We had a peaceful night at Leo Carrillo State Beach Campground.  We woke up to overcast skies and rainy forecast.  Esme, Cal, Asa and I went to the beach after a breakfast of bagels and cream cheese and leftover donuts.  We heard there were caves and tide pools but we were there between high tide (5:29am) and low tide (12:29pm) at about 8:30am.  We probably would have seen more closer to low tide.  It was still interesting though and we almost had the place to ourselves. 

Then we walked a little to the north and saw a small cove.  Cal and I explored the rocky area while Esme and Asa played in the sand. Then the boys climbed up a bit while Esme savored her last time at the beach this year. 

We walked back to the campsite and left, heading towards Los Angeles.  Nole was not thrilled about this but it was happening.  He was worried about parking and theft or damage to the RV.  I was worried about parking but after an exhaustive search I couldn’t find anything saying it was or wasn’t do-able so there was nothing to do but try.  The stops I had planned wouldn’t take long so I wasn’t too worried about anything happening to our ride. 

Our first stop was seeing the Hollywood sign from Griffith Observatory.  It seemed like the easiest place to find parking.  We found it, found a parking spot for $10 and saw the sign.  Woot!  Mission accomplished.  Nole was still a bit grumpy, since he was here against his will but I think he started to relax seeing how easy that was. 

We hit the road again and made our way to Little Tokyo.  I knew the kids would like this, especially Cal.  We got there and the first lot we tried was for court parking only.  We can’t park this thing just anywhere and we definitely can’t park it in a parking structure.  I made a couple of turns and we found another lot.  The nice man charged us double ($20) but let us park there.  Score!  It also looked fairly safe and our spot was within eyeshot of the attendant. We were just one block from the restaurant I wanted to go to but they had a 50 minute wait.  While we waited we did some shopping in Little Tokyo.  The girls and I went to the Sanrio store (i.e. Hello Kitty) but everything was pretty expensive.  Next we went to a little shop that sold a lot of unofficial/unlicensed Disney and Hello Kitty stuff and other random items.  Asa bought a rejuvenating face mask (more on that later).  Esme bought a plushie and the girls bought a bunch of $1 lipsticks.

It rained all day.  A consistent driving rain.  But we still had fun.  The piece de resistance was the restaurant.  It was Kura Revolving Sushi Bar.  It was so much fun!  Each plate you took was $3.15.  They said they had food for picky eaters and they did have watermelon.  We were able to get a plate of rice as well. Nova was going to try a plain cooked shrimp but Cal and I ended up eating it when she was too scared. We could also order hot items and those came to us on a separate conveyor belt.

The plates for $3.15 had just one or two pieces of sushi on them so it wasn’t a big commitment if you didn’t like it. Cal and Nole shared a squid plate and did not enjoy the texture. We found a ton of things we did like though! Asa and I really enjoyed umami oil steak and seared steak. They were cooked. There were both cooked and raw choices. We had 27 plates of sushi (plus two plates of potstickers and 3 plates of watermelon). Every 15 plates got you a prize so we got 2 free prizes from our 30+ plates!

Nole said, “This may be the best day of the trip!” which was quite a change from this morning.

We made a stop for handmade authentic mochi from a little confectionary and boba smoothies from a convenient store and then headed back to the RV.

Asa immediately tried on his face mask which was terrifying. Esme and Nova have been putting on and wiping off lipstick all evening.

We made it to the RV park near Disneyland where we will stay the next two nights. We did three loads of laundry and ordered a late dinner from Door Dash and now the kids are all nestled all snug in their beds before a long day at Disneyland tomorrow. In the rain.