I’ve made one short DL trip last November & stayed completley within blocks of the parks. Now I have an opportunity to to return as part of a last minute larger trip to the LA area at the end of March to see the Le Brea Tar Pits. The steps seem more complicted this time & the late planning ment some choices with the order were constrained by the lack of hotel options at DL, so I’m afraid of having missed something. Please let me know if anything doesnt look right or if you have any suggestions. I’m traveling with my 2 young teens, who have never been to California, but have been to WDW many times, & like thrill rides, museums & are pretty go with the flow people just happy for new experiences.
Monday- Fly into LAX arriving mid evening & Uber to Sheraton Universal
Tuesday - Uber to La Brea Tar Pits & then to LA Natural History Museum. Dinner at Universal CityWalk?
Wednesday- Universal Hollywood - planning to get regular tickets & see if I need to upgrade to Express Pass once there- Hours are 10am to 6pm, which seems short. About 7-8pm have a car service take us to Anaheim & check into the Grand Legacy (Don’t have a car service determined yet, Suggestions?)
Thursday- California Adventure start because it closes early & Avengers Campus is a prioriy. Then hop to Disneyland later
Friday- DL start & hop as needed
Saturday- CA start & hop as needed
Sunday- Breakfast in Anaheim, then a Car service to an Airport hotel in LA (Have not picked yet, but it seems there are many options). Visit Griffith Obervatory in the afternoon into early evening ( the museum part seems to be only open Fri-Sun)
Monday- Take Airport Hotel Shuttle to LAX for early afternoon flight home to the East Coast.
I’d appreciate any helpful feedback Except to rent a car, because there is no way I’m trying to drive in Southern California
I’d say everything looks pretty good. Everything I knew about LA/OC was in the before times so I’m afraid I can’t be any help. Even my “avoid LA traffic at any cost” seems to be dated with a lot of people working from home now.
I had an elementary school trip to the Tar Pits and Natural History Museum and I remember it was a really fun trip, I hope it’s great for you all!
I haven’t been to Hollywood’s Universal since my 12th birthday, a very long time ago. I am again zero help here, but maybe someone else can chime in, but I think City Walk would be a great place for dinner unless you feel comfortable taking recommendations from some of the locals.
DCA/DLR are both small enough that I like how loosely you have your park days and you can’t get much closer to the entrance than you did as far as Harbor resorts go. For only being once before and this being a last minute thing, I think you did amazing!
We used Executive in December and they were great - early both on arrival and departure and very nice clean cars. Drivers were very friendly. We had a luggage issue on arrival and they waited the whole time for us (we did get charged extra because the wait went longer than an hour but it was a reasonable charge and they were upfront about it).
This sounds like a fun trip! The La Brea Tar pits are cool, we went maybe 5 years ago (I also went as a child and just had to return and take my own kids). We also went to the Griffith Observatory, and enjoyed it.
We stay at the Grand Legacy a lot, they have always been good to me with room requests so I keep going back. Good choice!
My only suggestion would be to rent a car, but I know that you don’t want to. Honestly, driving in LA is not that bad. I just drove in Spain on roads that are half the width of American roads and had traffic rules that are very different. LA is easy after that!
Thank you both. Its nice to hear a good first hand report on this car service. Particularly, because the tranfers from LA to Anaheim & back are the part of this plan that makes me the most nervous to get set, because it seem the most difficult to fix on the fly. I will get a quote from them & hopefully have this part taken care of.
Thank you My son is very excited by the idea of the Tar Pits. This whole trip ended up planned around getting him to see them. I"m glad to hear the Grand Legacy is a good choice, because the reviews elsewhere have been mixed. In any case, it was one of the few hotels close in that had room that week. I feel lucky to get it already & I’m not super picky, so hopefully the experience will be good.
I figured someone would suggest renting a car anyway & I can see the logic in the logistics, but I’ve lived rural too long to drive in LA. In my town, 5 cars at an intersecion is a level of traffic worth noting I dont even love driving in Raleigh, which is a town not a city compared to LA, & I’ve found being a pasanger on the LA freeway a bit stressful. I’m sure I would adjust if I had time, but a couple drives over a week doesnt seem quite worth it.
I did a Universal Studios Hollywood Trip in January. We were there on a 10-6 day and left before the park closed having done everything we wanted to do. Granted, we did have the VIP tour which included express passes, but that also included an extended backlot tour and an hour long lunch. Wait times were very low, and one of my trip friends complained that we probably didn’t need the express passes.
(If you are looking at Express Pass, you may want to look at the VIP tour options too - they aren’t incrementally that much more expensive than the express pass and include a nice lunch and breakfast.)
I would look at the restaurant list for Citywalk and make sure there is some place you want to eat - I felt like a lot of things had shut down since we were last there. We ate at a Mexican food restaurant and it was fine.
I have gone to Universal Hollywood three times in recent years, so happy to answer any questions you have
That is good to hear, much less nervous about fitting everything in then. I’m used to Universal Orlando, where I alway try to stay on site for the express pass benefit & I haven’t been without it for a long time. Of course Orlando has many more rides. I will check in to the VIP option & run the numbers considing that I wouldn’t need to buy breakfast & lunch separately. I don’t ride rollercoasters & some other thrill rides, so apart from just getting to everything, the express pass can also be useful to reduce the time I spend waiting for teens to ride multiple things before we can do something I’d like
I will definitely take you up on the offer to ask more questions as they come up. Thank you! I’m still at the broad outline stage, but I bet I will have more questions about the park itself as the time comes closer. There is a lot of info online about the orlando parks, but much less about the Hollywood one specifically.
Except to rent a car, because there is no way I’m trying to drive in Southern California 
