This post will help you create the perfect Los Angeles Itinerary for you and your travel besties.
Why L.A.?
So many thoughts come to my mind when I think about Los Angeles such as shopping on Rodeo Drive, the Hollywood sign, brunch at the iconic Beverly Hills Hotel, exploring art exhibits, and supporting Black-owned restaurants. This Spring, I decided to see the beautiful city for myself and catch a Los Angeles Lakers game of course.
If you’re planning on visiting Los Angeles this year, this is the perfect post for you. This post is filled with gems to help you plan a trip to Los Angeles and locate black-owned restaurants for your next vacation.
When to Travel to Los Angeles?
Traveling to Los Angles during Spring will give you a great opportunity to explore the city without overwhelming crowds of people. If you want to go to the beach, you should travel to L.A. toward the end of Spring or during summer when the weather is warmer.
Where To Stay
A great trip starts with great hospitality. When planning a trip to Los Angeles, it is important that you nail down where you are staying before you start planning your activities. Not only will this establish the vibe of the trip but it will also help you decide how to budget your money for the trip.
FRUGAL TIP FROM CIARA:
If you’re staying at a hotel with a lot of amenities, then it makes more sense for you to include some of those amenities on your itinerary instead of paying for transportation to go do something similar at another location.
Los Angeles is composed of different regions and different experiences await in each one. If it is your first time in Los Angeles, you want to experience as much as you can so for this itinerary we focused on hotels in Downtown L.A., Beverly Hills, and West Hollywood.
We opted for the AC hotel by Marriott Beverly Hills which exceeded our expectations. The location was central to all our activities plus the amenities complemented our itinerary. The price was perfect for our budget too.
When choosing our hotel, I also had my eyes on Pendry West Hollywood and The West Hollywood Edition. I eventually chose the best option for our budget and our itinerary.
Things To Do in Los Angeles
This portion varies from group to group and your interest in activities might change depending on who you are traveling with. For example, if you are traveling with Kids then you might build your trip around visiting theme parks such as Disney world and Universal studios. If you are going on trip with friends, then you might focus on rooftop bars and shopping. When researching Los Angeles, I saw a bunch of tours and museums that sparked my interest such as visiting The Los Angeles Museum of Love, The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, The Griffith Observatory. I found the website, Discover Los Angeles, to be extremely helpful and informative when finding things to do in Los Angeles and pop-up events to attend.
My trip to Los Angeles was a couple’s trip and we went to Los Angeles with our eyes set on attending an L.A. Lakers basketball game. That was the first event that we included on our 5 Day itinerary and then we built it up from there.
To find activities, I searched various social media sites because I love to see visual evidence of people enjoying establishments. I ended up finding OOO (Out of Office) which is a new app that helps you create itineraries while also accessing past itineraries and recommendations from people you follow and other people who have traveled to those areas. This app made planning this trip to L.A. so much easier. You can even share the itinerary with your travel mates which is such a unique feature. It takes away the hassle of typing up a full itinerary and constantly updating it as plans change.
LOS ANGELES ITINERARY
Day 1: Arrival Day
Hotel Check-In
Explore a Museum or Go on a Tour
Hollywood Walk of Fame
Dinner at Yamashiro Hollywood
Day 2: Breakfast at The Court Café
Explore a Museum or Go on a Tour or Visit a Theme Park
Lakers Game at Crypto.com Arena or Dinner at Tao
The Highlight Room
Day 3: Breakfast at Poppy + Rose
Day Party at PH Day & Night Club
HiHo Cheeseburger
Station 1640
Day 4: Lunch at Stevie’s Creole Café
Shopping at The Grove, Beverly Center, Rodeo Drive
BOA Steakhouse
Day 5: Departure Day
You should do whatever works best for you and your travel arrangements.
Where To Eat
Can you even visit Los Angeles without having In-N-Out? Yes, you absolutely can. In-N-Out is delicious but I knew that due to the location of most of our activities, it would not fit into our itinerary. This really was not a big deal since L.A. is loaded with food options for every diet.
I decided to include some black-owned restaurants on our itinerary because it is so rare to come across a hub of black owned restaurants. To find these black-owned restaurants, I used a new app called Eat Okra. If you love Yelp, then you will also love this app. One thing that I really love about this app is that it updates you about the development of new black owned restaurants from restaurateurs before the restaurants are built. It also features well known foodies and their top picks for different locations. I will use this app going forward for all my vacations within the United States.
I hope this article helps you to plan a fun trip to LA. Feel free to share this Los Angeles Itinerary with your travel besties!
Disclaimer: The Modern Bestie is not affiliated with any of the companies mentioned in this article and The Modern Bestie does not receive sponsorship or payment from any of the companies mentioned in this article.
