A drive along the Pacific Coast Highway to Malibu

With the brilliant blue skies and warm weather continuing, we thought staying along the beach for the day was a good idea.
So, we drove up the coast along the PCH to Malibu. The start of Malibu is actually not far from LA, but it stretches along the coast for a good 15-20 kilometres.
Near the north end of Malibu were a number of stars' beach homes. Although we only saw the garage side of the homes, it gave us a good sense of where the likes of Pierce Brosnan, Dustin Hoffman, Whoopi Goldberg, Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell hang out on the beach.

On our way back down the PCH we detoured at Pacific Pallisades and drove well up into the hills. Every house above 100 feet off the Pacific has been located so as to afford pretty stunning views. If you lived up there, you'd also be neighbours with the likes of Sally Fields and Michael Douglas/Catherine Zeta-Jones.

When we got back to Santa Monica, we thought we were going to Umami, an elite burger joint. But it turned out that it was no longer there. So, instead we ate along the 3rd Avenue Shopping Concourse, up in the Sonoma Wine Bar adjacent to Nordstroms. We had an excellenty thin crust pizza of the day with salad and a wonderful Alexander Valley Chardonnay and then set off to do some walking down the concourse.

On the way back to where we parked, well up on 10th Avenue in a rather expensive parking spot - got a ticket - we shopped for this evening's dinner at Vons. They had a fabulous deal on wine for Von members that we got anyway - very nice!

So, it was an eat in evening again with lots of great wine and rowdy card playing.