Adventures of David and Paul: Los Angeles - Nerd Culture and Roller Coasters

David is a big Final Fantasy nerd and has played online with friends for over two decades, but has never attended any official fan events in the past - sometimes they're hard to get to, sometimes they're in Las Vegas in July, often they sell out and he can't get a ticket. Well he was in luck this year, as his friend (Shaina) managed to grab some extra tickets and offered one to him! Ticket in hand, we decided to make a mini-vacation out of it and spend some time in LA - a city we have only visited for a day or so at a time on a couple occasions.

We had a morning flight that arrived at LAX at 11:45am on a Wednesday, and proceeded directly to the new rental car center, which is apparently the largest parking garage on earth (Surprise! We're in LA after all). It was a massive structure. Usually we try to use transit when we're visiting cities, and LA does have a decent and growing rail network, but it just wasn't feasible as the sole transportation method for our trip. To get from LAX to the Anaheim Convention Center takes 2-3 hours on transit and involves multiple transfers. Other places we planned to visit, such as Six Flags Magic Mountain, are even further across the metro area (it's almost 70 miles from the Anaheim Convention Center to Six Flags) that transit would be nearly impossible. So we got a car for this trip. It was pretty straight-forward to get our car, and then we drove straight to Long Beach, which was generally in the direction we needed to go, to get away from LAX and downtown LA before the afternoon rush. We parked and went to the Aquarium of the Pacific, which was a somewhat small but nice aquarium. We then walked around the area, which is pleasant with good views of the water, a lighthouse, and the giant ship Queen Mary docked nearby.

We then drove into a neighborhood of Long Beach to check out some local shops. We walked around a bit and went to a super cute cat store. Not a pet shop, but rather a store where every item (books, shirts, etc.) was cat-themed. We then went to Drunk Coffee where Paul got an interesting coffee spritz and a bubble tea place for David before going back to the car. We then drove to Anaheim and checked in to our hotel. By now it was early evening, and we drove to Ebisu Japanese store to browse for a bit before picking up some friends for dinner at Mama Katsu - a Korean katsu joint near our hotel.

David is ready to see some fish!

Birds with neat beaks.

Paul hanging out at the aquarium.

Tropical.

The boardwalk path at Shoreline Park.

There's the Queen Mary!

The lighthouse at the summit of shoreline park.

Views across the marina to downtown Long Beach.

There were a lot of cute houses with yards in bloom.

David at the cat-themed store.

A coffee spritz/seltzer. Interesting.

Immaculate vibes at the bubble tea store!

Some taco/burrito art in Long Beach.

The giant Ebisu store.

Dinner time! We had katsu and spam musubi.

On Thursday, we had a day full of tourist sites planned - before David would start attending the Fan Fest for most of the day on Friday and Saturday. We woke up early (thanks, time zones) and slowly got around before driving 35 minutes to get coffee at Casa de Agave. This was a cute little coffee spot with an outdoor area, and served as a nice way to break up our drive to central LA.

We then continued northwest, driving another hour (yes, there is a lot of driving to get across the vast metro LA area), arriving at the La Brea Tar Pits right as they opened at 9:30am. Fun fact, "The La Brea Tar Pits" translates to "The The Tar Tar Pits." This is our second favorite double-repeat translation after "The The Angels Angels," which is the direct translation of the baseball team "The Los Angeles Angels." Anyway, back to the tar pits - this was a really unique and fascinating site. The pits are still active, and you can see tar oozing and bubbling across the site. The museum is cool, and is just about to start a major renovation - which will leave it closed until just before the 2028 LA Olympics.

There were a massive amount of Pleistocene and Holocene fossils on display, and it was cool to wander the site and see all of the slowly bubbling pits. The area park hosting the pits is a nice compact tourist area with multiple sites - including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art right next door, which had a huge expansion that was only open for a member preview. We walked past this, and also skipped the huge brand-new car museum across the street, and went to the Academy of Motion Pictures Museum (AKA the Oscars museum). This was a large museum that is interesting for anyone that likes movies. In addition to permanent exhibits about the craft of film-making and the awards ceremony, there were special exhibits on Jaws, Barbie, and Ponyo/Miyazaki. There's also a huge rooftop terrace with great views of the Hollywood sign and surrounding area. With a brand new subway stop (that opened a couple weeks after our visit), this area is a fantastic spot for tourists.

David getting an early morning matcha.

Tar bubbling up.

The La Brea Museum.

Fossils in the museum.

They have hundreds and hundreds of dire wolf skulls.

BLOOP.

An exhibit outside the art museum.

Ready for the magic of the movies.

David as the godfather.

The desk in the movie, for comparison.

One of the rooms in the Ponyo exhibit.

Paul loves Miyazaki.

I just see 7 old ladies here. ;)

I'm a Barbie girl, in a Barbie woooorld.

A miniature of the Barbie movie set.

Aghhh!

View from the museum's terrace.

Leaving the museum, we were ready for a late lunch. We drove to Melrose Ave nearby and had a nice relaxed pasta/sandwich lunch at Mauro Cafe. Afterwards, we walked to the nearby LA Video Game store. Melrose Ave has a lot of nice local restaurants and shops, but the street was too wide and car-oriented, which was a recurring theme in LA. Some road diets would do wonders! We then drove to downtown LA and went to Little Tokyo, a touristy but nice area with Japanese shops and restaurants. We walked around and checked out a few little stores and got some matcha ice cream.

It was now late afternoon, so we drove all the way back to Anaheim, briefly stopping at the convention center for David to pick up his Fan Fest badge, and then relaxing for a bit at the hotel. For dinner we drove to "Packing House" a food hall near downtown Anaheim. We had a cocktail at BXCR, which is designed to look like an old train inside the food hall, and then walked to Strong Water, a popular tiki bar. We didn't have a reservation, but they sat us at the accessible spots at the bar, and we had a cocktail and some loaded tater tots. That wrapped up a very full day. With the time change we were in bed early.

Lunch time.

Melrose Ave would be much cuter with fewer cars!

Little Tokyo.

Walking around Little Tokyo.

Paul in Little Tokyo.

Mmmmm, matcha soft serve.

A space shuttle monument to the Japanese-American astronaut that died in the Challenger explosion.

Downtown LA.

The Packing House.

Having a drink in BXCR.

Inside Strong Water.

On Friday we started with some coffee/matcha together and then split up for the day. David went to Fan Fest and Paul on a roller coaster adventure:

David met up with one of his friends before the keynote address, where they would announce details about the next version of Final Fantasy XIV - coming in January (woo!). The convention center was packed (they said around 10,000 people) and it took around an hour to get inside - just in time for the keynote. The fans were super pumped to be here and it was really fun being around so many people from diverse walks of life all brought together by a game.

After the keynote, David walked around the convention hall looking at art, mini-games and chatting with some folks before he and a couple friends went to grab lunch nearby at Bubba Gump Shrimp (ugh - there aren't that many options near the Convention Center). After lunch, he returned to the convention center and watched more sessions from the game developers and staff, and chatted with friends for a bit before calling it a day around 4pm to go back to the hotel to chill and wait for Paul.

Just a little crowded to get into the Fan Fest ...

No where to sit to watch the show either unless you were in super early.

Meanwhile, Paul walked to California Adventure, which was about a 35 minute walk north of our hotel. The main goal was to get the one coaster credit he needed there, which was accomplished 5 minutes after opening. He then enjoyed rides and the atmosphere for a few hours before leaving and having a quick lunch of spam musubi at Mama Katsu. He then walked to the hotel to get the car, and drove to Knotts Berry Farm. With his Six Flags season pass Paul got in free (and also got free parking), so it was a cheap stop to get the one new coaster credit he needed and to re-ride some of his favorites. Leaving Knotts Berry Farm it was obviously time for ice cream. Paul found a neat anime ice cream place called Tsun Scoops, which had cool flavors and was doing a collaboration with something called "Milky Subway: the Galactic Limited Express." Paul made a quick stop in Garden Grove, which has a small pedestrianized main street to look around.

We met up at the hotel in the late afternoon, and then met with our friend Mark (who Paul went to grad school with) and his partner Lucas. They drove us to Downtown Disney, and we had a cocktail at Trader Sam's Tiki Bar outside near the pool of the Disneyland hotel (two tiki bars in one trip - woo). We had fun catching up. We then picked up some Final Fantasy friends and went back to the Packing House for dinner, since it was close by and offered a lot of food options for everyone. It was still packed even though we arrived after 8:30pm. We hung out for a while and then called it a night after another long day.