A DAY AT THE BEACH

We departed our hotel in Marina Del Rey on foot this morning to find somewhere on Venice Beach to grab a bite to eat for breakfast. After a hearty meal, we made a command decision to walk Venice Beach in its entirety en route to Santa Monica.

Venice Beach was an interesting place that reminded us a lot of South Beach in Miami. There were quite a few interesting characters and sites to be seen along the way. When we got to Santa Monica, we wandered up and down a huge historic pier with a ferris wheel, roller coaster, and "trapeze training school" that reminded Amy of her and Valerie's participation on trapezes when on vacation in middle school.

After watching them for a while, we decided it was time for Amy to overcome her new-found fear of horses; if you have any questions please reference our blog post from two days ago and then watch the video clip below. Bottom line, as you'll see...Amy made it through the event with flying colors and I think we found the exact type of horse she'll be riding from here on out.

Following our horse ride on the pier, we walked back east to meet Amy's friend Radikha, her husband Fred, and their son Ethan who live in L.A.; in fact, they just returned earlier this week from a long trip to Italy that they went on directly from our wedding. We met them at the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica (similar to Lincoln Road in South Beach) and spent a couple of hours conversing over crepes and exchanging stories of our recent adventures. We could have chatted for many more hours but had to get on our way back to Marina Del Rey as there was another engagement with one of David's former coworkers Scott, his wife Sara, and their lovely daughters Abby and Maddie (who also live in L.A.).

After a great meal with the Scott/Sara clan at the Second City Bistro (http://www.secondcitybistro.com/) with a lot of good laughs, we headed back to our hotel in Marina Del Rey for our last night in the greater L.A. area before heading two hours south to San Diego. Its our shortest drive of the trip and our last stop along the Pacific Coast before heading home on Saturday. Unfortunately, we ended the night abruptly because of concerns with parking allowances along the street in El Segundo, where the restaraunt was located, which made us forget to take a picture with the family for inclusion in the blog. We're counting on Scott to send us one of his family so we can add it later.

The final two days should be a solid whirlwind through San Diego, but we've got some great events planned and a few more blog postings to go.

Good night!