DAY 8: Still Los Angeles - Tar Pits and Farmers Market

I am actually quite over hearing about mega-mega mansions, the rich and famous and their antics… I must say, there are beautiful homes and lots and lots of very well-known shops around. Lots of glitz and glam. The streets are wide and things are surprisingly tidy compared to other cities. But it’s been enough… today I needed to see something “real” and interesting. 

So I visited the Tar Pits. I have read about these in the past and have been intrigued. As you come through the gates, you can smell the tar, just like when they build a new road. The large areas are fenced in but everywhere, as you walk you see where the tar starts seeping through the grass. In some cases the employees have put cones up to warn you, in other cases these black gooey oozes are just there, coming up in the lawn. There are these large ponds where the tar literally bubbles up, just like the mud pools of Rotorua. 

Black, sticky tar oozing out of the earth.

Just oozing out of the lawn even.

Massive amounts of fossilised bones have been dug up in this area and the museum is full of assembled skeletons of prehistoric animals, even of a mammoth and a giant sloth. 

Statues of some of the animals that lived in the area long ago, are on display on the grounds.

The Tar Pits are on the grounds of LACMA (LA Centre for Modern Art). At the entrance there is an exhibition of Rodin sculptures. Nice but Rodin’s The Kiss is still my favourite. 

On the grounds there is also this very large boulder which I managed to lift above my head (apparently J ).

The lad wo took this photo did quite a good job, don't you think?

Around lunch time I proceeded to the very well-known Farmer's Market.

Look at this! Would you call this a farmer's market?

There was even police guarding the entrance to one shop, no one in and no one out…. I counted 10 of them, AND a police helicopter circling above. No-one would say what was going on but everyone thought it is someone more important than a celebrity who is shopping there. Who knows….

I was happy to try the ice cream sandwich at Haagen Dazs. They have a new cinnamon snickerdoodle cookie (what we would call a biscuit) and I had it with rum and raisin ice cream. The two flavours went together real well. Not sure if I will have it again though. Not because I don’t like it… I like it a lot in fact. It is just that the cookies are very hard and I really do not want to lose a crown.

Eventually I found, off to the side another sign saying Farmers Market…. And there was a food court there with proper food and also meat, fruit and veg for sale. I bought me a Gumbo Ya Ya with corn bread and a side of hot mustard potato salad. This I took home for dinner.

GumboYa Ya with rice, chicken, sausage and shrimp. The corn bread was so-so and the potato salad was spicy!

I was planning to fit in another bus trip that goes all the way past Venice Beach to the Venice Canal area but my feet were sore from all the walking, so I called it a day...... But only after I made good on a promise to Alexander. Mimi went looking for the Avengers… and found three of them! The 3 photos cost me $15 ($5 per superhero), so I really hope Alexander likes them.