the resurrection of Christ. It wasn't quite as big, but just as beautiful.

The rest of our time spent in L.A. we bought $40 worth of soda from a soda shop full of unheard of soda companies and all sorts of different flavors like chocolate, peach, and pepper just to name a few. We visited the Hsi Lai Buddhist temple. This place was beautiful as well and we also couldn't take photos inside the building just like our own temple. 

I loved their Chinese gardens and landscaping. Stephen thought this sign was funny because, why would someone bring their turtle to a temple and dump it in the pond?

 Lastly, we bought some Japanese ice cream. It came in a box called mochi that we bought at an Asian grocery store. The smell in that place was like a punch in the face. It smelled really bad and the further into  the store you walked the worse it got. We bought chocolate mochi which is essentially an ice cream ball inside of a tapioca-like gel substance. I ate the first one and then decided that the mochi part really grossed me out-- not the taste because there is no taste, just the texture of it, so I peeled the rest of it off and just ate the ice cream itself.

 All in all, we had an awesome vacation. We came home extremely exhausted which is a good sign, and we can't wait for the next one!