#2: The Los Angeles Zoo

I have always been a huge fan of zoos. Especially living in a city, zoos are one of the only ways I actually get to see animals besides the standard city pigeons and chihuahuas in bedazzled tutus. I love the San Diego Zoo (and the Wild Animal Park!), and have been meaning to check out the LA Zoo for years but just have never gotten around to it.

So last Sunday my amazing, always-a-good-sport boyfriend and I made our way out to the zoo, on the far end of Griffith Park. As we entered the zoo, Ronny said he wanted to see the pandas first (of course)... and it was then that I had to break it to him that there were no pandas at this zoo. The look on his face showed me that that was the only reason he had agreed to come. Well, at that point I was just hoping the new "Elephants of Asia" exhibit could somehow make up for the lack of pandas (hint: they didn't, as if they could).

Despite that first hurdle of disappointment, I had high hopes. The map made the zoo look huge, and all the directional signs kept pointing us toward pictures of zebras, koalas and other cuddly animals. However, 10 minutes into our walk and I could hardly hide my disappointment. I know it may be an unfair comparison, but where the San Diego Zoo really excels is making the animal habitats look spacious and natural. The LA Zoo hardly seemed to put much effort at all into this. The hippo pool is 3 times the length of the actual hippo. I wonder if he can even turn around :( The brown bear was sweltering in the mid morning sun, with only a tiny pile of quickly melting snow to even give him a hint of his "real" home. The zebra had a smaller corral than most rodeo arenas. I mean, it was sad. I guess most zoos really are, but only being to the San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal Park in recent memory kind of let me forget how small, cramped, and "caged" the animals really are.

Don't get me wrong, there were some highlights. The adorably cuddly koala bear high in his tree, back to the crowd. You do you, little koala. The perfectly camera-ready zebra, who saw me aiming my camera and posed perfectly so I could get a good shot. No joke, as soon as I took the picture he started moving around again. The mountain goats perched high up on the rocks, doing down at everyone with a "holier than thou" expression (though I will never be able to take them seriously with those ridiculous goatees.. I mean really guys). And then there was my personal favorite, the giraffes. Their habitat seemed to have a bit of breathing room, and lots of tall trees to reach up and eat from. I saw the tallest giraffe in his 16-foot glory stretching his 20-inch black tongue up into the branches.'

The "Elephants of Asia" exhibit, which I have seen billboards for all over the city for months, was a big disappointment. They seemed to put a big emphasis on educating people on the elephants from different regions (India, China, Thailand, etc) which was cool, but the elephants were literally stepping on each other's toes! They just looked so sad.

Overall, I'm glad I went, but I definitely won't be returning to the LA Zoo. If you want a good zoo experience, there is none better than the two in San Diego (plus, they have pandas). But, if you insist on checking the LA Zoo out for yourself, make sure to arrive early. We got there around 11am, and by the time we left at 1pm, we could hardly walk there were so many people and kids.

Can you see all my stripes from this angle?

Just... a little... further...

Sup.

The elephants were camera-shy so I settled for a picture with the sign.

#5: UCLA vs. USC Football Game

Surprisingly, I get asked a lot by non-Angelenos how I feel about Los Angeles not having a football team. Well, obviously it doesn't bother me, because we do have a pro football team, the USC Trojans. They are so pro that they aren't even allowed to compete in college bowl games anymore (true story!)

And you can't mention the USC Trojans without mentioning their cross-town rival, the UCLA Bruins. The rivalry runs pretty deep around LA. Football fans, basketball fans, hipsters picking out scarf colors, douchey guys at bars... they all belong to either the "SC" camp, or the "LA" camp. The majority of my coworkers are USC alumni, and several of my friends from high school went to UCLA (bestie Barbara actually works there) so I have been exposed to both sides, and, though neutral in my own personal preference, have my own prejudices about what type of people cheer on each team. Which obviously makes the idea of watching an LA collegiate rivalry sports game - and the people watching that goes along with it - all that more exciting.

The rivalry game this year was hosted by USC at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, where the 1984 Olympics were hosted. When UCLA hosts, they play at the Rose Bowl. That would have been pretty cool too. Barbara was able to get us UCLA student tickets for half the price of tickets from the USC box office, so as a thank you for saving us $100, we dressed up in Bruin Blue and made our way to the Coliseum.

As we got close to the Coliseum, we began to see more and more red shirts, and more and more police officers and caution cones. Always a good sign when heading into downtown LA. We had planned to just park at the Coliseum and like noobs didn't really explore other options, but when we saw that stadium parking was SIXTY DOLLARS (I swear, only in this city) we had to readjust our plan, and fast. We ended up parking at a slightly shady strip mall (complete with a Metro PCS... only in strip malls) and paying off the security guard not to tow our car.

As we made our way from the strip mall to the stadium, we walked past the entire stadium parking lot. There was some Grade-A tailgating going on. Well, it looked Grade-A to me, but being a Dodgers fan and attending a dry college have severely limited my tailgating experience. There was music blaring and meat barbequing and beer being spilled all over the place by people that, to me, looked too young to be drinking. Does this mean I'm getting old? Probably. We ended up walking behind a group of UCLA students, because we all know that there is strength in numbers and some of those USC fans looked pretty big and intimidating. Luckily my borrowed UCLA hoodie and Ronny's polo shirt helped us blend in perfectly with the other college students.

Also like noobs we assumed that this really was a professional sporting event and that we could buy drinks once we got inside the gates. However, little did I know (this being my first college football game) that they don't serve beer. What the heck!? Where are we, Cal Poly?! Seriously. So poor Ronny and I had to prepare ourselves to deal with screaming college kids acting ridiculous, while completely sober. Ugh. (Sidenote: lesson learned).

Ronny had warned me in advance that the game would be a blowout, but I really didn't understand how serious he was. Within the first 45 seconds, the Trojans had scored. Cue the Trojan mascot complete with mohawk helmet on the live white horse to gallop around the stadium as 90,000 people lost their minds and did that dumb little "fight on" hand motion. The other 10,000 people were the UCLA students in my section, chanting obscenities and saying "Just wait! We'll get them soon!"

Cut to the half-time mark, when the score is USC 29, UCLA 0. Trojan fans, still 90,000 strong, were still waving their arms chanting "fight on" or whatever, but those once confident UCLA fans were now deflated and hanging all 10,000 of their heads in their hands. Not even a marching band rendition of "Moves like Jagger" by Maroon5 (complete with some sweet band dance moves) could cheer these kids up.

Ronny and I took it as our cue to exit, and get out of the stadium before the paid-off security guard decided to tow my car. If nothing else, we HAD to escape the girl behind us, a rouge USC fan in the UCLA section, who was screaming her head (and our ears) off. It was a blood-curdling, shivers-down-my-spine scream that still haunts my dreams. As we were walking back to the strip mall, I felt like we took a wrong turn. What had been crazy busy full of people, and honking cars, and music and drinking was now completely deserted. The only sign hinting at what had been was the insane amount of trash. I'm surprised I didn't see a little Wall-E roving around making a skyscraper out of all the plastic cups, kep taps, potato chip bags, napkins, and other general filth. Ew.

When we got home my brother so graciously gloated to me that the final score was USC 50, UCLA 0. I don't really understand why he's an SC fan but that's neither here nor there. And regardless of how obnoxious the fans were (on both sides) I walked away from the game completely envious of the fact that these schools have a venue like this to display their school spirit. And apparently this is small-time compared to schools in the South. It was something so foreign to me, but overall was a lot of fun. It made me feel like I was a college student again (hoodie and all!) and I just wish that my alma mater had something that cool that I could follow for the rest of my life. I guess I will have to settle with watching Cal Poly's one famous football player, Ramses Barden, make 7-yard catches for the NY Giants.

Oh, and I am still convinced that the majority of USC Trojans fans have NO idea where Troy is. Just saying.

Our view of the red sea from the blue corner

Some sweet marching band action

Go... Football!

#22: Horseback ride on the Hollywood Ridge

Like I mentioned in my Playboy Mansion post, in college my friends and I were obsessed with The Girls Next Door. So you better believe I saw the episode where Holly, Bridget and Kendra went horseback riding with some friends up on the ridge of Mt. Hollywood. A simple google search told me that the horse stable in the Hollywood Hills is called Sunset Ranch. A few months of coordination later (my friends are really busy), Marsha, Nicole and I made the trek up Beechwood Dr to the stables.

I had been looking forward to this outing for a few months and had pretty high expectations. I am happy to say that it exceeded all of my expectations, and is something I would highly recommend to locals and tourists alike. The views are amazing, the guides were super nice (both were aspiring actresses who grew up on ranches) and informative, and you get to see a part of Los Angeles that most people never get to see. Griffith Park continues to amaze me and I can't wait to explore another part of it soon (perhaps the LA Zoo?).

If you do decide to take a horseback tour from Sunset Ranch, go in the morning before it gets too hot. You will be sweating like crazy on your ride because you have to wear a helmet, and the horses struggle with the heat too. Wear long pants, because there's nothing grosser than having your legs covered in horse hair and sweat (eewww). Spend $15 extra dollars and do the 2-hour ride instead of just the 1-hour ride. For $30 you get to walk on some paved paths and see bits of downtown, but for $45 you get twice as much time, and get to go all the way up to the top of Mt. Hollywood. You get unparalleled vistas of downtown, the valley, the Griffith Observatory, and the interior of Griffith Park itself. It was well worth the extra time and money. Yet another bucket list item that lived up to the hype and did NOT disappoint!

This is as far as you can go by car up Beechwood Dr. To the right is the Hollywood Sign hike, and a short (yet steep) walk to the left is Sunset Ranch.

Me, Marsha and Nicole geared up in our helmets and waiting to get our horses.

Me with my horse Malcolm and an incredible view.

Marsha with her ironically-named, very large horse Tiny.

Nicole on her horse Kennedy. They named him that because they say he only likes to be ridden by women... hahaha

Walking "nose to tail" on the Old Mulholland Highway.

With views like this, we almost forgot we were actually in the city.

I always claim that "there is no smog in LA.. it's just fog." Unfortunately, this picture proves me very, very wrong :(

Looking down at the Griffith Observatory

A bonding moment with Malcolm, after the ride and a much-needed water break for both of us!