LA experts - what do you think?

[Fely the 1st]

After modifying our vacation plans in may for three or four times we ended with a LA only stay. Except from visiting DL resort we, two adults only, are completely new to LA, so any tips and suggestions are more than welcome. So far my plans are:
- visiting Universal Studios for two days ( I know the park is small but we love Universal, and I have no problems riding Forbidden Journey, Minions or Mummy five times in a row with butterbeer breaks between)
- Warner Bros Studio Tour, Lunch in a Retro diner, relax at the pool (Sheraton universal) and visit universal Boulevard for diner
- Sea World for one day, not sure if by rental car or train (what would you do)
- visit the wildlife learning center, have lunch at Astro restaurant, Griffith observatory in the afternoon
- take a short look at the icons like Walk of Fame, Graumannˋ s theatre, rodeo drive ( plan to use the metro for this)
- Tar pits and museum
- Santa Monica Pier, if we have time
- and maybe one day at DL and DCA. Think about a VIP tour there, but not quite sure yet. I reallllly would love to ride some of the new rides and get some Disney vibes but it is so much money and there are a lot of things at Disney (at the moment) I do not like.

If you know any hidden gems or tips I would appreciate.

 

[Douglas Dubh]

I’d probably skip trying to do Sea World and add another day at Disneyland. Sea World is a nice park but it’s a long way there and back for one day, especially if you don’t have a car.

 

[Fely the 1st]

Sea world is a must do on our list. Background story, my husband lived in Duisburg, Germany as a kid and there in the zoo lived a beluga whale, Ferdinand, who now lives in Sea World since a couple of years. As he is very old, the beluga not my husband , he would love to see him one more time. But thanks for the Tipp.

 

[ktlm]

Sea World is in San Diego which will be about 130 miles from the Sheraton at Universal and it involves driving through LA. Driving from the Universal Area to Disneyland can take anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 1/2 hours depending on traffic. We've had it take 2 hours not during any rush hour time. From the Disneyland area, it is another hour and a half at least to get to Seaworld. So you could be talking a 4 1/2 hour drive to get to Seaworld from the Universal area if there is LA traffic. We haven't done the train between the 2 as we usually go from DLR either north or south, but not both in a trip-- but I think it is around a 3 hour trip not including your time to get to and from the station and your city destination and your wait for the train etc-- so it probably won't be under 4 hours there either. If you are staying near Disneyland for part of your trip, I would advise making your Sea World drive during a time you are staying close to Disneyland. The drive between Disneyland and San Diego usually isn't bad--- we have made that trip back and forth many times as we often spend half a week at Disneyland and half in the San Diego area and fly in and out of SNA.

We typically either go south to San Diego (most of the time) or north to LA, but we don't try to do both in a trip-- I totally get the need to see Ferdinand. I would be the same way. You might want to think about staying a couple of nights in the San Diego area. We really enjoy it that direction--- way more laid back than LA. The beaches are a lot nicer up and down the coast in that area, and you could also go to the San Diego Zoo or Safari Park. You could even look at flying in to Los Angeles and flying out of San Diego or vice versa. A lot of times it isn't more expensive to book 2 flight legs instead of one round trip flight. The thing that sometimes gets you there as far as cost is the rental car rate in returning the car to a different airport--- of course, if you did the train, you could avoid that. You could either rent a car in each place so you would return to the same location, or not even rent a car in one or both places. For us, we would definitely want a car in the San Diego area because things are spread out.

Warner Brothers and Griffith Observatory are both great. For us those would be must dos in that area. We weren't impressed with the Santa Monica Pier. If you want a bunch of really funny "celebrity" photo ops-- go visit Madame Tussards in Hollywood--- we had a blast in there and have a ton of great pictures. That was our favorite part of the Hollywood area.

Have you done DLR before? Are you talking one day per park, or just one day? One day would be really hard to see it if you have never been-- they pack a lot in the 2 parks. I totally get you not being happy with Disney right now-- we aren't either. We have been to either WDW or DLR or both every year since 2008, except for 2020. After our 2021 trip to DLR- we chose to go to neither in 2022 and currently have no plans to do either this year. I have a real problem with some of the stuff they are doing now and I hate the park reservation system--- virtual queues made our last trip an absolute stressful nightmare too but at that point there was not even Genie+ or lightning lane. Making the hopping time earlier does help some (couldn't even hop to go to lunch in 2021 like we usually do), but we had some issues on our 2019 WDW trip that combined with our 2021 DLR trip has made me not in my usual hurry to go back. I do think things have improved at least some at DLR since then though.

 

[DLgal]

Um, I get that your husband wants to see that whale, but driving to and from Sea World will take up literally your whole day. It is easily a 4 hour drive each way. Not kidding.

If you really want to do that, fly into or out of San Diego airport and then use LAX for your other flight.

The train will take twice as long. It's a slow trip.

 

[bcla]

Amtrak California's Pacific Surfliner service isn't at normal service levels yet after landslide repairs. Not sure when that's going to be considered ready for that.

https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/...-railroad-tracks-in-san-clemente-deemed-safe/
Right now they're still reporting that they're using a "bus bridge" between San Juan Capistrano and Oceanside

https://www.pacificsurfliner.com/gl...fied-1-31-2023_wknd-srvc-restored-to-slo.pdf/

 

[pirate33]

Day trip to Sea World from Studio City: please don’t do that to yourself. Ugh.

 

[Fely the 1st]

Thanks so much for all your informations. This Board is really worth gold. I had no idea the train route is under repair. You can not get Infos like that if you are visiting international and do not know what to look for. I really appreciate that. I also obviously underestimated the drive to San Diego. So we changed our planes a little and put Sea world at the end of our trip with a short overnight stay in San Diego.
For our LA sightseeing we want to use the metro for some places, is it save or should we better take Lyft? And one more question, we really like visiting zoos, but I saw a lot of not so good comments about LA zoo and that the animals seem to be unhappy. Did someone visit recently?

 

[ktlm]

we really like visiting zoos, but I saw a lot of not so good comments about LA zoo and that the animals seem to be unhappy. Did someone visit recently?

If you like zoos, you might want to consider adding on a little more time in the San Diego area. The San Diego Safari Park is fantasic. The tram ride there reminds me a little of Safari at Animal Kingdom. The San Diego Zoo is considered one of the best in the country.

 

[DLgal]

Thanks so much for all your informations. This Board is really worth gold. I had no idea the train route is under repair. You can not get Infos like that if you are visiting international and do not know what to look for. I really appreciate that. I also obviously underestimated the drive to San Diego. So we changed our planes a little and put Sea world at the end of our trip with a short overnight stay in San Diego.
For our LA sightseeing we want to use the metro for some places, is it save or should we better take Lyft? And one more question, we really like visiting zoos, but I saw a lot of not so good comments about LA zoo and that the animals seem to be unhappy. Did someone visit recently?

Good plan.

The only zoo worth visiting in Southern California is the San Diego Zoo. The Safari park is cool too, but it's nowhere near the Sea World and the other zoo. You'd need a whole extra day to go there. You can technically do Sea World and the San Diego zoo in the same day. Sea World is really small.

The metro is safe, provided you are used to using public transportation and know how to manage it without looking like a helpless tourist. Lyft/Uber is also easy to use in LA, although pricing can vary dramatically due to surge pricing.

 

[Douglas Dubh]

You can technically do Sea World and the San Diego zoo in the same day. Sea World is really small.

Of course it’s also possible to spend a whole day there too. We did last time we went, but then we also did the All-Day Dining.

 

[DLgal]

Of course it’s also possible to spend a whole day there too. We did last time we went, but then we also did the All-Day Dining.

It really depends on what you want to do there. We don't do the shows, just the rides and walk up exhibits. Half the time, half the rides are closed.

 

[Fely the 1st]

We usually do a whole day at sea world in Orlando, really enjoy the animal encounters, feed the stingrays and so on. So we will spend the whole day. Sea World is a park we really like, except of the food . But we now plan to drive from LA after lunch, maybe do some Stopps on the way, sleep over an San Diego and then go to SW.
Unfortunatly this time we have no time for the other San Diego zoos, but we know both and they are really great.

 

[DLgal]

We usually do a whole day at sea world in Orlando, really enjoy the animal encounters, feed the stingrays and so on. So we will spend the whole day. Sea World is a park we really like, except of the food . But we now plan to drive from LA after lunch, maybe do some Stopps on the way, sleep over an San Diego and then go to SW.
Unfortunatly this time we have no time for the other San Diego zoos, but we know both and they are really great.

Sea World in San Diego is MUCH smaller than Orlando, just so you are aware.

 

[bcla]

Thanks so much for all your informations. This Board is really worth gold. I had no idea the train route is under repair. You can not get Infos like that if you are visiting international and do not know what to look for. I really appreciate that. I also obviously underestimated the drive to San Diego. So we changed our planes a little and put Sea world at the end of our trip with a short overnight stay in San Diego.
For our LA sightseeing we want to use the metro for some places, is it save or should we better take Lyft? And one more question, we really like visiting zoos, but I saw a lot of not so good comments about LA zoo and that the animals seem to be unhappy. Did someone visit recently?

I'd check out the Pacific Surfliner website for more information. It's kind of odd as it's a service that's provided by the California Dept of Transportation, but working with Amtrak for ticketing and personnel. But yeah that area south of San Juan Capistrano has been out for months and even with repairs they're saying that they haven't restarted full service.

As for Metro - I was OK using it, but you need to research it carefully and be accepting that it is public transportation and that you will likely see things that you can't unsee. Especially the Metro Red and Purple subway lines. Those are dens of homelessness and mental illness. I brought my child a few times, and even a 12 year old can figure out the problems of where to the mentally ill spend their time. Some of the buses weren't too bad, but it depends on the line. And newer Metro Expo light rail line from Los Angeles to Santa Monica was great. The equipment is new and well maintained, and there aren't as many of the crazies. Any particular route you're looking to go? I haven't ridden the entire system, but I've managed to get in a lot of travel on four trips. My last trip was 7 calendar days where I rode on Metro 6 of those days, including line 460 (downtown LA to Anaheim) in Orange County. I purchased a 7-day unlimited pass for $12.50 and made extensive use of it. They are going to a different system where they're eliminating pre-purchased day/week/month passes, but will be using a "fare cap" system that automatically deducts based on daily/weekly fare maximums.