Happy New Year at the Rose Bowl!

Wow what a way to ring in a New Year!  No better way than seeing my Dawgs beat Oklahoma in what I think may have been the best game I've ever watched. While my heart couldn't take many games like that, the outcome was one that made the win even sweeter.  The Dawgs fought hard and proved they wanted and deserved that win and now I cannot wait to watch them take the stage tomorrow night for the NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP!  We have waited a long time for this one and I only hope and pray we have the same outcome as last week.
The Rose Bowl has been one we have always said we would go to should GA play there and we were really excited when that was the bowl we were playing in.  The day after the SEC championship when the rankings were announced we were online booking plane tickets and hotel.  We left Atlanta on Friday night along with a plane full of Dawg fans.  We flew into Ontario just outside of LA and got there around midnight which was actually 3 am eastern time.   So needless to say we got to the hotel and crashed.  It was nice that we could sleep and still wake up with it being early in California.

On Saturday we got up and decided to do some sightseeing in Beverly Hills and Hollywood.  We loved just looking at the houses with all their landscaping, of course we shopped down Rodeo Drive or looked that is, and we even drove up through some of the Hollywood neighborhoods.  The houses were so nice and it was just crazy to see all these homes going up these narrow steep roads.  Most of them have a lot of bushes or fences to give them a lot of privacy.  It is just very different.  Some of our views weren't that great of the city because the fog/smog was so bad this particular day.  The weather was great though and considering how cold it was back home we were glad to get these warmer temps.
Of all the times, my sunglasses broke on the airplane and I am a huge sunglasses girl.  I have to have sunglasses so that was at the top of my list to get.  I will be able to say I got my pair of sunglasses in Beverly Hills.

 These chandeliers hung going down Rodeo drive.  A guy had told Joanna that each one had cost $30,000.  Who knows for sure but they were fun to see!  I would love to have seen it all lit at night.

This middle watch was just a small $94,000

Yay for new sunglasses!

We took a ride down Hollywood Blvd and got out to see a few of the stars.  They go up and down both sides of the road so unless you want to find one in particular you just walk and look.  We walked a few blocks to see who we could see.  I lucked up and found one of my favorites...Adam Levine.

After Hollywood Blvd we decided to see the Hollywood sign.  This was the most confusing for us because we had read about several places to go to get good views.  Driving we could see it very good but it wasn't that easy finding the best place to stop.  There were hikes that we read about but we really didn't have on hiking shoes so we headed to the Griffin Observatory which we had seen as a good place to go.  Well this turned out to be a huge let down for us.  We had no desire to walk around inside with the other 5,000 people and the sign was pretty distant as you can see.  It was just not fun for us having to wait to get up there then getting up there, freezing, and not seeing the sign like we wanted.  Not to mention at this point we were all getting hangry!

We finished our night eating Mexican in Pasadena.  I wish I had a picture of the first Mexican restaurant we went to.  What was on the map turned out to be so sketchy but we died laughing when we saw it.  Laughed and then drove on!  

Sunday we were up ready to see more and we started our morning at a little breakfast cafe called Cafe Buna.  This was a great breakfast and we had a fun time there.  Let me just write this little fact...bathrooms are valuable in California.  You cannot just stop anywhere to go unless you are a customer and the whole entire trip we couldn't believe how hard it was to find a bathroom!  It was awful!  This particular morning we left Cafe Buna only to come back shortly after since there were no other bathrooms.  We had just rode around Marina Del Ray and stopped at the marina.  Next we headed to Venice Beach which we had seen was great for people watching.  It definitely was that.  WE stopped at Muscle Beach.  This was where Arnold Schwarzenegger used to work out.  We let the guys get out there and show off their workout skills since they supposedly do this at home 3 times a week...really though that is just ping pong sessions!

 In the town of Venice they have a canal running through that some of the houses back up to.  It is modeled after the real Venice in Italy and it was neat going over the little bridges and seeing these canals.

Venice Beach

This guy was working out in his firefighter get up

Hubs on the pull up bar

We saw it all down there at Muscle Beach 

 Once we left Venice we went on up the cost but when we got to Malibu we decided we would need to turn around because our little trip up the coast was getting ruined by the fog.  It was so thick you could not see a thing!  That would make our trip pointless since we couldn't see.  You can see in this picture on the Malibu pier how bad the fog is behind us.

Since our coastal drive was shortened we headed back to LA to try to get a better glimpse of the Hollywood sign.  Like I mentioned, the day before our view was disappointing. This time we went to a random intersection and got a picture and then rode up into a neighborhood which actually took us right under the sign.  We couldn't get the best picture but we did see it up close.  If I ever go back to L.A. though I will do a hike to see the sign.   Just my recommendation from what we saw.

Since it was New Year's Eve a group of us had plans to eat in Santa Monica.  We had a great time.  It was so much fun going out all over and seeing so many Dawg fans out and about.  After dinner we walked out to the Santa Monica pier.  We talked with our friends and family back home while they were ringing in the New Year.  We did happen to see a few fireworks which was just what we wanted and then we headed back to our hotel.  We had an early day the next day so making it until midnight (California time) wasn't going to happen.

The next morning we were up early to get to Pasadena for the Rose Bowl parade.  We had grand stand seats which was nice.  We did have to wait an hour for a bathroom, again the bathroom problems continued, but we were in our seats by 8 which was when the parade started.  This parade was such a fun one.  The floats were all so pretty with so many beautiful flowers.  Definitely my favorite part was when the Red Coat band came through.  There were so many Georgia fans everywhere and everyone went crazy when they came marching through.

The pooper scoopers were definitely some of the fan favorites!

Here comes the Red Coats!

These tow trucks were called in for the broke down floats.  The big dragon broke down just after it passed our seats.

FC at the Rose Bowl

such an awesome fly over

 This game kept me on edge to say the least.  The first half had us worried while the second half had us shaking and praying for the win.  At one point though I couldn't help but take a picture of how pretty the sky was.  All this as Rodrigo was kicking the extra point!  Of course GA would go on to win it in double over time and we would celebrate the rest of the night.  We were screaming, crying just over the moon happy that in one week we would be playing in the natty!!  All of us Georgia fans have been waiting on this one for a while!

Tuesday we had all day to sight see again before catching the red eye flight home that night.  We chose to ride up the Pacific Coast Highway again since our first try was ruined by fog.  This day was much better with no fog! We rode all the way up to Santa Barbara going through Malibu, Santa Monica, and Ventura.  It was a pretty drive and I'm glad the weather cooperated for us.

a view from the homes in Malibu

Ventura

our lunch stop

point Magu

Sunset driving back to L.A.

 We left L.A. at 10:00 pm (California time) and landed in Atlanta at 6:00 am.  We got home at 8:00 so you can see we did not get much sleep at all.  I had to lay down for a couple of hours when we got home and got to wake up to this little bulldog! I had missed that sweet boy and my girls!!  GOOOO DAWGS!  I can't wait to cheer them on in Atlanta on Monday!!