Weekend getaway: Destination, Los Angeles

This past weekend, I headed down to L.A. with my friend Shelby. Her fiancee races in the West series and they had a race at Irwindale Speedway on July 4th. We flew down Thursday night and once we got in, we had dinner at a BBQ place called Wood Ranch with some of Jeff's sponsors.

Friday, the guys had to be at the track by 6:30 am, so Shelby and I got up and took them and then we headed back to the hotel to get ready. It was going to be a warm day and I wasn't looking forward to it. Thank goodness Jeff's hauler has A/C and we were able to be in the hauler for the good part of the day. Jeff did well in practice and qualified 6th. Prior to this race, he had raced there 4-5 times and had never finished a race yet so that was his goal. He stayed in the top 5 for the whole race, even battling for the lead on the last lap of the first part of the race. It was exciting and fun to watch and it was the best West race I've ever seen. Jeff hung on for 4th and he was so happy to just finish, and to get a top 5 just made it that much better.



Saturday morning we got up and took the guys to the airport and then Shelby and I went to find our Hotel. Tom tom got us lost (although it was probably an operator error) haha. We finally found the Marriott in downtown LA and we were really impressed with the room. It had the coolest bathroom ever with the movie lighting on the sides, so cool! We dropped our luggage off and then we went shopping. We went to the Fashion District which is blocks and blocks of shops. We bought so much stuff! We left there around 3:00 and headed for Beverly Hills. We stopped at a bunch of shops along there and I almost bought a purse at Juicy but I didn't love it, so I decided to wait until I find one that I absolutely love. We went into Dior, Coach, Juicy, Dolce & Gabana, BCBG, Kitson, Kitson Kids, and a few others that I don't remember the names of. We also went to the Crumbs cupcake shop that is a favorite of some celebs.




Next we decided to drive down Sunset Blvd. and we found the biggest shoe warehouse I have ever been to. It was unreal and overwhelming. We tried on sooo many different shoes and Shelby ended up with a few pairs. By this time it was getting later so we headed back to the hotel to get ready to go out.

There weren't really any clubs around us and Shelby wasn't a fan of getting a cab, so we walked across the street to the Westin. We heard there was a great steakhouse there so that's where we went. It was on the 35th floor and it was a rotating bar. We got a window seat and got to see the whole city and night so that was really cool. We had nice dinners of fillet Mignon and shrimp. After dinner, we headed downstairs to a club called Suede. It was brand new and very nice. We made some friends, had some drinks and just had a good time.





Sunday morning we got up and had breakfast at our hotel which was really good and then we made the journey to LAX. That place was a zoo. We walked in and I said, yea were not going to make our flight. The line was wrapped around 4 times, and that was just to check your luggage, not to mention the line for security. We ended up making it through it plenty of time and our plane was a little late so we were fine. We both slept on the plane home and then I read my book. We got home and went to dinner at The Rock and then I headed home.

We had the best time down there and we both agreed we need to do it again!