The overnight bus, whilst saving me a night's accommodation, didn't offer the best nights sleep I'd ever had so I was a bit tired when we pulled into the LA greyhound station, which is pretty much in the middle of nowhere. I was directed to the nearest metro, 8 blocks away, and set off trudging through the industrial district and Little Tokyo. I'm pretty sure my bag gets heavier with each step!

Once I'd finally arrived at the hostel, after getting off at potentially the best decorated metro in the world, and checked in, I was in an absolutely foul mood. Not only did it cost about 8 dollars more per night than had been advertised, there was no air conditioning so the room was stuffy and hot, the little kitcheny part of the room was dirty and half the windows didn't work. It was not an auspicious start! I was in such a bad mood that I didn't even want to speak to mum on skype! Luckily after a shower and a sit down I had calmed down somewhat and was feeling more positive so decided to go for a quick walk down the Avenue of the Stars. It's a silly thing to be impressed by a pink marble star in the street but nonetheless I was awestruck to see Gene Kelly pretty much as soon as I left the hostel.

I immediately came to the conclusion that Los Angelinos have no compunction about shouting stuff to you in the street, or striking up random conversations, particularly when they hear an English accent. Now this can go one of two ways, either it's creepy men trying to hit on you and telling you you're hot (which in my case I literally am due to the excessive temperature) or you end up having a nice little chat on the bus or the metro, which at least stops you getting too lonely anyway. When I was in San Diego we came up with the term 'drive by compliments' which was exactly what they were, and my British sensibilities have real issues with it, there just isn't any personal space!

It was fortuitous that Dan, of limbo fame, was in LA at the same time I was so we arranged to meet up that afternoon and have a look around Hollywood. Our first port of call was to find a viewpoint for the Hollywood sign, which is difficult to get to if you a) don't have a car or b) refuse to pay for a guided trip round. Luckily there was a spot near my hostel which afforded us some good views - it's not as big as you expect though. The afternoon we spent wandering was well spent, not only did we manage to pick up some free tickets to see a show being filmed at CBS the following evening, but X factor was being filmed at the same time so we got to laugh at the multitudes of people who were queuing around the block for the chance to see the back of Simon Cowell's head. The downside of that though - we couldn't go see Mann's Chinese theatre and all the handprints as that's where it was being filmed. Maybe next time. Hollywood Boulevard is a melting pot of crazies, tourists, stalkers and people trying to sell tours of the celeb homes in the area. It was just a mental place, and a lot seedier than I imagined. I probably should have expected the high number of strip clubs, shops selling strip club wear for the dancers and tattoo parlours, but maybe being naïve I expected it to just generally be a lot cleaner. That's not to say it's not brilliant fun though.

Waking up with a slight wine headache the next morning I decided to go up to Beverly Hills and see how the other half live in Los Angeles. Well, let me tell you, it is just moneybags central up there. Now I went up on the bus, and as LA is so sprawling it takes forever to get anywhere on public transport, as you stop and start every block to drop people off, stop at the intersection lights etc. This does mean that you see a lot more of the city, all the different areas, suburbs and cultures that are there, but as soon as you get into Beverly Hills and have a look down Rodeo Drive you are just in millionaire and trophy wife heaven. Every car was at least a BMW or a Mercedes, the number of doggy spas and daycares was outrageous, palm trees waved in the breeze, boutiques abounded and the women seemed to do nothing all day but sit in nail salons and shop. It was a world away from the districts I'd driven through on the bus. Sadly I didn't see any celebs although it wasn't for want of trying and staring into the shops whist being given evils by the shop assistants.

I went to meet Dan afterwards for our evening of entertainment at CBS studios, via Universal City Walk for a quick look round - I'm pretty sure it was smaller than the Orlando version. We found our way to CBS studios easily enough and got in the queue to go watch Whitney, a comedy I'd seen before at home and had the guy from Glory Daze in it - who although not the title character is definitely the funniest person in the show. If you've never been to watch a programme being recorded I can highly recommend it. Yes it gets a bit repetitive and you have to force the laughs after about the third time, but for someone like me who loves all things TV and film it was brilliant to see something behind the scenes and be a part of it for a little while. I have to say though the warm up guy we had wasn't brilliant, it's got to be a difficult job keeping people engaged for four and a half hours, and maybe I didn't get some of the American humour but he ran very hot and cold. We also got a free sandwich and twinkie so that was a nice bonus. If you ever get chance to watch Whitney I watched the second series episode two being filmed, you might (probably won't) be able to hear my ridiculous laugh every time the name 'Ramona' is mentioned.

One thing that LA has shown me - Americans are not shy when it comes to asking for money. Now LA has a large population of homeless people, as well as jobless with 10 people applying for every vacancy, and I can understand a homeless person asking for money on the streets, it's a worldwide issue. However I did not expect to be asked for money for drinks, for sandwiches, bus fare and for metro fare from every Tom d*** and Harry that sees me walking by. It's not like I'm dressed smartly, and I don't think I give out vibes that say 'I'm loaded ask me for cash', because, lets be honest, I'm pretty much as skint as everyone else out here at the moment! Anyway a quick sorry, no change, seems to be accepted with a 'it was worth a try' kind of shrug and leaving me with a nice beetroot face of embarrassment.

Sadly CBS night signalled Dan's last night in LA so it was back to the drawing board and being a solo traveller once again the next day. Since the weather was so amazing I decided to get on the bus and go to Santa Monica which is meant to be a really nice beachy town/suburb of LA. For the first time in the US leg of my trip's history I had bad weather when I arrived. When I say bad it wasn't howling gales or anything, but it was cloudy which kind of ended my plans to sunbathe! Instead I started walking along the seafront to Venice Beach, home of the more 'artistic' locals. On the way I picked up a man called Henry; you may remember earlier I said about people striking up random conversations - that's what happened here he just started speaking to me randomly; anyway Henry was a very nice chap and walked along to Venice beach with me, pointing out places where films were filmed and telling me about the time he saw David Beckham on Rodeo Drive. Jealous much! Venice beach is home to the infamous 'muscle beach', but, I think as it was a weekday, there were only two men in there, one of whom the only muscles he had were probably from lifting the large number of pies he shoved in his great maw judging by the size of him. If you have never heard of Venice beach it is crazy. The promenade has loads of street stalls selling all kinds of things from paintings to t shirts to painted wooden skulls (Mexican day of the dead stuff), and an unholy number of cannabis shops who name themselves 'Dr Weed'. Basically with the cannabis laws changing in California numerous people did short courses to get certified as a doctor and can now legally sell weed for medicinal purposes, so you go in, pretend you have a bad back or something and get a prescription written up for medical marijuana, thus the entire promenade has a constant whiff of suspicious cigarettes. The people on Venice beach are a real mishmash too. You have your standard tourists like me, locals who look suspiciously normal and thus are probably the freakiest there, green clad weed doctors, skateboarders and then random people such as the ridiculously bronzed old guy in a burgundy mankini I saw in one shop, and a rollerskating, guitar playing Sikh in a turban who is apparently a feature of the landscape he has been around so long!

Once I'd had my fill of madness the sun had come out so I waved goodbye to Henry and got on the bus back to LA, stopping off at Jim Henson's studios and saying hi to Kermit, and nipping down to get a quick gander at Kat Von D's tattoo parlour, from the tv series LA Ink. If I'd have had the time and money I'd have gone for another tattoo down there but budgeting is taking hold of me more now! Sightseeing over it was time wave goodbye to tinseltown and go to the home of Ron Burgundy, Baxter and Brick Tamland - San Diego.

Becca