Rough Guides - Los Angeles

Thanks to Hollywood, most people on the planet have at least an idea of what Los Angeles is like, though this usually involves lots of palm trees, movie stars and glamour. The City of Angels, Tinseltown or just La-La Land is the home of the worlds movie and entertainment industry, the palaces of Beverly Hills, Sunset Strip, the original Disneyland, the Dodgers and the Lakers and a beach culture that inspired Californias modern surfing boom in the 1950s, the Beach Boys, the Doors and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Yet first-time visitors should expect some surprises, beginning with the vast size of the place, hard to absorb until you actually get here. LA is only Americas second biggest city in terms of population, but its stitched together by an intricate network of freeways crossing a thousand square miles of widely varying architecture, social strata and cultures.

Beyond the skyscrapers, Downtown LA actually has an historic Spanish-Mexican heart and is a traffic-clogged sixteen miles from the hip ocean enclaves of Santa Monica and Venice Beach and thanks to high crime and gangster rap, South Central LA and Compton have become bywords for violence and gangs such as the Crips and the Bloods.

Bordered by snowcapped mountains and the Pacific Ocean, Los Angeles spreads across a great desert basin. The entertainment industry has been hyping the place ever since film-makers arrived a century ago, attracted by a climate that allowed them to film outdoors year-round. Since then, the money and glitz of Hollywood have enticed countless thousands of would-be actors, models and other budding celebrities to cast their lot in this hard-edged glamour town, their triumphs and failures becoming intrinsic to the citys towering myths. Today LA seems to be re-inventing itself again, as indie musicians, writers and designers (many fleeing high rents in San Francisco) are colonizing neighbourhoods such as Echo Park, Highland Park and Silver Lake, adding a bohemian and artistic vibe to a city often stereotyped as being in thrall to celebrity and beauty. Beyond the city proper lies the San Fernando Valley or simply the Valley , home to the movie studios of Burbank and Universal City , while to the east, the San Gabriel Valley is anchored by historic Pasadena and the lavish Huntington Library and Gardens . To the south, Orange County features a strip of affluent beach towns and the ever-popular Disneyland in Anaheim.

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THE GETTY CENTER

Highlights

This futuristic shrine to Basquiat, Hirst, Johns, Koons and Warhol is a work of art in itself.

The vaunted main strip in Hollywood is packed with gorgeous Art Deco theatres, tacky but fun museums, the Walk of Fame and the home of the Oscars.

For high-end consumers (and avid window-shoppers), this compact section of Downtown Beverly Hills, featuring jewellery, fashion and beauty boutiques, is the main reason to visit Los Angeles.

A colossal, Modernist arts centre, the Getty is stuffed with treasures of the Old World and is set on a hillside providing a great view of the metropolis.

Trawling the promenade between Santa Monica and Venice is an LA tradition, taking in the surfers, sand, musclemen, skaters and assorted eccentrics.

Kids might prefer Disneyland, but thrill-seekers should skip Mickey Mouse and make for the mother of all rollercoaster parks.

This classically dark and moody watering hole has long been a favourite hangout for movie stars of the Golden Age and todays brattier celebrities.