Actually, I don't think I did too bad. It's just that I'm such a cheapskate, especially when it comes to vacations, that I'm already dizzy thinking about how much this is going to cost. "Going to" BTW, is the operational phrase of course, since everything's on credit cards so it isn't what I paid today, it's what I'll be paying off tomorrow.
Virgin America had a deal for non-stop Orlando to Los Angeles (a zippy 5 hour flight) for $199 each way. Not bad, huh? Never flew Virgin America before but it looks swankier than the low-budget airliners like Southwest or Spirit and with this sale, at about the same price point. Cool.
The hotel booking wasn't as joyous since everywhere I looked rates in the heart of Hollywood are crazy, which is really where I want to stay since I'm not intending on getting a rental car and want to focus primarily on Tinsel Town as opposed to all over the LA area. Even the Hotel Capri style places run well over $100 a night anywhere near, say, Hollywood and Vine. Oh they get a bit cheaper the farther east on Hollywood Blvd. you go, into Los Feliz, but then you not only get the Hotel Capri style no-tell motel drug-dealer/crack whore specials, but the neighborhood is more fitting to these seedy venues as well.
So I decided to book what I hope will be an amicable compromise. I'd checked this place out last time I was putzing around with the idea of a Hollywood vacation and eyed its quirky visage with a slightly skeptical stare. Though the reviews are mixed, I seem to get the feeling that a lot of the negative reviews are people too square to be hip.
The place is called the Hollywood Dream Suites Hotel and it's basically an old 1920's or so (I'd guess) flop house, supposedly lived in by early Hollywood starlets and other assorted aspirants back in the Golden Age. Now it's owned, apparently, by some Greek immigrants, undoubtedly proud of their heritage (al la the multiple decorations adorning the building's facade commemorating things like the Olympics and Alexander the Great) and in possession of that commodity so visibly abundant in Hollywood: gaudy faux-drama. It looks either like a quintessential artsy uber-trendster locale or a 21st century neo-hippie/borderline homeless squat. Guess I'll find out when I get there. At just $62 a night, and in walking distance (though a smidge of a hike I guesstimate by Google Maps Street View) of the nexus of Hollywood's tourist areas, looks like the best deal out there.
As for the miscellaneous stuff, it looks like the same shit that goes on here on I-Drive in Orlando for our hapless tourists. Bus tours (expensive), kitchy "museums" (overpriced) and even a West Coast mini-version of Universal (but obnoxiously at about the same rate as here...what?!) Oh but I'll be doing some of it despite my fiscally-conservative side's cringes. I'll be on vacation, dammit! YOLO!
As you can read about in this FLASHBACK post, I've been to LA before but it was just that one time so this trip will mark my triumphant return to La La Land after 31 years. I wonder if anything's changed? I think it has. Who cares! I'm still gonna bop out to Duran Duran first chance I get.