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LOS ANGELES ON FOOT: It's sure a drag these days to drive up to LA.
No matter when you leave San Diego you're going to be slowed down
from Mission Viejo onwards. And, of course, once you get there you
find some LA drivers don't agree there is a kinder, gentler America. |
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But there's an alternative to dragging
around LA in your car: LA on the hoof. Walking. Yes people sometimes
actually walk in this city that has rediscovered the value of shoe
leather. Some of the more interesting places in town are seen best
while walking and the City Fathers have now facilitated that by starting
a revamp of downtown, polishing ethnic communities such as Little
Tokyo, cleaning up areas like Hollywood Boulevard, encouraging historical
tours and creating the new Red Line of the Metro Rail system festooned
in modern art to counter what New Yorkers have called the "visual
banality" of LA. Los Angeles was always hip. Now it's cool. |
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If for instance, you were to stay at the New Otani
Hotel, you could start with its "Touch of Japan." The hotel
is at 120 South Los Angeles Street beside Little Tokyo Village. |
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For $399 per couple, the hotel offers a Welcome Sake with hors d'oevres, a Shiatsu massage, dinner and breakfast for two, all taxes, gratuities and valet parking. For an additional $200 you can get an authentic two-room Japanese suite. You are close to all the nostalgic architecture and recent renovations of downtown LA so you're right there for strolling through the art and recently expanded museums of Little Tokyo and buying a thousand types of Japanese merchandise in the Japanese Village Plaza. (You can also buy a Drugstore Indian carving and cowboy boots at 50 Percent Off! but that's another story).
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