Santa Monica

We arrived in Santa Monica and headed for the Pier. As we were walking down to the beach, a fog was rolling in. So these first couple pictures we took weren’t very clear. It was cool, but felt good on a hot day.

Keira loved the water!

Route 66 souvenirs, Santa Monica is where it ends

Next we walked over to the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium. It’s pretty small, but it’s cheap and there are hands on tanks where you can feel the sea creatures. Really cool for the kids. Ok and the adults. 🙂

In the small aquarium, this small shark in the corner was poking his head out of the water

Violet touching some sea creatures

This thing felt like velvet, it was so soft around the edge

Next, we headed back up on the pier to take a walk around, and we saw these really pretty birds just sitting there hanging out.

The bird guy just comes over and hands Violet this bird to hold like a baby

Keira didn’t like it very much, not too sure the bird did either

Turns out the birds name was also Violet, the guy was happy to finally meet a little girl with the same name

Her happiness in this pic lasted about 5 seconds, then she started crying. She does not like her hair being messed with.

The bird was hanging on the guys tooth. This is the bird guy, can you tell?

Petting another pretty bird

Down the pier a bit is the Pacific Park. It’s a tiny amusement park on the Pier. Micah, Rachel and Violet took a ride on the ferris wheel.

View from the ferris wheel

View of the end of the pier from the park

After we walked around on the pier the fog had cleared off, so we headed back down to the water. Violet loved it! She was having fun running back and forth in and out of the water.

After playing for a bit in the sand and water, we ate at the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company restaurant. Yummy food right on the pier, perfect.

From the movie, Forrest Gump. Great movie, fun restaurant.

Next we drove over to Third Street Promenade. They have the street closed off to cars, and its a fun cute place to walk down. There are a bunch of shops and restaurants and there are usually lots of performers, trying to make some money.