PassPorter.com Feature Article Original article at: http://www.passporter.com/articles/easy-day-trips-from-disneyland.html Disneyland Easy Day Trips: A Disneyland Planning Articleby Cheryl Pendry, PassPorter Featured ColumnistLast modified 02-11-2016 In the second of this series of articles, looking at day trips you can enjoy away from the various Disney parks around the world, we head over to Disneyland in California. Located in the urban sprawl that makes up the massive city of Los Angeles, on our first visit to Disneyland, we took the opportunity to explore more of the surrounding area. Think of Los Angeles, and so many famous sights spring to mind – Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and of course the city’s various beaches. We took a guided tour, which we met up with in front of the TCL Chinese Theatre. We opted for a Saturday, as we figured the traffic wouldn’t be as bad, and it was fine. I was glad we got there early, as the place certainly gets packed out. Our tour then took us to the Hollywood Bowl, through Hollywood, Beverley Hills, and La Brea Tar Pits, before stopping for lunch at the Farmers’ Market, and then visiting downtown LA. Sadly, the exact tour doesn’t seem to be offered any longer, but if this sort of tour does interest you, we used Viator for ours, and they still have full day tours of the city available, albeit with slightly different itineraries. Somewhere that is now included on some of those itineraries is Griffith Park, home to the famous Hollywood sign. We’ve made it to Griffith Park on one occasion, although our planning wasn’t the greatest. We decided to spend our final couple of hours in the morning at Disneyland, and because we were visiting during Christmas and New Year, by the time we got to Griffith Park, there was no car parking to be found anywhere, which was a huge disappointment, as I was really looking forward to seeing the views, the sign, the carousel that first inspired Walt to build Disneyland, and I fancied exploring the Griffith Observatory. Sadly, it was not to be on that occasion, but it’s a day trip I fully intend to still take one day… One trip we were able to take on that vacation was to the California Science Center, and our main reason for visiting was to see Space Shuttle Endeavour. I’ll admit that, now having visited Atlantis at the Kennedy Space Center, their presentation is so much better, but it’s still a very impressive moment when you first emerge into the hangar where she’s located. The size of the Shuttle really does have to be seen to be believed! Timed reservations are required at busy times of the year, and can be made through the center’s website or via phone, and best of all, although there’s a small service charge, that’s it. You don’t have to pay a full admission price, which we both thought was a complete bargain.
If you have children, the next suggestion may not work for you, but for adults, the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens is a fantastic visit. We went to specifically see the gardens, which cover 120 acres, and they were absolutely stunning. In particular, we loved the Chinese and the Japanese Gardens, both of which were very peaceful, and beautiful.
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