Los Angeles, California

February 2-3, 2026

Docking at Los Angeles on Monday was impressive. We came in at dawn, and paused before docking to salute the original Queen Mary, now a hotel and restaurant in LA.

Our reaction to Los Angeles was that it is BIG. That is, it seems really spread out. It took between an hour and an hour and a half to go anywhere. This picture from our Uber captures our impression.

We decided to drink the Kool Aid and take a Hollywood bus tour. We did get to see Hollywood and Vine, and, from a distance, the sign.

Our guide managed to cram thirty minutes worth of interesting information into two hours. We went through Laurel Canyon, Beverly Hills, and Bel Air, where we saw many tall privacy hedges blocking our view of celebrity homes. 

That night we had dinner aboard the original Queen Mary. The food was delicious. We particularly liked their clam chowder and their apple tart.

Tuesday we went to Venice Beach and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. It’s a fun community. Mal had poached eggs in a gravy that tasted like an Italian-Mexican fusion. Very good. We wandered around, saw the scenery, and sat on a bench and did some sketching. Here are two pretty typical photos.

That night we went to dinner at Musso and Frank’s Grill. We saw it mentioned often when we read biographies of people like Neil Simon and Lorn Michaels, and we wanted to see what it looked like. We were impressed with the look of the place, the service, and the food. It deserves its reputation.

Los Angeles is a sprawling Southern California city and the center of the nation’s film and television industry. Near its iconic Hollywood sign, studios such as Paramount Pictures, Universal and Warner Brothers offer behind-the-scenes tours. On Hollywood Boulevard, TCL Chinese Theatre displays celebrities’ hand- and footprints, the Walk of Fame honors thousands of luminaries and vendors sell maps to stars’ homes.

Los Angeles has a diverse economy with a broad range of industries. Despite a steep exodus of film and television production since the COVID-19 pandemic, Los Angeles is still one of the largest hubs of American film production, the world’s largest by revenue; the city is an important site in the history of film. It also has one of the busiest container ports in the Americas, and despite a business exodus from downtown Los Angeles, the city’s urban core is evolving as a cultural center with the world’s largest showcase of architecture designed by Frank Gehry.