Waking up Saturday Morning, I was fully prepared for the events of the day to come. For this day, we planned on driving to Venice Beach, where we would bike the 6 miles along the board walk till we got to the end of Santa Monica, which was the end of the bike path. The first thing that struck me about the day was the weather. Though many people think that the beach resides in this sort of perpetual sunlight, there are actually many days where it will be the only place that is overcast. This was one of those days, as it was pretty overcast and gray out. However, the humidity added some heat to the air so it was still comfortable to wear shorts. Anyways, we rented our bikes and got started along the path. The bike path is actually pretty calm, as it is located about 100 feet away from the boardwalk. Because of this the first part of the trip was pretty quiet, as most of the people we encountered were pedestrians or other cyclists. This part was uneventful and it took us about an hour to bike to the end of the path. At the end of the path is the Santa Monica Pier. For those too lazy to do a Google image search, it is basically a small amusement park located on a pier. Games, over priced theme restaurant, rides, you name it.
After getting bored after about ten minutes, we decided to head back, though instead of going along the bike trail we went along the Venice Beach Boardwalk. This is where the real entertainment is. Because there is no regulation over who can set up shop along the boardwalk, just about anyone is able to sell whatever they have. Art enthusiasts can purchase wood engravings of Barack Obama and Michael Jackson. Music lovers have plenty to choose from, as I saw such advertised acts as a guy who did bird calls and a Jamaican guy who freestyled about people that walked by his stand. There were also more medical marijuana stands then I have ever seen in my life. Every five feet I had some guy walk up to me asking if I wanted a five minute "doctor's examination". Granted the examination probably consists of the doctor asking your name, but they didn't seem to really be hurting anybody. Maybe annoying people as they walked by, but you quickly learn to ignore them. It’s not like this are was particularly clean looking either, as there were some parts of the boardwalk that looked like they were out of a shady third world street market.
After we went turned our rented bikes back into the shop we rented them from, we decided to drive down to Huntington Beach to see if we could get anywhere close to the world surf championships that were going on. As soon as we got into town, we realized that we didn't have a shot in the world of finding parking, as a hundred thousand people had descended upon the town to watch the festival. Cutting our loses, we at least got a feel of the atmosphere while waiting in the traffic that was going through the center of town.
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