What are the must sees I should add?

[BitsnBearsMom]

We are heading to Disneyland/California in march and want to see some 'other stuff' also. There will be dh, myself, almost 18yo DS, 12yo DS, gramma and gramps. I am the only one who has been there but that was almost 40 yrs ago so I will consider this my first trip too!!

So far we have....
Land about 3:30 on a Wednesday at LAX - get rental car and go check in at GCV
Thursday - Disneyland - which will also give us some time to re-group and adjust to the time change
Friday - drive to LA for Warner bros studio tour, and we won't to see the sidewalk stars, hollywood sign and other sights..... Not sure what else is a must see.
Saturday drive to Santa Monica pier and then work our way south along the coast (again what are the stop and sees along here? Or does someone have a better suggestion? I'm sure beaches will be too cold for swimming in march)
Sunday - disneyland so we can make sure to see fireworks and shows..... I believe they only happen on weekends at this time but again not sure as schedule isn't out yet
Monday - final day at Disneyland..... Free time for shopping or whatever.
Tuesday - check out of GCV and head to la to see??? 3pm flight from LAX to Vegas then the trip continues in Vegas until the 16th when we have an overnight flight home.

Suggestions would be welcome and appreciated! My boys are fairly well travelled and don't need all theme parks..... We've been to universal in Orlando and it just wasn't our cup of tea so we are good to skip universal. Griffith observatory and la brea tar pits may be good additions! We want to have enough time for Disneyland but at the same time we want to see some of California too!

 

[ncc1701]

On your last day you need to be at LAX btw 12:30 & 1:00 or maybe earlier to allow time to drop of the rental. Plus you have to allow for traffic to get there from DL. I wouldn ' t plan on doing anything that day.
Enjoy your last day in DL and sleep in.

 

[BitsnBearsMom]

ok thanks! How long should it take to drive from VGC to LAX mid day on a Tuesday? And what about the Friday morning when we go do the studio tour..... I'm sure we will have no issues getting up early as we will still be 3 hrs behind! We are used to Toronto traffic but I understand the traffic in LA is worse.......

 

[ncc1701]

We drove from Huntington Beach (which is 30mins or so west of DL) to LAX but it was a Sunday morning around 9:00am so it was easy.I forget how long it took but it was around the amount of time Mapquest said it would take.
Based on our limited driving in the LA area on that trip I say take whatever Mapquest says & times it by 1.5 at least.
We got stuck in a massive traffic jam on that trip coming to the LA area from Santa Barbara around 11:00am so we ended up ditching plans to eat at DTD at DL and went straight to HB instead (after taking a detour thru Beverly Hills to get out of the traffic)

 

[debbiedoo]

You should always add time when going places. LA traffic can Be heavy at anytime of day on certain interstates. We use the Waze app on iPhone and it has been very accurate. Reports accidents etc.

 

[debbiedoo]

You should always add time when going places. LA traffic can Be heavy at anytime of day on certain interstates. We use the Waze app on iPhone and it has been very accurate. Reports accidents etc.