Venice Beach… Not quite the same as Venice itself

What a fantastic experience this place really is, as my daughter said a “little scary” with fantastic visual benefits, sounds that make your ears jump around faster than your eyes, you can get anything pierced or tattooed and in as many places as you can buy tee shirts, with fantastic images on the front, from the Beatles to sexual positions of the animal kind.

This is the only place I have ever seen two policemen watch as a kid spray paint his graffiti art on a wall, with the sound of a dozen or maybe twenty random people playing drums to some even more random but rhythmic beat, whilst thirty to forty people all watched on swaying uncontrollably to the beat.

Street performers revel in the sun whilst attracting the beautiful people getting as many rays of sun as possible, prior to going down to the famous Muscle Beach Gym, which by the way in over 10 visits to Venice Beach at varying times of the year and day I have yet to see those body builders who you wonder how they get all that muscle in that one skin. I have though seen the man whose sign says “I work for marijuana” right in front of those two cops who had been watching the graffiti king, hell bent on becoming the next Picasso.

Then look out, although as you would expect in California, there are cycle and roller blade paths and routes everywhere, you get rushed by a variety of roller bladders and skateboarders, from stunt pro level down to the older guy who is obviously hell bent on pleasing his new found, too young for him, partner who is less stable than Bambie on the ice in the film of the same name.

Then you have the weirdo’s, you know the ones who dress normally, have well kept hair and dress like human beings, they stick out like sore thumbs in this fantastic circus of extreme and culture.

Venice Beach is a must if you are ever in LA, take it for what it is, try not to get sucked into getting a piercing or tattoo, henna or real, (I keep getting tempted to get a tattoo, the only thing that stops me is my wife, she would kill me… I am sure) just watch and absorb as you walk along the beach front, take in what surely must be the greatest and most complete mix of extreme and culture in one single walkway in the whole world, drink a beer at one of the outside bars, sit and people watch, buy a piece of Pizza to fill a gap and enjoy what is for sure the best free entertainment in the world.
And don’t miss the shop that sells the American Indian gifts, memorabilia and read some of the information regarding the history of their people, it might just make you sit up and think about what was all that about…

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Ian Plumbley

© Copyright Ian Plumbley 2006

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