After we went to see the Christmas Carol movie at the El Capitan theatre in Los Angeles, we decided to cross the street, walk the famous Hollywood Walk of Fame and check out the Grauman’s Chinese Theatre.

Visiting Hollywood Walk of Fame is pretty much in almost every guide book. I even put it on my Best 10 Free or Cheap Things to Do with Kids in Los Angeles.  But I might have to take it back, I will say SKIP IT!

If you don’t have any plan to watch movie at the El Capitan which I highly recommended, then find something else to do like going to Santa Monica beach or the Griffth Park. Seriously, kids are too young to know anyone who has their names there. You can see how excited Mr. Z were when we asked him to pose.

Plus, there are a lot of characters walking around in front of the Grauman Chinese’s Theatre that will urge you to take a picture with them. Here is the thing. My kids are used to Disney World and other Theme parks where characters will pose a picture with you for FREE. Well, not in Los Angeles! You will have to tip them. I think I will take Mr. Incredible from Disney (which actually put on the mask to look like Mr. Incredible from the movie) over Mr. Incredible from Hollywood any day.

Now, if you are a movie fan, it’s still a fun thing to do to stroll along the Hollywood blvd and check out your favorite movie stars’ name plate. It’s just not the experience that we enjoyed as a family there.

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Our last stop on our tour of Los Angeles was the Santa Monica Pier. After a long bike ride from Santa Monica beach to Venice beach and back, we were all ready for a break and fun.

It was a bit disappointed that the Carousel that Debbi mentioned in her post was closed. So we walked down the wooden parking deck to the Santa Monica Pier.

It was early in the evening and we navigated through a throng of tourists and locals walking along the pier. I spot the sign indicated the end of Route 66. Any parents will remember the favorite Disney movie – Cars and route 66 was a main character in that movie. But technically, Route 66 ends at Santa Monica Blvd and Ocean Ave which is just a couple block North of the Pier.

Before we entered to the twilight zone of the Pacific Park, the amusement park on the pier, we walked around and people watched. Since we traveled during Winter, a lot of attractions were operated at the limited hour. We already missed out on the Carousel and we also missed the Aquarium. But I guess after San Diego, Miss J and Mr. Z were probably more interested in more relaxing things to do.

As the Sun slowly went down on the horizon, we headed to the Pacific Park for the Pacific Wheel ride. The view on the top was one of my favorite view. It’s amazing to see how huge the Santa Monica beach is. No wonder we didn’t make it to the ocean. It would take us a while to walk that distance with 2 kids.

At the end of the day, we had a great time in Santa Monica and will definitely come back again.

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One of the main reason we visited Los Angeles with our kids from our last vacation was mainly for my craving of Thai food. Yup! You heard that right. I just want to gorge myself with Thai food in Thai Town.

From the picture above, you might think that I took that picture in Bangkok from our trip to Thailand. But nope, that picture was from Thai Town in Los Angeles.

Thai Plaza and Silom Market is a main Thai shopping market with everything from food to household items. The store is packed full of Thai products and other Asian products you can think of. We didn’t spend a long time there because I know I can’t buy anything so why torture myself.

Thai Town in Los Angeles is a six-blocks stretch along Hollywood Blvd between Western and Normandie. You can tell that it’s Thai Town because you will be greeted by the Thai Shrine that is filled with colorful garlands, candles and lotus flowers.

The places we couldn’t miss in the visit to Thai Town are the Thai restaurants. The food in Los Angeles reminds me of home. No gimmick, nothing fancy, taste just like home. My brother who lived in LA for a couple years recommended me to Ruen Pair and I wasn’t disappointed.

Sorry there is no picture from Ruen Pair. I was just too busy eating!

After a big meal, we walked across the parking lot to another must-stop for me. Baan Kanom Thai is a perfect place to help sooth your mouth from spicy Thai food. This place has almost every types of Thai dessert that I have been dreaming and thinking about.

That’s one thing I love about visiting little ethnic town in major city like China Town or Thai Town here. It won’t give you the same experience as visiting those countries but I think it will give you a little glimpse. The signs are all with Thai letter and people is speaking Thai all around you.

So if you are looking for good Thai food in Los Angeles, head to Thai town and you won’t be disappointed. There are many more great restaurants in the area. But with our limited time, we could only eat so much in a day.

If you live in LA, please leave a comment for other great restaurants to share with us.

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Our visit to Los Angeles was short but fully packed with fun things we did with our kids ranging from a fun visit at the Le Brea Tar Pit, an amazing theatre experience at El Capitan or a beautiful view of Los Angeles Sunset.

Another memorable visit on this trip was our quick stop at Santa Monica beach. It was such a short visit that I will have to go back one day to take advantage of many fun family-friendly activities available at this popular destination.

Our first stop as soon as we found the parking spot was the playground. The sandy playground is nothing fancy but it’s something that I absolutely love. Most of the structure in this playground encourages kids to be active.

Miss J couldn’t run fast enough to climb up this bar. And she was quite successful in go up there. We all know who is the Monkey in this household.

Mr. Z didn’t want to be outdone. He tried his hand on the monkey bar as well.

And after all these exercises, they still had more energy. I guess it was from a lovely and yummy lunch we had at Cha Cha Chicken. Thanks to the recommendation from Delicious Baby’s City Guide.

We decided to try out the biking along the Santa Monica beach bike path. I think it’s one of the best feature at this beach. The bike path runs along from Santa Monica beach all the way to Venice beach and beyond. The bike path was very popular with both tourists and local. So make sure to stay alert and don’t ride too fast. It can get pretty crowd and some turn can be a bit tricky.

We rented a family bike with kid seat attached at the back. It was a perfect way for kids to also enjoy the beach. After riding from Santa Monica beach to Venice beach, we took a quick break at the Venice Beach Skate Park. It was very entertaining watching many moves they could do. Amazing! Then it was time to head back to check out the Santa Monica Pier. Stay tune for more fun in Santa Monica.

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Taking kids to a museum in Los Angeles can be hit or miss, depending on what kind of museums you visit and what mood your kids are in. Los Angeles might be known for glitz, but don’t let that fool you into thinking that the city is superficial. Your vacation in L.A. can be as educational as you make it. If your kids are in a good mood for adventure and learning, check out these museums:

Page Museum La Brea Tar Pits (5801 Wilshire Boulevard): Where else can you find the piece of history in the middle of the city? The Page Museum hosts one of the largest collection of Ice Age fossils, and that collection is still growing. Kids will love to walk in the park to check out the many tar pit displays. Stop by Pit 91 and you can see what the archeologist have to do to in order to get all of those fossils. Nearby, you can stay in Le Parc Suites hotel in Hollywood.

Los Angeles County Museum of Art (5905 Wilshire Boulevard): This art museum knows how to take care of family with kids — it was even voted one of the ”10 Best Art Museums for Kids” by Parents magazine. There are various programs available throughout the year and kids can bring adults in to visit for free. Plus, it’s located right next door to the Page Museum. Another option for a place to stay while visiting the Los Angeles County Museum of Art is the Petit Ermitage in Hollywood.

Griffith Park Observatory (2800 East Observatory Avenue): Part museum, part observatory, part planetarium – The Griffith Park Observatory will satisfy everyone in the family. Kids seem to be especially mesmerized by the Foucault pendulum at its entrance. As the saying goes, “the best things in life are free.”  You got it.  The best thing about the Griffith Park Observatory is that the admission is free for all.  Though, you will have to pay to watch the planetarium show. It’s just a quick car ride from the kid-friendly Magic Castle Hotel.

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Do you see a monkey there?

Think she will make it to the top?

Well, she sure does make a progress!

Monkey reveal! It’s Miss J!!

She had a blast at the playground on the beach in Santa Monica. Yes, it’s on very single list of tourist attraction of things to do in Los Angeles. And I think it’s there for a good reason.

Santa Monica is a great place for a relaxing day for parents. Because it’s a perfect beach to just let kid be kid. Kids could probably spend hours in this playground alone. But that’s not the only thing you can do in Santa Monica. So stay tune for our full adventure day in Santa Monica.

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A visit to Los Angeles with kids will not be complete if we didn’t visit the Page Museum – La Brea Tar Pits. It’s one of the best things to do with kids in Los Angeles. I have read about this museum from other travel blogger and put it on our to-do list for our quick jaunt to Los Angeles. After a fun day at the El Capitan theatre, it’s time for a bit of educational trip for the kids.

The Page Museum AKA the Ice Age Museum

The Page Museum La Brea Tar Pits is a research and educational facility and one of the best museum with the most extensive collection of extinct Ice Age fossils.

It helps that our kids have watched the Ice Age movies countless times. So it’s nice to be able to point out the extinct animals and they were able to make a connection. It took quite sometimes for them to grab the concept of ‘extinction’ because they still can see it on TV.

Perfect Size Museum for Kids

We went there during the weekday so it was very easy to find parking along the street. There is also parking inside the park and you can get the discount when you purchased museum admission tickets.

The museum itself is only one story. But the display and exhibition is very adequate to give you the knowledge about the ice age creatures.

With small size, it allows kids to remain engage without getting bored with the display.

The Coolest Things to See at The Page Museum

One of the coolest part of the Page Museum at La Brea Tar Pits has to be the Fish Bowl. The Fish Bowl is the area where researchers are working on the on-going project at the tar pits mostly cleaning and cataloging the fossils.

Kids (and adults) were mesmerized by the whole thing. (I don’t think I can work in that fish bowl. Too much pressure with people watching.) They were able to see how scientists and volunteers are working and cleaning those fossils. We also stopped by the theatre room to watch the short movie about the history of the Page Museum. It’s very fun and engaging and I highly recommend it. It will provide you with the background and history of the museum in a quick and fun way.

The Active Tar Pits in the City

After we walked around the Page Museum, we headed out to the most popular spot in the whole park – Tar Pits in Hancock Park. The Tar Pit give us a glimpse to the real Indiana Jones wanna-be like myself. We visited in Fall so there was no working excavation going on at that moment.

Kids get a chance to see how the real tar pits look like as there are many fenced-off tar pits all around the Hancock Park. However, the most well-known one is Pit 91. Pit 91 is tar pit that has been reopened in 1969 and the excavation work continues until today. We saw the area where the volunteers carefully excavated specimen inch by inch during the Summer.

New Discovery at Rancho La Brea- Project 23

However, the work in Pit 91 is temporarily suspended. In 2006, there was a new discovery of new fossils during the parking garage construction. Twenty three boxes of asphaltic deposits were moved to the Page Museum for further work. Hence, Project 23 is born. The name of Project 23 came from the 23 extract crates.

So far, they have discovered over 700 measured specimens including a large pre-historic American Lion skull, lion bones, dire wolves, saber-toothed cats, juvenile horse and bison, teratorn, coyotes, lynx, and ground sloths. For the current news and update, check out the Excavatrix blog.

It was a great fun day with our kids. They really enjoyed the visit. I think the Page Museum La Brea Tar Pit is one of the coolest place to visit in Los Angeles with kids.

Disclaimer: We paid for our own admission tickets. I will always let you know if I receive the complimentary tickets. And there will never be any outside influence on how I write my post.

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Visiting Los Angeles with kids  was one of the last minute add-on itinerary to our week long visit to the West Coast. We didn’t plan to spend a lot of time in Los Angeles because we had so many things to do in San Diego from theme parks, zoo, museum and beach. But one of the plan that I added to our things to do in Los Angeles and looked forward to doing was watching a show in the El Capitan theatre.

The El Capitan theatre is one of the fully restored movie palaces in Hollywood. It was one of the original 3 theatres envisioned by Charles E. Toberman and Sid Grauman to create Hollywood theatre district in the early 1920s.  After the years of ups and downs, it’s currently operated by the Walt Disney company. Did I just say DISNEY? Yes, it’s the venue for many of Walt Disney Pictures‘ movie premiere. It’s a perfect place for kids to experience different kind of movie going.

The theatre itself is nicely decorated with all the detail. It makes you feel like you step back in time to the old glory day of Hollywood. The staffs were attentive and very helpful.

One of the thing I always love about watching a movie at this kind of movie palace is the pre-show. Kids enjoy listening to the live music which I think much better than just watching the advertising on the screen.

We went there during Thanksgiving and we were able to enjoy Holiday Spectacular pre-show. I think I was enjoying the show more than the movie itself.

After the show, we also walked around and checked out the display of the behind-the-scene information about the movie. We even saw some of the costumes used in the movie. Yes, it’s the 3-D movie but I guess they will need the real costumes to make it more realistic.

The ticket cost might seem to be steeper than your typical movie ticket but I think it’s well worth the experience for a visit on special occasion.

After you exit and still want more Disney experience, you can stop by Disney’s Soda Fountain and Studio Store for some quick snack and shopping.

Disclaimer: We paid for our tickets ourselves but we were very lucky to receive 2 free tickets from a complete stranger while we were waiting in line at the box office to a VIP section. So we only bought 2 extra tickets for our family.

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Sunset photography is probably one of the hardest thing I have tried so far. During our West Coast trip, I had only 2 chances to capture the Sunset.

Our first Sunset was in Hollywood at Griffith Park Observatory. It was such a great place to visit with amazing view of the City of Angels.

The sunset view became more special when you share with someone you love.

The next day we went to Santa Monica in the afternoon. The Santa Monica beach was a great place to spend a day with kids. There are lot of fun things to do. The view of the Sunset was also amazing.

As we were leaving, we turned around and found this view of the Santa Monica ferris wheel during the Sunset. The lights were on and the fun had just begun.

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What to do with kids if you only have 48 hours to visit Los Angeles?

As we are planning our Southern California trip, I have planned out what to do in San Diego down to the hours.. Ok. I’m a bit obsessive when it comes to travel planning. I know that. Now that San Diego plan is ready, I can turn my attention to Los Angeles.

Los Angeles in 2 days is not merely enough but I just have to do it. I need my Thai food fix. It will kill me if I fly all that way but couldn’t taste Thai food that as close as I can get in Thailand. I just have to do it. :)

I know that LA is big so no matter how well I plan, we won’t be able to see it all. This time I will just focus on kid-friendly and preferably cheap or free activities. We plan to stay in the Hollywood area for easy access to much of the activities.

Here are my Top 10 Frugal Family Friendly things to Do with Kids in LA.

1. Griffith Park -The City of Los Angeles park – Griffith Park is a great place for the whole family. The biggest city park in the country has so many attractions and activities you will think you are visiting a theme park. Kids can enjoy train ride from LA Life Steamers Railroad Museum or Griffith Park Southern ride and visiting Travel Town. If train is not in their interests, perhap a pony ride or Griffith Park Merry-Go-Round. Oh! And the best part, admission is FREE for everyone. So you can have great fun in LA on a budget with your family and your kids.

2. Griffith Observatory – An iconic place of LA is not only in a great and amazing location but also FREE. What else can we ask for? The Griffith Park Observatory is part of Griffith Park. There is also planetarium show that you will have to pay small fee to watch the show. However, the show is not recommended for kids under the ages of 5. There are still plenty of kids-friendly interactive displays to keep little ones busy.

3. Grauman’s Chinese Theatre – One of the most famous theatre in LA or even in the world. Hollywood is all about movies and there is nothing that will be more hollywood than the Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. You can walk around and checkout the historical cultural landmark. However, you can also check out the inside when you purchase the movie tickets. It likes killing two birds with one stone. But your movie tickets cost might be a bit higher than your hometown movie ticket.

4. Hollywood Walk of Fame – It’s cheesy, yes. But it’s fun. Kids will enjoy tracing their hands on many famous stars’ handprints. Walking along the Hollywood will give them a taste of fame. The best part is that it’s totally free. Just enjoy the stroll and have the discipline not to buy too many souvenirs.

5. El Capitan Theatre - Another famous theme theatre in Los Angeles. Also with the association with Disney it can’t go wrong for family with kids. I have been so in love with old world theatre like the Fox theatre in Atlanta. So I’m really looking forward to watching Disney movie in this historical theatre. Ok. The tickets might be a bit higher than typical AMC tickets. But it’s still a good deal comparing to other attraction around town especially in a big city like Los Angeles.

6. Page Museum – La Brea Tar Pits - A unique experience that kids will talk for year. As long as I have known, kids love things that are gross or out of ordinary. And the La Brea Tar Pits is both. The smell will probably stay with you for a whole day. But it will be an experience they will talk about for years to come. It’s not just all smell but kids will learn about one of the world largest and most diverse assemblage of extinct Ice Age plants and animals. The admission is free on 1st Tuesday of the month. General admission fee is $7 which is very affordable.

7. Getty Villa – I can’t wait to check out this museum that has fantastic Roman-inspired architecture and garden. Kids will be inspired by this educational museum that dedicate to the study of Greece, Rome and Etruria. Another big plus is the admission is FREE. There is a parking for $15 per car. But that’s very cheap considering you are in LA.

8. Santa Monica Pier – A fun outdoor pier offers a variety of entertainment, dining and shopping experiences, including the thrill rides of Pacific Park; a historic 1922 Carousel, and an interactive aquarium. You will also be able to enjoy the beautiful view of the Pacific coast and stay a while longer to take in the amazing view of the Sunset. There is no admission so it’s one of the major attractions that will fit any budget. There are several great family-friendly hotels by the beach.

9. LACMA NexGen Gallery – One of the Top 10 Best Art Museums for Kids deserves to be one of the best. There are a variety of programs to encourage kids in arts. Plus the NexGen program which is the only FREE youth membership program in the country allows kids to experience art even more. Join the program is free to all kids and will allow kids to enter the gallery for FREE along with one free admission for adult who accompanies the kid. At the Boone Gallery, you will can also utilize a variety of programs built with family in mind – family guides, collection highlights, children audio tour and art tole.  This what I call best program for kids!!!

10. Walt Disney Concert Hall – A unique architecture that’s a home of Los Angeles Philharmonic is a great place to visit even if you don’t want to sit through 2 hours for a concert. You can take the self-guided audio tour or guided tour daily at the Music Center. Check out the website for schedule and time.

So now, my problem is just finding time to fit all these options to my schedule.

Is there other fun and free things to do with kids in Los Angeles that I missed? Please feel free to leave me a comment!

Photo Credit: JohnMueller

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