Best

The new room at the terrible hotel was a significant improvement over the previous one. It was much smaller – barely larger than the bed itself – and had no desk, no closet, no chair, no luggage rack and a pervasive odd smell. However the bed was much more comfortable, and once the drug dealers closed up shop for the day it was so quiet that I could sleep with the window open and have delicious fresh air flowing in and abating the smell.

Even so, it was with great relief that I left it this morning and travelled a few miles to the south-west to Manhattan Beach, and my final hotel for this holiday, which turned out to be a completely different experience. My room is actually a mini-suite, with a kitchen, two televisions, a dishwasher and even a fireplace. It’s such a contrast that I suspect there may have been a booking error, but since it hasn’t been charged to my credit card I’m keeping my mouth shut.

After settling into my suite I took a walk down the seashore, through the immaculately curated upper-middle class suburbs. It’s the sort of place where the residents set up those little library boxes on the sidewalk, and have bowls of free candy in their gardens for the local children to take as they admire the comprehensive displays of Christmas lights and inflatable Santas. Manhattan Beach doesn’t have homeless people, so these affectations can be entertained. Why Manhattan Beach doesn’t have homeless people is a mystery, and one suspects there is a lot of shadowy work behind the scenes to ensure that it stays that way.

Even down on the beach itself, which is crowded with decaying Winnebagos and dirty tents just a mile or two north, there’s just children cavorting wholesomely on the sand or in the surf, locals walking expensive dogs or riding expensive bikes, and tourists carefully Instagraming their serenity in the golden glow of the sunset (#blessed). Like Sydney, LA makes a lot more sense when you can see the water – all cynicism aside, it’s genuinely beautiful, tranquil and delightful.

After watching the sunset and strolling the pier, I looked up the nearest hipster bar, apparently just called ‘X’, and wandered in that direction. My initial impressions were promising, as I walked back and forth on the little stretch of street where Google Maps promised it was without being able to locate it: in my experience, all of the best bars are almost impossible to find. When I finally worked out that I needed to walk into a closed and dark restaurant, then dart quickly to the left through its lobby into the bar, I was rewarded with exactly my kind of venue. Velvet couches, mezcal-heavy drinks, fondly kitsch 80s music (Electric Dreams by Georgio Moroder, The Riddle by Nik Kershaw, Chequered Love by Kim Wilde, etc), high quality stainless steel garnish skewers that no one cared that I souvenired, and a chatty bartender who turned out to be from Colorado Springs and comped me my second drink. Best bar ever!