So unless you follow me on Twiiter or Instagram – which you should, if you don’t (@StreetsDept) – you may have noticed that I took a little vacation from blogging to take a trip out to California. My first ever trip to California. Not to mention my first time ever leaving this time zone!

Me, my boyfriend Steven, and one of my best friends and room mate Alex, flew into San Francisco for about 5 days, then we drove down the coast, down Highway 1, spending a few more days in L.A. Needless to say, I took a ton of photos of some really great street art – which I plan to get up on here sometime this week – but in the meantime, I invite you to check out some of my other photos from the trip on Flickr…

See my photos from San Francisco HERE,
My photos from Highway 1 HERE,
And my photos from L.A. HERE!

What did I think of the trip?

San Fransisco is EXACTLY the city you imagine, except even better. Nearly every street has an awesome view. Alcatraz in the bay one way, and the top of a foggy hill the other. The Bay Bridge this way, and a gardened stairway that way. I’m not saying that there weren’t areas that left something to be desired, but I am saying that my jaw was dropped about 80% of my time there. I completely fell in love. (Don’t worry though, I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. I love Philly with the heartburn of a thousand late-night hoagies. Don’t doubt it.)

Oh, and one last thing: yes, you need to carry a light sweater around with you wherever you go. It’s so cute.

Highway 1 was terrifying. Stunningly beautiful (seriously, go look at the photos,) but you are literally driving on a winding cliff for about a quarter of the 13 hour+ drive. My heart dropped a few times, but clearly we made it.

The only thing I might recommend, if you’re considering this trip, is to do it in 2 or more days. We tried to cram it all into a day’s drive to save car rental money, but there’s just too much to see. You’re rightfully going to want to stop the car every 5 minutes, and we did for the first hundred miles or so, and there’s just no sense in missing anything.

Los Angeles, on the other hand . . . How do I put this nicely? Not my kind of city. Not at all.

It’s 100% true what they say about the traffic in L.A., the people in L.A. – even the smog in L.A.! So gross. The only things I really remember right now are that I saw some guy from Glee. I felt a 3.5 earthquake. And I ate some sushi.

Oh, wait, there was good street art. Lots of it too. But that’ll have to wait for now.

Long story short, go look at the photos!!