Venice Beach and Santa Monica

We drove up to Venice Beach and Santa Monica recently because I've been dying to see it. The two places are so close, yet so totally different! Venice Beach is full of hippies and places to get medical marijuana. Definitely not like anywhere else I've ever been! Santa Monica is super nice with boutiques and fancy hotels and restaurants. 

There was a Hare Krishna gathering in Venice that weekend. It was full of people in saris and lots of chanting was happening. They believe in reincarnation and a whole slew of other things that are totally foreign to us; however it was interesting to see. I got a pamphlet and read some about them on the way home. Totally crazy town, but interesting. 

Skate park. 

People painting concrete structures everywhere. 

A little bit of the Hare Krishna festival.

They asked Josh if he was interested in a prescription.
They didn't look twice at me. Rude?

Muscle beach!

This guy was posing in front of tons of people, I couldn't stop snickering.
Real mature, right?

It was getting late-ish and I had a major sun burn on half of my body, so we drove a couple of miles down the beach into Santa Monica. I'm not going to pretend that I didn't want to see the pier because I was dying to see it. I mean, what if we rode in the same seats as Spidey when they got engaged!!! You liked the Hills too, don't try to deny it. 

Just outside of the Santa Monica pier. 

Waiting to ride the Ferris wheel. 

Family self portraits in line! Check out the sun burn!  

He loved it!!

Bumper cars!

California beaches are always SO busy! 

Reminded me of Despicable Me...

And they won a minion! 

I'm not sure I would want to live in the area because of all the tourists (and people smoking weed in Venice), but it was a fun place to visit after church on a Sunday afternoon. I'm glad we finally made it up there to see the sights, and we found a fun English restaurant/store in Santa Monica where we had some traditional English fare and I got some fancy English lotion!