My Super Duper Road Trip 2017 Part 3

Sunday April 30: After getting ourselves together, Erich and I went to our favorite place for breakfast in the LA area, CINDY'S. Cindy's is on the outskirts of Eagle Rock. We discovered Cindy's quite by accident back in January 2016...and it was INCREDIBLE! We couldn't wait to go back this trip. And since it was Sunday, they had their special brunch menu. BONUS YUM!

Amazingly, the hospital I work for was recently named one of the best healthcare facilities to work for in the country and they made a video to celebrate this. In the video, everyone is lip-syncing/dancing to a Justin Timberlake video/song. (I'm NOT in it--by choice.) I had never seen the original video and after watching the Valley Children's Hospital version, I watched the Timberlake version. My jaw dropped. Where is he at the beginning of the video? CINDY'S!  Ha! Click the word VIDEO to see it. Who KNEW we were so trendy? Ha! After breakfast, we were off to Hollywood. We parked the car just off of Melrose, just down the street from Raleigh Studios. Raleigh Studios, you ask? I know you've never heard of it, but if you have ever seen WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?, you've seen Raleigh. Bette Davis/Baby Jane drives into the studio gate in the film.

  No, Raleigh Studios was NOT our destination. Instead, we were heading to the studio right across the street, PARAMOUNT STUDIOS.

We'd been to Universal Studios a bunch of times (and it's more amusement park than actual "studio"). In 2016, we visited Warner Bros.Studio, and that had been a really awesome tour. So we decided to check out Paramount's studio tour. 

The waiting area was filled with costumes, props and even some Oscars for Best Picture (including the first-ever winner, "WINGS"). Once the tour began, we realized it was a truly intimate tour. I think there were only 5 of us on the tour plus the tour guide. One of the first stops was a warehouse filled with props, costumes, and set pieces that we were allowed to explore, touch, play with or even try on (I passed on the costumes, thank you...).

In the next shot, behind the giant shoes, is some transporter thing used in one of the STAR TREK movies. I beamed over... How amazing!

Throughout the tour, I kept trying to find the sound stage where THE BRADY BUNCH had been filmed. (There are plaques on the various sound stages saying what films/TV shows had been filmed within them). I never did see it, but when we got to the section of the lot that had once been RKO, and later Desilu, we came to this park-like area. The tree in the middle, although now way overgrown, is the sane tree where (gasp!) Greg Brady was caught smoking! (Oh my STARS!!!) (They even showed us a film clip of that scene. Ha!)

Our lovely tour guide...Alec (yes, that was her name). She was just awesome!

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We went into several sound stages and saw the sets for the Jane Fonda/Lily Tomlin comedy GRACE AND FRANKIE, the set for some Nickelodeon superhero kid's show, THE THUNDERMANS, and the DR. PHIL and THE DOCTORS talk show sets. We also we allowed to walk around and explore the NEW YORK back lot section...we even went into some of the "buildings".

Let's go through this door...

Zowie--not much space or many amenities. Ha!

This little first aide station is crammed in between sound stages. The back patio was apparently the patio of a beach house for Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis in "TOP GUN" (I saw the flick---but don't remember the scene...).

We also got to tram thru the original arch for the studio, which was used in SUNSET BOULEVARD and has been iconic since the studio started.

Then they had one of the 4 (!?!) benches used for FORREST GUMP...so, of course, I sat on it. Forget Forrest Gump. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Flabby Lump.

The tour was good and worth the price of admission. It was a Sunday, so there was not much activity on the lot---which may have been a bonus for us (would we have been able to visit all of the sound stages otherwise?). However, I preferred the Warner's tour, truth be told.  After the tour, we hurried over to downtown Hollywood where we were to meet Nedra at the Hard Rock Cafe in the Hollywood/Highland Center. We were going to go on a TMZ CELEBRITY TOUR. 

We met at the bar and had a cocktail or two before the tour. Mmm. Mine was super delicious. 

Once aboard the tour bus, we were off on a 2-hour tour and celebrity hunt. The tour guide kept asking us to keep an eye out for celebrities. To tell you the truth, I don't know who anyone is these days. One tour goer had been on the tour before and she had seen a celebrity---one of the "Real Housewives". WHO? Never seen it. We drove around Hollywood, down the Sunset Strip (I was dismayed to see that the Rocky & Bullwinkle statue was gone) and into Beverly Hills.

The TMZ tour didn't really work for me. The best part (to me) was seeing a toy bunny committing suicide by hanging (ahhh, the city of broken dreams) and, at a stop at some famous gay bar called The Abbey (Elizabeth Taylor used to hang out there--whoopie!) where we stopped for a long time "looking for celebrities", a female employee came on board the bus and gave us all cookies. Ha!

Other than that, most of the lure and locations (The Viper Club, where Joaquin Pheonix died or the Chateau Marmont where John Belushi O.D.ed, or the Roosevelt Hotel where JFK and Marilyn Monroe were said to have hooked up, etc.) were stuff I already knew. Oh well. I never watch TMZ anyway. But I DID find out that TMZ is an old movie term, meaning Thirty Mile Zone. Back in the day, if you filmed within thirty miles from the center of Los Angeles, you did not have to compensate the union actors/extras for excessive transportation costs. Ha!  Oh, and I "won" an official TMZ Celebrity Tour sippy cup. Whoo hoo! (You KNOW you are super jealous... Ha!)

Following that, we met Nedra at a restaurant called MESS HALL for dinner and drinks.

It was also the end of our time in Los Angeles and time to bid Nedra farewell. It was sooooo incredibly groovy to see her and to have gotten to spend time with her. I miss her already.

That's it for April 30th. Stay tuned as May 1st had us hitting the road to fabulous Las Vegas...with a silly-fun stop along the way.

Stay tuned. (Or jump to the next section HERE).

 CHEERS!