Starting towards San Francisco- Sunday, July 9, 2006

 On Sunday morning, July 9th, we got up quite early and had a full day planned. 

We began by continuing on the tour of TV and movie sites that we had started on Friday. We had gotten as far as Santa Monica and decided to call it quits that day. We continued on the original route that I had planned and worked our way back towards Santa Monica.

We started at Alamitos Bay, where the opening to "Gilligan's Island" was filmed. It was only about 20 minutes or so from our hotel. Unfortuately, when I went to take a picture, we noticed that the memory card had not been put back into our camera that morning when we had stopped at a Wahlgren's to get our pitures saved on a CD. We had to go all the way back to get our card back, and got lost when we did so. As a result, we were about an hour off from where we had expected to be. (By the way, since we were driving through Seal Beach, I assume that we were only a short ways from my cousin Cathy's. Maybe we'll have a chance to see her on one of the next legs of our trip.)

We drove through Long Beach and found the home of Joan on "Joan of Arcadia." Julie and I both thought that the houses in Long Beach were great-- a real eclectic assortment of beautiful little homes. From there, we saw the fire station that served as Station 51 on "Emergency!" and the hospital where they took the injured people. Both were very much the same as they were on T.V.

The real highlight of the tour on this day was Torrance High School. The school served as the high school for both "Beverly Hills 90210" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and the figures prominently in the stories of both. The school itself is very cool and it was amazing to get out and walk around the outside of it. I remember commenting once when 90210 was on, and I said, "Come on, what high school really looks like that!" Well, this one is the real thing. Unfortunately, we really couldn't see into the courtyard area where the beautiful fountain is, but we sat on the steps of the school for a while. We did see some other tourist with a camera who evidently had jumped the fence to get in. We weren't going to do that. We did walk a few blocks to the house used as Buffy's house.

Julie thought it was interesting that the "Beverly Hills, 90210" house wasn't in Beverly Hills, but was in Arcadia. The "Joan of Arcadia" house wasn't in Arcadia, but was in Long Beach.

From there we went to the beach house that was used in the later seasons of "Beverly Hills, 90210" (again, not in Beverly Hills). We saw the school from "Joan of Arcadia" in El Segundo. Then we saw one of the schools used in Grease in Venice. That brought us back to near Santa Monica, and we were ready to head north, after a lunch at Taco Bell.

We followed route 1 up along the coast to Malibu and stopped at Paradise Cove. We spent awhile on the beach there, right near where Jim Rockford had his trailer on "The Rockford Files." Anna enjoyed jumping into the surf again. We saw a few surfers out on the waves. The place was crowded and we paid more for parking there than we probably should have, but we got to enjoy the sun for a while.

We continued our way up the coast hoping to get closer to San Francisco, but we had a long way to go. We followed route 1 for a ways right along the beaches and cliffs of the coast. Eventually we took route 101, which went a little faster. By the time we decided to stop, we had only gotten as far as Pismo Beach, but it was time for us to turn in for the night.

TV and Movie Land- Friday, July 7, 2006

Day 1- Our tour of TV and Movie sites (or as Julie called it- our Great Tour of Fun. I don't think she was being sarcastic, but it's hard to tell.)

We started out really early in the morning this day, and were out touring. The list of the sites that we went to can finally be revealed!

We started at the Los Angeles Arboretum, where "Fantasy Island," the old Tarzan movies and The African Queen were all filmed. Unfortunately, we couldn't see much because we didn't want to pay admission, and they weren't even open yet. We might go back. Nearby was the Santa Anita racetrack where the Marx Brothers filmed A Day At the Races.

We continued on through Arcadia and Pasadena. We saw the Walsh house from "Beverly Hills 90210" and the house used for the pilot episode of 7th Heaven. We saw the houses used in Father of the Bride, on "Benson," and the house where Michael Meyers grew up in Halloween. We took saw Doc's house from Back to the Future (the house was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright). Then we stopped for a stretch break at the Rose Bowl.

We couldn't see "Stately Wayne Manor" from the "Batman" TV series because it's quite hidden from the road. That's not surprising, considering that Paul McCartney is supposed to own it now. We saw the hospital used at the beginning of "General Hospital" and the building used for the hospital in City of Angels.

We drove around Dodger Stadium and went to a beautiful neighborhood nearby filled with Victorian houses, including the one used for the TV show "Charmed." We saw the LA City Hall which was the Daily Planet building on the Superman TV shows. We saw the Mayan theater used in The Bodyguard. We went to a private school where the Genovian consulate was in Princess Diaries. Unfortunately, Anna was sleeping in the backseat by this point and the guard at the gate told us we weren't allowed to take pictures here.

We found the "Hyperion Hotel" from "Angel." We found the Cunningham house from "Happy Days." We went to the gates at Paramount Studios, featured in Sunset Boulevard." We went to the apartment from "Melrose Place." We found Angel's mansion from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (also designed by Frank Lloyd Wright).

By then we were close to Griffith Park in the hills north of LA. We were able to park and take a short hike to the caves used as the Batcave in the TV version of "Batman." That was a nice little hike to stretch our legs, though the climb hurt Julie's back a wee bit.

We drove through Hollywood, past the famous sites including Grauman's Chinese Theater. We saw Sydney's apartment from "Alias" and the houses where the terror took place in both Halloween and A Nightmare on Elm Street. Nice neighborhoods, really. By then, it was time for a late lunch at Pink's Hot Dogs. They were very busy, but it's the place to get hot dogs in LA.

We saw the office building used in "Charlie's Angels" and then went out to Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills. It has been used in many movies, and we recognized the spot where Wolverine was in X-Men and where the Ghostbusters were in Ghostbusters 2. Luke and Laura's wedding from General Hospital took place here too. It was also a good place to explore and Anna liked finding a lizard in the garden. We saw a big limo and from the people we saw making preparations, Julie thought that someone famous was getting married that night. Maybe so, but we didn't see the actual couple.

On our drive to the coast, we saw the Beverly Hills City Hall, featured in Beverly Hills Cop, and the skyscraper used as the setting of Die Hard. We reached Santa Monica around 6:00, and spent some time on the beach. The girls appreciated a chance to run in the sand and the water. They didn't enjoy the tour all that much, so we let them have a while to play. Although we had more sites to explore, we fished the day touring here, although we were able to pick out a few places used in the opening of "Three's Company." All in all, it was quite a full day.