Day 7 - Venice Beach (Los Angeles, CA)

Venice Beach day! We started our day with breakfast at Mimi's. I ordered one cup of tea and they sent me four packets. I'll take it.

Kettle.

After a breakfast of oatmeal and toast, we went to this place where you paint your own ceramic figurines and they fire it for you. 

Assortment of brushes.

Jodie and her watering can.

Gavin painting his garden gnome.

I chose a cheap little rotund piggy bank and tried to get creative.

Little elephant.

Hungry for pennies.

Everyone took a pretty long time painting their ceramics, so I headed across the parking lot to a reptilian pet shop.

Surprisingly friendly.

Lizards are too wiggly to walk.

Cup o' snake.

Mom decided to let us go on to Venice Beach without her. Parking was hell but we finally found a lot that charged $25 per car.

Fairly recent.

It was just as I remembered, except with fewer street performers and more of things like these -

$40 medical marijuana cards.

Not worth it if we're only there for a little over a week.

There was a huge Hari Krishna celebration happening on the lawn. I got a few interesting pictures.

Should have grabbed some literature.

Dance festival.

Cheap food.

People handing out copies of the Bhagavad Gita.

Main building.

Huge crowd.

My favorite picture.

There was also a huge drum circle happening on the sand, but we just listened from afar and didn't feel like joining the mass of people.

Jodie stylin'.

Saw it last time. Pretty hyped.

Mountains in the distance.

Outdoor showers.

There was plenty of street art -

Botticelli.

Van Gogh.

This thing.

I got to get some free pictures with the locals, too.

This guy gave the *best* compliments.

Man from Liberia.

Gavin found another penny machine, of course.

Also, Zoltar.

The whole place is pretty campy and full of cheap stuff and all kinds of art (ranging from outrageous to nowhere near impressive). We found some flowers on the sidewalk left over from the celebration earlier and took them home for a temporary souvenir.

Feelin' real tropical.

Squinty.

And none of us got too burnt, either.

-Marie