Hi SociTea – Los Angeles, California

The second thing I did on my solo day on Hollywood Blvd,  very busy, very touristy street was have tea.  There is a lot to do on this street from famous theaters, to driving tours of film sites to more than one wax museum. It is the walk of the stars with anything and everything you could want to do with movies. And I love that, because I love movies. But I also love being in quiet places and recharging. I also love tea.

My goal was to find a high tea service where I could relax and spend a couple hours reading. During my research I found a lot of highly recommended places, mostly hotels with Sunday only service. This is fairly common so I was neither surprised or disappointed.

Finally after a lot of searching I found a place called Hi SociTea that shares the building with the W Hotel just off Hollywood Blvd. I must repeat that is shares the building with the hotel, for all my research it looked like the tea bar was in the hotel. Which it is not, so says the concierge at the W Hotel who was real confused about what I was asking for.

Having finally located the entrance I was pleasantly greeted by dark navy walls, high windows, friendly service and more tea choices than I new what to do with. I settled on a ginger roobis, which was the best roobis I have ever had. I went back and fourth trying to decide if I wanted the full tea service, which was what I had originally came for. But despite being on my feet all day I wasn’t terribly hungry. After waffling for a good 5 minutes and asking the very patient server a million questions I settled on just the tea and a Scottish Salmon Sandwich.

The sandwich was heaven. Sourdough bread, lox, lemon, capers…there are no words. I sat in the window watching people come and go chatting with the two employees while I devoured my tea and sandwich. I learned that they are planning on expanding into the building and will have more tables in the near future. And that their full tea service will continue to be available every day of the week. Though if you are like me and decide it is too much food you can always order anything off the full menu piece meal.

I officially loved everything about this place, and am sad that it doesn’t live in Oregon. I would go every single day. I am not kidding.

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Museum of Death – Los Angeles, California 

I am going to start out my Los Angeles series on a bit of a downer, well at least a downer if you aren’t at all interested in the macabre. Last year my husband had a work trip in Los Angeles so I tagged a long and we co-opted the week as a partial vacation. The first day we were there was one that he was working and I was on my own. But as you probably know Los Angeles is huge, I couldn’t figure out the bus system, and I don’t use hired cars unless I have to.
My ride (my husband) was going to be around Hollywood Blvd for the day, so I looked up interesting things to do, made my choices and off we went. I should preface my choice by saying I have been the LA a lot and seen just about everything there is to see there. So while I thoroughly enjoyed the Museum of Death and think it is one of the most notable and important things in the area, it is okay if that isn’t your cup of tea. There is plenty of other things to do there. I am just not going to write about them here, just yet at any rate.

The Museum of Death in Los Angeles is one of two museums owned by JD Healy and Cathee Shultz. The second is located, appropriately in New Orleans.The mission of the founders was not to scared the be-jebus out of people, but to help people better explore and understand the mechanisms of death, the history of funerary practices, grief, taxidermy and all kinds of other random things that go along with death. It is educational, with a good intent behind it and if I am being quite honest, at times a little hard to swallow.
I love all things true crime and was really excited to explore their exhibits on the Manson Family, the Black Daliah and other  incidents of infamous murder. They also have a vast collection of art work done by serial killers during their incarceration. I loved all of this, but then there was a hall way of nothing but photos of gruesome car crashes and that was it for me. I quickly walked through the hall and moved on to other exhibits continuing to enjoy the remainder of the museum.
Museum Visiting Info:

6031 Hollywood Blvd, Hollywood California
Opens at 10am 7 days a week, closes at 8 (Sunday – Thursday), 9 (Friday) and 10 (Saturday)
Admission is 15 dollars.
There are no pictures inside the museum, hence the lack of pictures on the post.

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