Los Angeles

After I spent a relaxing morning in Beverly Hills, I ventured to The Getty Museum. To be honest, I wasn’t too thrilled to visit this museum. I appreciate art and artists, but as a scientist, I tend to miss the big picture behind the art. I pay more attention to logic and detail, and just get confused with abstract things. However, as I get older, I’m starting to appreciate history more. So with that, I thought it might be fun to explore this huge museum full of historic artifacts… artifacts that just happen to be art.

The drive to the museum was terrible. I-405 is a nightmare. I hate it. But I’ll go into more detail about that later. Once I parked my car, though, the walk to the museum was beautiful. The museum sits on top of a hill overlooking LA. There is a train you can take to get to the top, but it was a nice day, so I chose to walk. In hindsight, I probably should have taken the train, because I worked up quite a sweat. I just learned the hard way that you always take the train up but walk down.

Once at the top of the hill, the museum entrance is jaw dropping. It’s huge!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 6: Asheville, N.C.

The next stop on our road trip was Asheville, North Carolina. I had never heard of this city before, but Dina suggested it on our joint “Road Trip” Pinterest board. It seemed like something right up her alley – arts and food.

We ended up getting to the River Arts District around noon. I must say, I was a little disappointed. There were textile shops, woodworking shops, paintings, sculptures… Anything, you name it, they had it. The down side was that everything was insanely expensive. I’m not saying the artists shouldn’t be charging that much, I just wish I could have seen something affordable and within my price range. If I was rich, I would have easily refurnished my entire home. Unfortunately, the three of us got discouraged pretty quickly, once we realized we wouldn’t even be able to buy a small souvenir. We were also getting a little hangry, so our next stop had to be lunch.

On the northern-most tip of the arts district is the White Duck Taco Shop. It’s a quaint spot with you guessed it, tacos. We each bought a taco or two, and a side of chips and queso. We had come in hungry, but we left stuffed. I never would have thought that I would have ever become full from eating tacos, but they definitely give you your money’s worth. I can’t really tell you if the tacos were particularly delicious, though, because I scarfed mine down, without even giving my taste buds a chance to taste anything. I do remember the sangria, though. That felt really good going down in the misty, dreary, hot weather.

 

 

 

After the arts district, we headed into town. It took us a while to find parking, but everything happens for a reason. I ended up parking a block away from this amazing book exchange. First, you go and explore; find a book you like. Then you head downstairs to buy it. After your purchase, you can head over to the champagne bar, and buy a glass of champagne, then settle in a read your book while enjoying a little bubbly. Honestly, this is where I fell in love with Asheville. I truly want to go back just so I can fully experience this store. I just want to spend an entire day there. It’s like Starbucks, but better! We easily spent an hour there, and we didn’t end up buying anything. Everything is reasonably priced, since it’s a book exchange. My issue was that I wanted to buy too many books. There was no way I’d be able to afford them all, let alone, find room in my already packed car.

After reluctantly leaving the book exchange, we just wondered around downtown. There are tons of boutiques and tiny shops all along Patton Ave. and Battery Park Ave. Unfortunately, our road trip was starting to catch up to us, and we were all just tired. We wanted to just head to our motel for the night, and just chill. So after a couple of hours of window shopping, we decided to make one last stop at French Broad Chocolates. Ideally, I would have loved to have gotten a tour of their factory, but it was Thursday, and they only give tours on weekends… So when I go back to Asheville, to thoroughly enjoy the book exchange, I can go on a tour of the chocolate factory too! Anyway, I digress. Even though we didn’t get to experience the factory, I still wanted to check out the chocolates. I had read rave reviews, and I obviously needed to try for myself. Now, even though it was fairly hot, it was also very drizzly, and just gross weather; therefore, a nice cup of hot chocolate sounded amazing. I got the dark chocolate “sip”. It was absolutely amazing, and it hit the spot perfectly. I think I may need to buy some for winter here in the northeast, hopefully I can manage to follow the directions properly, and do the chocolate justice. Also, I just could not pass up the opportunity to try some cake. They had a mocha stout cake. Even though we had lunch less than 3 hours ago, I’m not gonna lie, when he first handed me my piece of cake, I felt gypped. It looked so small! But after drinking my chocolate, I was full. The cake was delicious, but dense, and I could not finish it. The French Broad Chocolate Lounge is definitely a must see if you’re ever in Asheville.