| The sights of Los Angeles are spread throughout five counties. At off-peak times, the freeways are quick and convenient and it is easy to get around. Downtown LA comprises the financial district with skyscrapers that seem the more surprising because the rest of the city is so flat. It is also home to lively local communities with markets (there’s a fabled covered market for local produce) and shops. Here are Chinatown, Little Tokyo, the Hispanic centre around Olvera Street, the historic district where the city was founded, with landmarks from the city’s early 20th-century heyday, as well as cultural institutions like the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and Museum of Contemporary Art. The LA Philharmonic’s dramatic new Walt Disney Concert Hall is one of the most striking recent additions to the city's cultural and architectural landscape and is reminiscent of Frank Gehry's other masterpiece, the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. East of Downtown, the city of Pasadena, in the San Gabriel Valley, has a historic centre and two outstanding museums. To the west of Downtown is Hollywood, although the actual Hollywood sign is located high above Hollywood Boulevard up in the hills near Griffith Park. Although the famous sign is situated on a steep incline, which means that it cannot be visited, the extensive Griffith Park is great for a wander and fantastic panoramas of the whole city. It contains the famous 1935 Art Deco Griffith Observatory (website: www.griffithobs.org). |