Los Angeles, two day pre-cruise questions, local advice needed

[coloradocruise]

Here's what I've come up with so far and need some local LA people to help me fill in the rest:

 

First half day:

Arrive LAX around 4 pm, rent car for two days to drop off in San Pedro

Want to go to the Santa Monica beach/pier that evening

 

Q: charge for parking in Santa Monica? good relatively cheap place to eat that is also somewhat healthy?

 

Q: where's a safe and inexpensive place to stay that night and would be easy to get to where we want to take the double decker bus tour around LA the next day?

 

Full day:

Double decker 24 hour hop-on/hop-off tour until they kick us off

Drive to San Pedro afterwards to spend the night, already have hotel reservations

 

Q: where do you park for the trolley? Price for parking?

 

Second half day:

Drop off car, possibly take their local shuttle around, go to pier

 

Q: breakfast place to eat? what is there to see in San Pedro on that shuttle?

 

Q: return from cruise way to LAX?

 

Thanks for any help you can give me!

[Curt Jerome Wild]

Here's what I've come up with so far and need some local LA people to help me fill in the rest:

 

First half day:

Arrive LAX around 4 pm, rent car for two days to drop off in San Pedro

Want to go to the Santa Monica beach/pier that evening

 

Q: charge for parking in Santa Monica?

good relatively cheap place to eat that is also somewhat healthy?

 

Click on this link:

http://parking.smgov.net/overview.html

There are a lot of parking structures with meters. All over.

If you can find street parking, there is that as well. Just be absolutely sure that you read the signs as far as "No Parking from XPM to XAM or whatever. Have quarters with you. It should only cost a couple of bucks for several hours.

 

 

Santa Monica is a good, but healthy restaurant mecca. Almost anywhere you stop and look will be healthy.

If you walk along the Third Street Promenade:

http://thirdstreetpromenade.org/dining/index.html

There is a huge amount of good healthy restaurants to pick and choose from (pretty much everything no matter what type of food, is cooked in a California Healthy way). Just stroll and look at the posted menus until you find something that intrigues you.

[Curt Jerome Wild]

Q: where's a safe and inexpensive place to stay that night and would be easy to get to where we want to take the double decker bus tour around LA the next day?

What is considered "inexpensive" to you?

 

These are all some suggestions that I know personally in various nice interesting areas of Los Angeles. They are all safe and inexpensive for their particular location. Click on these links and see if anything looks good to you, and I'll add more info if you have more questions or need more suggestions.

 

If you want to stay in Santa Monica:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=423818

 

My favorite for Marina Del Ray:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=679886

 

Good for Venice Beach:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?p=12754774#post12754774

 

This is great for a nice area of South Hollywood:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=555307

(The TV show "The Hills" is located all around here. Their apartments are across the street behind The Grove)

 

If you want more cool, decent price, but lots of cool fun stuff in the area of The Sunset Strip, look at the Hyatt here:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?p=12755037#post12755037

 

This is good and quaint and in a central location from all you want to see:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=509495

 

[Curt Jerome Wild]

Full day:

Double decker 24 hour hop-on/hop-off tour until they kick us off

Q: where do you park for the trolley? Price for parking?

Do you know for sure which company you are using?

There are a few. I think that Starline is the best for this type.

If you are doing Starline, then here's the info:

http://www.starlinetours.com/los-angeles-tour-1D.asp

Starline: Parking Validation

 

We validate your parking ticket on the purchase of any tour.

 

This validation is good for the first 4 hours of parking for a set fee of just $2.00.

All day parking is $10 max.

Entrance to this underground parking is by the Renaissance Hotel 1755 N.Highland Ave. at Johnny Grant Way, the sign reads "5 Star Public Parking Hollywood & Highland", or from 1754 N. Orange Dr. with the name as above.

 

Having parked please make your way to the forcourt of the Chinese Theatre, by taking the elevator.

[Curt Jerome Wild]

Drive to San Pedro afterwards to spend the night, already have hotel reservations

 

Second half day:

Drop off car, possibly take their local shuttle around, go to pier

 

Q: breakfast place to eat? what is there to see in San Pedro on that shuttle?

What hotel are you staying at in San Pedro?

This will make a difference on the specific recommendations.

Also what "shuttle" are you talking about here?

You could be referring to a few different thing...

[Cruisin' Chick]

If you're talking about the rental car company shuttle service, that isn't for sightseeing, just for getting you to the port. You probably won't be able to see much in sights from that shuttle anyway as that area is pretty industrial.

[CruisersfromMD]

Thanks for the info on the tour. We will be spending the day in LA after our Monarch cruise. We plan on heading up to LA from san Pedro after rush hour, around 9:30. Do you think that is a good time?

 

I saw the info on the parking, do you think we will have any problem parking - will the lot be filled around 10:30 AM on a Friday?

 

We thought we would head to Santa Monica and walk around the pier area and get an early dinner before heading to LAX to return our rental car and catch our 10:30 PM flight home/

 

Thanks for any information you can provide.

 

Do you know for sure which company you are using?

There are a few. I think that Starline is the best for this type.

If you are doing Starline, then here's the info:

http://www.starlinetours.com/los-angeles-tour-1D.asp

 

Starline: Parking Validation

 

We validate your parking ticket on the purchase of any tour.

 

This validation is good for the first 4 hours of parking for a set fee of just $2.00.

All day parking is $10 max.

Entrance to this underground parking is by the Renaissance Hotel 1755 N.Highland Ave. at Johnny Grant Way, the sign reads "5 Star Public Parking Hollywood & Highland", or from 1754 N. Orange Dr. with the name as above.

 

Having parked please make your way to the forcourt of the Chinese Theatre, by taking the elevator.

[disneykins]

Great thread. Lots of info we can use for our 2 days post cruise in Oct.

 

Is it possible to get from Santa Monica to Disneyland (and back) by shuttle or is a taxi the only way? Dont want to rent a car. Can we shuttle from San Pedro to Santa Monica hotels? And then we need to get to LAX from Santa Monica, again is there a shuttle? How much are these shuttles or how much by taxi?

Thanks,

Tony and Debbie

[DaNana]

Here is a great place to check out how to get around.

 

Best of Citysearch Los Angeles 2008 - Best Los Angeles Taxi/Limo

[Curt Jerome Wild]

Great thread. Lots of info we can use for our 2 days post cruise in Oct.

 

Is it possible to get from Santa Monica to Disneyland (and back) by shuttle or is a taxi the only way? Dont want to rent a car. Can we shuttle from San Pedro to Santa Monica hotels? And then we need to get to LAX from Santa Monica, again is there a shuttle? How much are these shuttles or how much by taxi?

Thanks,

Tony and Debbie

 

Yes in general, you can do all of this by shuttles.

http://www.supershuttle.com

Most of the time it will be less than a taxi.

[coloradocruise]

First of all, thanks for taking the time to help me out and answer questions for me. Now to your questions:

 

1. Inexpensive to me would be less than $100 a night for a hotel. As much as I'd love to try to stay in Santa Monica, it seems cost prohibitive. I think we might just try for a 4* at the airport using Priceline.

 

2. We don't know for sure which tour company we will be using. We're on a limited budget so are trying to see some sights relatively inexpensively. We might even just use the rental car to go see them instead. Do you know if most of the big sites have parking nearby? Such as the Farmer's Market area, Hollywood, etc. and how much it costs to park?

 

3. We booked via Hotwire the Crowne Plaza in San Pedro for four people for $92.00 total for one night. I had a coupon for a $10 rebate from Hotwire through my Entertainment book.

 

4. The trolley I saw for San Pedro was one that takes you to three locations--the cruise pier, downtown and a shopping area possibly? I'm thinking from what I could deduce that the Enterprise car rental is right around the corner from the Crowne Plaza. I thought in the morning, we could return the car and then take the trolley around town if there was time before departing to the ship.

 

Again, thanks for your help.

[Cruisin' Chick]

First of all, thanks for taking the time to help me out and answer questions for me. Now to your questions:

 

1. Inexpensive to me would be less than $100 a night for a hotel. As much as I'd love to try to stay in Santa Monica, it seems cost prohibitive. I think we might just try for a 4* at the airport using Priceline.

 

2. We don't know for sure which tour company we will be using. We're on a limited budget so are trying to see some sights relatively inexpensively. We might even just use the rental car to go see them instead. Do you know if most of the big sites have parking nearby? Such as the Farmer's Market area, Hollywood, etc. and how much it costs to park?

 

3. We booked via Hotwire the Crowne Plaza in San Pedro for four people for $92.00 total for one night. I had a coupon for a $10 rebate from Hotwire through my Entertainment book.

 

4. The trolley I saw for San Pedro was one that takes you to three locations--the cruise pier, downtown and a shopping area possibly? I'm thinking from what I could deduce that the Enterprise car rental is right around the corner from the Crowne Plaza. I thought in the morning, we could return the car and then take the trolley around town if there was time before departing to the ship.

 

Again, thanks for your help.

 

One thing to consider is location. If you're going to be doing a lot of sightseeing, an airport hotel may not be what you want as you'll be constantly driving away from it as LAX isn't around any places to visit. Rental cars usually cost more to rent from airport locations as a rule of thumb, and any savings you get from an airport hotel may be eaten up by what you spend on gas. Just something to think about.

 

The trolley you're referring to, does it just go to locations in San Pedro (I can't imagine the downtown is downtown LA as that is quite a distance from SP)?