Los Angeles Help Please

[ali-ali-oh]

We are arriving in Los Angeles cruise terminal on 30 Sept. We are intending to hire a car and do the sights of LA on the Friday including Beverley Hills, Rodeo Drive etc and then spend Saturday probably at Universal Studios to fly out of LAX 9.30 Sat eve back to the UK.

Does this sound reasonable? I have no idea of the geography of LA so would appreciate any help/guidance you can give. I did post a similar request on another thread but without too much success. Can you recommend a car hire place that would let us drop off at LAX?

Could you suggest a nice/safe hotel in LA (somebody suggested the Queen Mary)? We thought it would prob be better to get a hotel near some of the things we want to see on the Friday rather than somewhere near the airport, or would you advise us differently?

Any help/suggestions/advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks - Ali

[LMCAT123]

Los Angeles is a huge area. If you belong to the British Auto Club please try and get a road map of LA, you will need it.

 

The only car rental place at the pier is Enterprise, if you rent from them find out what the drop off fee is for LAX return. Your other choice, since you are flying back to the UK from LAX, is to take a cab back to LAX where all the car rental agencies are (Hertz, Dollar, Alamo, Avis, Thrifty, etc. etc.) and rent there. They will not charge a drop off fee, but you will have to take a cab to get to them from pier and that will cost about $50 (depends on traffic/time of day).

 

From LAX area to Beverly Hills/Rodeo Drive is not terribly far, but there will be alot of traffic on 405 Freeway so prepare for that, Fridays generally have alot of traffic anyway.

 

If you are doing Bev. Hills on Friday and Universal on Sat. I would NOT stay in Long Beach where Queen Mary is - that is totally out of the way and you would be doing alot of unnecessary driving. I lived in the LA area so I am not up on hotels in LA proper, but if you are only staying one night you might just consider a hotel near LAX since you need to be there anyway to go home. There are a zillion hotels around LAX. Perhaps other people will have some suggestions for you hotel-wise. Remember, hotels want you to check out by noon, which means you either are going to be taking all your luggage/personal belongings to Universal with you (not a good idea to leave them in car) or seeing if hotel can hold them in a secure room when you check out in the a.m. to go to Universal. You might consider a hotel near Universal if you do not want to stay near LAX.

 

We've traveled alot in the UK -- Area wise LA is way larger then London is and with very little public transportation everyone uses the freeways, just prepare yourself for heavy traffic :-)

 

I hope you get some better answers from people - enjoy your trip.

[jaynak]

I am not an expert in this regard - however, LMCat suggests a hotel in the LAX area is a better possiblity than the Queen Mary for your agenda... I agree. Our most recent stay was at the Hilton Garden in LAX (do a search if you are interested, under my posts for a little review) - it was a terrific place to stay, and the staff was simply outstanding with suggestions for us tourists and even transporting us around at no charge. Highly recommended in my books and we do in fact have them booked again. Regards, jayna K

[maren91]

Hello UK-

You can e-mail with any questions that you have, I live in Los Angeles and work for Universal so I could probably help you with any questions you have. maren91@aol.com

 

Happy traveling.

[little britain]

Hi - another Brit with an LA question - we fly in on Thurs/Fri and our cruise is on Monday so we have a lot of time to sight-see. Wondered if it was best to base ourselves in a hotel in San Pedro area and then drive back in to see the sights [Hollywood/Rodeo/movie star houses etc] or stay in town and just take a cab out on Monday to the terminal? What do people suggest. Many thanks!

[LMCAT123]

I would not suggest staying in San Pedro, or even Long Beach, it is simply too far and too much traffic if you are going back and forth to Beverly Hills, Hollywood, etc. Besides, San Pedro is not the prettiest place on earth :-) It is primarily a large industrial port area.

 

Los Angeles is huge - no one realizes how spread out it is until they visit there (or get caught in freeway traffic and not know the side streets). That said, I'd recommend you stay up in the Beverly Hills area as it is closer to what you want to see.

 

Allow plenty of time to get to pier on Monday, it is a work day and traffic will be much heavier then over the weekend.

 

I might suggest you visit the Getty Museum if you have time - if nothing else then for the stunning views out over L.A. and the Pacific.

 

Have fun.

P.S. We have visited the UK many times and love the Surrey area :-)

[little britain]

I'd recommend you stay up in the Beverly Hills area as it is closer to what you want to see. I might suggest you visit the Getty Museum if you have time - if nothing else then for the stunning views out over L.A. and the Pacific.

 

LMCAT - thanks for your super quick reply! OK - will start looking on Travelocity for hotels near Rodeo! I have found LC City Tours do a 5 hr trip covering most sights [beach/movie star houses] so that may be a good way to orientate ourselves, and, yes, the Getty Museum is on my list - higher than the Universal Studios which seems to be like a theme park place - I wanted to see the real studios? Also I heard you can get a sheet that tells you what movies are shooting and where - any ideas on this please?

[LMCAT123]

I honestly have no idea where you can get a list of what's filming on any given day, but perhaps the individual studio websites may be the first place to look. Sorry :-(

[cynbar]

I can't answer your movie question, but we were in LA a couple of years ago and easily arranged for tickets to see the filming of a TV show --- "The Drew Carey Show." We got the info on where to call for tickets out of a guidebook, either Fodor's or Frommer's, but the info in probably available online. Some shows such as the talk shows ("Ellen" and "Dr Phil", for instance ) have their own websites with a link to request free tickets to tapings. Someone else from the LA area can probably give you more specific information, but it was a lot of fun and I would definitely recommend arranging this if possible.

[dogsbestfriend]

Ali

 

As some of the posters have said...the L.A. area is huge..... I have lived in the L.A. area for the past 35 years.....my advice for your agenda would be a bit different than some on this post. It sounds like you will be disembarking from the ship from San Pedro (Long Beach) area.........then you want to go to the Beverly Hills, celebrity homes, and other sites to see...........with only a short time to visit......

 

Then you want to go to the Uniiversival Studio area.......these areas mentinioned above (Beverly Hills, ect.) are fairly much on the way toward the Universal Studios areas.....but as everyone said, expect alot of traffic...

 

Personally, since your flight home is not until 9:30 PM, and you want to visit the Universal Studios area, I would spend the evening at the Universal City Studios/Walk area (please ckeck their website for their amusement park and hopefully nice hotels)..........

 

enjoy your time there, and then head for the LAX airport the next afternoon..... expect a couple of hours to get to LAX airport.........shouldn't be that bad, but please plan for it in case.........the traffic can be horrible......:)

 

We are going to be in London in June of 2006 .........looking so forward to it....best to you! Write if you have any questions...

[little britain]

a list of what's filming on any given day

Found it! But apparently this is not freely available any more following 9/11...

http://www.seeing-stars.com/Tapings/MoviesBeingShotNow.shtml

For any one interested this seems to be the link to see TV shows being filmed http://www.tvtix.com/schedule.php

[ali-ali-oh]

Dogsbestfriend and others

Thank you so much for your advice. We have less than a week to go and I still haven't got myself organised for hotel or car hire. There are just so many options, it's difficult to know what to do for the best. That said, these boards are a god send. Any more suggestions would be much appreciated.

[little britain]

I still haven't got myself organised for hotel or car hire.

AliW - if you want to take a look we are probably going with Crowne Plaza, it seems quite a good central location [walkable to Rodeo etc] and reviews on Trip Advisor seem Ok and prices aren't bad. http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g32655-d76061-Reviews-Crowne_Plaza_Beverly_Hills-Los_Angeles_California.html If you do stay there, would love to know what it is like before we book it! Cheers

[maren91]

If you have questions about Universal or the hotels here I can probably answer, I have worked there for many many years now.

[little britain]

Maren91, If you have questions about Universal ....

Thanks for your offer - I have checked out the Universal web site and it seems a bit 'theme ride' to me - I was more interested in seeing the sets etc. Is there a way to do that without having to pay the [huge] entrance fee that includes all the rides please?

[suznf]

Thanks for your offer - I have checked out the Universal web site and it seems a bit 'theme ride' to me - I was more interested in seeing the sets etc. Is there a way to do that without having to pay the [huge] entrance fee that includes all the rides please?

 

Warner Bros has a VIP Tour, Paramount studios has a walking tour, and NBC offers tours as well. You can check them out at http://www.seeing-stars.com/StudioTours/WarnerBrosTour.shtml

[little britain]

Warner Bros has a VIP Tour, Paramount studios has a walking tour, and NBC offers tours as well. You can check them out at http://www.seeing-stars.com/StudioTours/WarnerBrosTour.shtml

Suznf - exactly the sort of thing I was looking for - thanks!:)

[ali-ali-oh]

Just in case anyone needs info at a later date and looks up this thread. We ended up booking a hotel from the courtesy phones at LAX as we booked a trip from the ship that did an LA tour and dropped us there. We booked the Four Points Sheraton for 89$ (one night) which had a free courtesy bus from the airport. The hotel was great. Much better than we expected for the money, in fact, it was prob the same as we would have paid twice that much for.

 

We also did Universal Studios - as a 3/4 day tour (booked throught the concierge at the Sheraton) on the Saturday which brought us back to the hotel in time for our flight home - once again, we got the free shuttle back to the airport and the concierge looked after our luggage for the day.