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The Pits and a Tower

Yesterday was my last day of Christmas break, and I was tempted to go into school, but honestly, I didn’t need to do much since I went in at the beginning of break. And I’ve done so little in the way of touristy things here, I decided I’d check out a local attraction.

It was the day of the Rose Parade, but I think attending that takes planning, so instead, I went to the La Brea Tar Pits:

There was an excellent museum there, and walking through it helped me understand the pits a little better before I saw them. There were many amazing bones. Did you know there were giant sloths in the past?

I even got to touch an actual giant sloth bone! So cool!

There were also mammoths and mastodons there. This is a mammoth – you can tell by its curved tusks:

The pits themselves looked like ponds of dirty water, but I could definitely smell them. It was a strong petroleum smell. The pits aren’t actually tar, which is a product humans refine from petroleum – they actually contain the naturally occurring substance called asphalt. I didn’t know that before, did you?

One of the pits is an active dig site. There’s an overlook so you can see into it:

Right next door is LACMA. I didn’t know what that was until I saw a sign – the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. I only went to the gift shop. I was already getting tired, so I didn’t want to pay for an admission that I wouldn’t properly use.

I was so close to another LA landmark, I couldn’t resist driving there:

Do you recognize it? What if I showed you this screen shot of the news from that fateful Christmas in 1988?

It’s Nakatomi Tower, the building from the movie Die Hard! It’s actually not called Nakatomi Tower – it’s an office building for FOX – but I was so excited to see it!

I did watch out for falling Hans Gruber when I was at the base of it:

What a great day! I will definitely have to do more LA field trips in the future.

2 Comments

  1. Lauren

    Ha!!! Nakatomi Plaza!!! That is fantastic! I am so glad that you had a Day of Fun before school starts up again! I absolutely did not know that about asphalt, but it makes me wonder: when they put down asphalt roads, are they actually tar?

    Thank you for taking us along on this awesome day trip!

  2. Carol

    Ha – “…falling Hans Gruber”. I hadn’t heard that name since “American Housewife” was cancelled. (In case you were not a viewer, one of the children had a pet by that name. She was a special case, and the pet was, I believe, a pig, so…)

    …and I did not know about the asphalt! Is this where Home Depot and Lowes go to get the stuff they sell then, or…? Anyway…

    Hope your first day back went well. Carry on!

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