The Bay to LA

Okay, so I'm a daily double poster.  We'll pretend it's me being productive, but really I am taking a break from packing and cleaning and selling and planning (for teaching, not from the trip!)

We will start our trip in the Bay because that's where I live (so smart, right?)  Abby gets in earlier in the week, so she will be forced to do all the things that I haven't done in the last five years, including but not limited to the Charles Schultz museum and the SF zoo.   Mom and Michael will be forced into my world famous San Francisco in a day trip, which I have almost perfected in my tenure here.

Read about Dani's SF in a day in a experience.

The conundrum is that Michael is reading Al Capone Does My Shirts for school and it amazingly takes place at Alcatraz, so that looks like a "have to," which throws off the general plan for SF in a day, so we'll see how that fits in to the day experience.  Another necessity is that we hit Fenton's, an Oakland mainstay even before it was featured in Pixar's UP.  The service is usually horrendous (although it was astonishingly better when Dani and I went) but the ice cream creations are worth it.  Fenton's was the first restaurant I ate at when I moved to Oakland, so it has a special place in my heart.

Our trip around the bay has to be pretty quick because Michael has his heart set on finding Rob Dyrdrek's Fantasy  Factory, as well as "the stars on the ground" and the Hollywood sign.  We'll have to hit up the Venice Beach boardwalk and the Santa Monica pier (magical at night!)  And, of course, we're seeing my favorite roommate, Courtney, before I head out of the state... but it will be a quick one before we hit ...

VEGAS!

Does anyone have any LA suggestions?  Any must sees?

Victoria