If I told you about a sunny place that has year-round warm weather where you could also go to a beautiful beach and hike in the mountains on the same day, it would sound like paradise. This is what it was like in the beautiful Golden State of California. Last summer, when I visited the Los Angeles area of California, I found nothing but sun, warmth, and good vibes.
My family and I have always loved traveling, and we often travel around the country. When I found out that we were going to California, I was not very excited. The first thing that popped into my mind was traffic and humid weather. I could not have been more wrong. It’s a quick six-hour flight from Philadelphia to Los Angeles. This flight could cost anything between $241 and $489 depending on the airline you fly from, assuming you fly economy class. After a long flight shortened by naps, the pilot announced that we would be landing soon. I looked out the window and found myself looking at a beautiful, vast mountain range that stretched for miles. It was already much nicer than I anticipated it to be, but the real shock came when I stepped outside for the first time, and it was not humid at all. It was hot, but I never found myself suffocating from the warmth or sweating profusely from the humid air.
I was fortunate enough to travel there with a close family friend, Saben Shawhan, who travels there about 6-8 times a year for multiple weeks at a time. He has been traveling all over the state, including places like Palm Springs, San Diego, San Francisco, Anaheim, and Los Angeles. Though he travels often for work, he said he never gets sick of going to California. When asked to describe it, he said that there was great food and you could probably find any type of food to eat there, and it is amazing. He said that it has so many amazing outdoor activities and is a very fun outdoor place to be if you are into that kind of stuff. Along with this, he mentioned that there are lots of crazy personalities there, and the entertainment options are fun and affordable. Unfortunately, Saben is often down there with clients for work purposes, but he said he has the most fun when he can go out and try things that are too casual to try with clients, such as a midnight food truck.
I could not agree more with everything he said. I never had a bad meal while I was down there whether it was street empanadas from an Argentinian man obsessed with Lionel Messi on the Venice Beach walkway or a highly-rated sushi restaurant owned and run by a family of Japanese immigrants, everything I ate was delicious. With the weather always being nice, it has no choice but to be a very outdoors-friendly place. I found that most restaurants had more outdoor seating than indoor, and every house had a beautiful porch for the owner to enjoy. The entertainment was endless in California, too. You could see a soccer game, watch a concert at a beautiful music venue, and then see a man with a Giant snake all in the day in Los Angeles. My favorite source of entertainment down there is watching Olympic skateboarders and rollerbladers do tricks at the famous Venice Beach skate park. I was able to see a man do a flip on his skateboard with his infant son in his arms for free.
Saben also mentioned some complaints about California, which were that the time zone often messes up communications with people still on the East Coast and that it is very expensive to live there. It is extremely unfortunate that it is expensive to live there because it is so hard not to fall in love with the state. With there being so many things to do and warm weather year-round to keep me occupied, California skyrocketed to the top of my “where I want to live” list. One major complaint I found online was that there was bad traffic, especially once you found yourself around some of the big cities. When I first climbed into the rental car, I expected our hour trip to our house to take two hours. Realistically, there was about 20 minutes of added time from traffic, and that included driving through Los Angeles. After talking to Pennridge High School student Casey Malone, who recently went there for a soccer tournament, she agreed with most of what is stated online and did find herself sitting in lots of traffic. Along with this, she added that the weather and scenery were so nice that it made the waiting not so bad. Though she was down there for a soccer tournament, she said it was easy to relax anywhere in her downtime because of the warm weather and good vibes.
On one of the days we traveled to Venice Beach, I found myself with some extra time to do whatever I wanted. I found myself biking for miles upon miles, soaking in the hot sun and letting it beat down on my back while looking to my left to see a beautiful sunny beach full of people playing volleyball and waves crashing, then looking to my right to see all the unique people and different food places Venice had to offer. I never found it so easy to lose track of time because I then found myself miles from my family, hurrying to make it back to where my family was so we could go and eat whatever delicious meal we had planned for that night.
When my mom first told me that we were going to go to California, I was honestly disappointed. Everything I read in the news and on social media gave me the idea that it was not a very nice area with snobby people. This could not have been further from the truth. I found some of the most beautiful places I have ever seen, along with meeting some really kind people. Ever since I was a kid, I have been told, “Never judge a book by its cover,” but it never really applied to my life until I went to California. Overall, this was an extremely eye-opening experience for me and something I truly believe I will never forget.
