Fodor's Travel Talk Forums - Santa Monica Trip Report

My wife and I spent a long weekend in Santa Monica in Feburary. Thanks to all those on this forum for their recommendations. Herewith is a brief trip report. We flew into LAX midday Thursday from separate cities (I from Portland, my wife from Atlanta) and happened to walk off the plane at the same time at adjacent gates. Too perfect. Within 2 minutes we were in baggage claim (where some sort of movie/TV show was being filmed) and hopped outside to wait for the Dollar Rent-a-Car bus. Took about 15 minutes of waiting and travel time until we arrived at the Dollar site and had to wait in line for about 15 more minutes before getting the car (note: most agencies, even discounters like Thrifty and Dollar, now have a free frequent renter program – sign up for it – we would have avoided the line) and other than the Dollar rep pushing us hard to prepay for the tank of gas (who falls for this?) the car was fine (and a good price at $21/day for a compact). Drove the 7 or 8 miles directly to Santa Monica through busy, but not unbearable, traffic. Not very scenic, but it only took 20-30 minutes. Arrived at our hotel, the Fairmont Mirimar (used to be the Sheraton), were stopped at the gate by security and asked our last name. Once I gave it, we were welcomed and waved in, and the guy didn’t even have to check a list. He said he remembered the name. Nice touch, or maybe they just decide whether you look legitimate or not. Drove past the gate around the largest fig tree I’ve even seen, dropped of the car and registered. We were staying at a corporate rate ($219) so we didn’t get the best room, but it was fine. Nothing fancy, but comfortable and it even had a wetbar. Biggest plus was windows that open all the way to let air in (this seems to be vary rare in today’s hotels). The lobby and public areas are very nice and the pool, while somewhat small (and too cold to use) was nestled in a very attractive courtyard. There is a fairly large half-inside, half-outside sauna and an extensive workout room. But having just finished a 3-day, 3-city road show for work, I was more interested in the hotel’s bar facilities than the workout facilitites. After a couple of well-deserved drinks that the hotel bar and a few handfuls of those wonderful nuts that fancy hotel bars provide (almost makes those $7.50 drinks seem resonable), we struck out for our first look as Santa Monica. We purposely chose the Fairmont due to its proximity to the 3rd Street Promenade as we largely rely on our feet for transportation on vacation and we wanted to be close to the action. We were unimpressed with the 3rd Street Promenade, however. While we expected it to be touristy, it was a bit much. Lots of noisy (and largely untalented) street performers, lots of restaurant hawkers, lots of time-share peddlers, and lots of the same national chain stores that seem to be popping up in every tourist center in the country (The Gap, Anthroplogie, Banana Republic, French Connection, etc). We moved on to the Santa Monica Pier, and while touristy (how could we not expect it to be), the views of the beach and the sunset and the feel of the wind blowing off of the water were great. We walked to the end and used the cold wind as an excuse to pop into the Mexican restaurant for a couple of beers and some chips and salsa. Oh, to be able to sit in a bar and not worry about someone blowing smoke in your face and all over your clothes is SO NICE! I tip my hat to Californians for making this possible. That night, we dressed up a bit, had a couple more drinks at the hotel bar (they’d added olives stuffed with jalapenos to the nuts) and headed up the street to P.F. Chang’s. I know, I know, it’s a chain, but I have a soft spot for their lemon scallops, and we were fairly tired and figured it would be nice to just walk a couple blocks and have a casual dinner. Well, let me tell you, that place was hopping. It was packed at 7:30 with lots of very beautiful people dressed in very fashionable black. I was glad we dressed up a bit. The plates fly out of the kitchen here, so though we had no reservations, we were seated before we could finish our first drink at the bar (to busy people watching to drink efficiently). And we were paying our check literally 45 minutes after being seated. A great, high energy place for a quick bite before going out – not a good place to linger. The next day (Friday morning) we took the car out, grabbed a couple of fruit smoothies and hit the road toward Malibu. Our intention was to drive as far as Santa Barbara (as it was a tough decision choosing Santa Monica over it to stay in), but construction and traffic on US 1 convinced us that this was not a good idea, so we turned around after driving through some of the hills in Malibu. What a beautiful area! Do those kids at Pepperdine know how good they have it? We dropped the car off around lunch time and walked over to the highly recommended (on this site) Border Grill. This is a neat place with a huge bar – must be great at happy hour. The food was pretty good if expensive. The tacos were nothing much (my wife’s lamb tacos were the best), but they did have a pretty interesting take on tamales – more like creamed corn – and they were delicious. Service was a little aloof – it took me about 10 minutes to get his attention to get another beer. Spicy food demands cold beer, doesn’t it? After lunch we decided to get the car back and drive to Beverly Hills via Santa Monica Blvd. This was a mistake. Traffic was pretty bad. It took us 30 minutes of hot, polluted driving to get 5 miles from the beach. We finally turned around and returned to the hotel, figuring we’d try again early the next day (Saturday). We gave the 3rd Street Promenade another chance, but ended up ducking into the first bar we saw to avoid screeching street performers and offers for free movie tickets. The bar was rather dark, and unfortunately all the beer was stale in the taps (yuck). The very nice and charming bartender told us that they had just re-opened after having been closed for 3 weeks for selling beer to a minor. This had been their first offense – the second would mean a permanent shutdown (pretty harsh!). As she hadn’t carded me or my wife, I sadly came to grips with the fact that we didn’t even raise the mildest suspision of being under 21. Made me feel so old we decided to head back and take a nap. We got up, showered, dressed, made our obligatory visit to the hotel bar and headed out for the long walk to dinner to another fodorite recommendation, Fritto Misto. This is a very causal, very affordable and very popular Italian restaurant on Colorodo Ave. While not cheap (pastas are $10-$13) it is very good and the choices are enormous. Unfortunately, the portions are also enormous – everyone leaving had styrofoam boxes with them. I know that many people would say that getting a lot of food is a good value, but when the portions so grossly exceed what even the biggest appetites can consume, then it’s just wasteful. I’d rather see reasonable portions and the restaurant’s profit margin increase, or better yet, lower the prices! Still, it was delicious. We headed in early as our bellies full of pasta slowed us down a bit. Plus, the next day was our last. We would need our energy. Bright and early Saturday morning, we got in the car, grabbed our fruit smoothies (with energy additive) and headed to Beverly Hills. Traffic was much better, drove briefly through Beverly Hills then up to Hollywood, past some of the Hollywood Blvd attractions (sorry, but Hollywood – in the valley at least - is not a pretty place – mostly dirty buildings and the ugliest tangle of power lines and poles I’ve ever seen). Took a detour and ended up on Mulholland Drive. This was beautiful – it runs along the top of the hills surrounding the city and has lots of vistas to turn off and take in the view (it was a beautifully clear day). And the homes are amazing. Once we’d had enough of the winding hill roads, we headed back towards the Pacific to Venice Beach. Venice seemed like a cool little beach town and the view of Santa Monica from the beach was neat because it gave a good perspective of how far away we were (the beach curves to the left, so Santa Monica is unobstructed from Venice). We didn’t stay long, however, because the boardwalk was mostly torn up (under renovation) and it had become very warm (must have been 80 degrees) and my long pants that seemed like a good idea early that morning were becoming uncomfortable. So we rushed home and changed before lunch. For lunch, we decided to check out Main Street as we had heard that it was a good alternative to 3rd Street. It was a LONG walk from the hotel, but we finally came to the area with the shops/restaurants/bars. We found a great place with a very nice patio (eating outside was a must on this perfect day) called the World Cafe. The service was great as was the food. After lunch we walked a few more blocks, found some cute clothing stores (no Gap here) where my wife bought a couple of summer dresses. As it had gotten to be 2:30, it had become time for a drink. We quickly found a suitable hole in the wall bar with very interesting local clientel, but more importantly, two empty barstools right on the street in the sun (I don’t think the regular customers favored the sun much). We passed a couple of hours chatting with the bartender and throwing our money away in one of those trivia wiz games. Finally we moved on, deciding to head back to our hotel via the beach, running into some “interesting” charactors, but nobody gave us any trouble. The beach itself is huge and there’s a nice concrete path running along much of it for joggers, skaters, etc. One thing that was very different for us as easterners is the way the beach (in Santa Monica) is separated from the hotels. Our hotel is advertised as ocean front, but to get to the beach, you have to cross a 4-lane road and then climb down (via a road or stairs) a 200 foot cliff passing over US 1 in the process. Not a big deal, but anyone expecting to simply walk out of the hotel and onto the beach would be disappointed. We cleaned up, got dressed (it had cooled significantly – actually had to exchange my shorts for a leather coat) and hit the hotel’s restaurant bar for our pre-going out drink and protein (nuts). Saw a very old and very anxious man with an obvious call girl as they were quickly leaving the restaurant. The poor old guy was excitedly instructing any restaurant employee who’d listen than they’d need to have their desert delivered to their room as they had to leave immediately. As the unlikely couple left, I noticed that it was about 7 minutes till 7 o’clock. I wondered whether his hour was about to expire. That night we hit a few of the pubs that are reportedly the result of British ex-pat’s influence on Santa Monica. The Brittania was nice with good service and a good crowd and the absense of smoke is wonderfully noticable. The other pub we hit, the Ye Old Somethingoranother, was even more crowded and full of thick necked bouncers. There must have been 6 of these mafia-looking toughs standing around glaring at everybody. The crowd that was in there clearly didn’t necessitate that kind of muscle, so maybe it gets rowdier as the night goes on. Or maybe it’s a mafia den. We didn’t stick around to find out. Those guys were too creepy. Having tied on a good one by then, I let my wife talk us into staggering down the street to a place she only knew as “One Pico”. The bartender at the Fairmont had recommended it to her. Figuring that “One Pico” referred to the address, we consulted our map beneath a streetlight and made the long walk. When we got to One Pico, we found that it was one of the fancy hotels that had been recommended to us (but was more than my company would pay). It was an exciting scene, comparable to the super hip hotels in South Beach. Lots of beautiful people milling about outside – it almost seemed like the entrance was restricted, but I was pretty tight and had walked A LONG WAY to get to this “One Pico” and I was going in. Didn’t turn out to be a problem. The lobby was huge and pretty swank with a free standing bar in the middle. The place was buzzing. The drinks were fantastic and they served freshly toasted almonds. Pure class. Without seeing the rooms, we decided that this is where we would stay on a return trip with the cost be damned (but I’m sure that was the gin talking). Somehow we made it home, very possibly stopping off somewhere else on the way, but I can’t be sure. We went to bed and awoke to rain (for the first time of the trip) and headed to LAX, stopping off at the World Café for brunch of eggs, spinich pancakes and a split of Veuve Cliquot. Even though it was raining, it was a perfect ending to a great long weekend in Santa Monica.