When you think of influencers and Instagrammers, the first thing you think of is California or LA. It’s typically the place where many successful entrepreneurs live and post on their social media. I took a trip to Los Angeles to see if it really matched up to the pictures and lifestyle portrayed online. Here’s where I visited to simulate a typical Instagram day in LA.
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I’d also like to mention that I have no intentions of harming or offending anyone with this post. This is simply me documenting myself visiting popular Instagram locations during my day in LA trip. I respect the hustle of all the hard working influencers, entrepreneurs, and content creators out there.
Urban Lights in LACMA
The most important and common stop to make was the Urban Lights installation by Chris Burden. This location can be seen photographed all over Instagram for the past few years. It’s been used in both day and night.
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It’s no surprise that there were plenty of people there also taking photos. If not that, many children running around between the light poles. Getting a photo without anyone in the background is no easy feat. In most of my photos, there were at least 2 people in them. I would assume most people who take photos here come really early, late, or just wait for a long time until they get a single second when no one is in the frame.
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We found ourselves having to try different angles to avoid getting photobombed. However, once we got a photo, it looks truly LA-magical. Worthy of being deemed the typical day in LA photo.
LACMA
Of course, we had to stop by the LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art). Unfortunately, we arrived quite late and didn’t have time to actually go in an see the exhibits. We where however, able to walk around the outside.
One building we walked by was the Automobile Museum. We weren’t aware of what red building was at the time, but knowing what it was now, we want to go back and visit one day. It also had a large rock outside that you could walk under and pretend to lift or be squished by.
We also walked around the Sculpture Museum. We had been to the Dallas Museum of Art and Sculpture Garden before, which was beautiful, bright, and had unique installations, so were were expecting something similar. The one outside of LACMA was very spacious and didn’t have too many sculptures outside. We think there may have been more inside that we couldn’t see. The most unique sculpture we saw in our day in LA was the Balloon Monkey, which was for some reason under construction at the time. Nonetheless, it still captured our attention.
Tar Museum
A very interesting place, that we didn’t think to look at, but happened to drive by was the Tar Museum. The Tar Museum is a very unique place to visit, much like the National Videogame Museum. This was a fun place to explore during our day in LA. It did had a very strong smell, so I’d steer clear if you’re extremely sensitive to scents, but there were a lot of things to look at from moving animal sculptures to lots of nature. My favourite spot for pictures was upstairs in the museum building. Looking down, you can see a lot of beautiful plants, similar to a greenhouse.
Santa Monica Pier
The last place we visited was quite a drive from the general LACMA area, the Santa Monica Pier. Not only was there a lot of traffic, but trying to find parking was very difficult. However, we had to visit as a part of having a typical Instagram day in LA. Not only on Instagram, but in videos, there are the famous beaches, docks, and ferris wheel from Santa Monica Pier you often see in the backgrounds.
What I considered ‘busy’ near the Urban Lights was no competition to the Santa Monica Pier. In fact, it was just as congested as the Trevi Fountain during our trip to Rome. We decided to not venture too far into the pier, though I’m sure it would have been fun to go around buying lots of food and walking around if we were comfortable with large crowds. Maybe it’d be a place I would have visited often if I was in high school and lived close by. We walked around a bit and decided to call it a day at Fat Sal’s.
Overall
After my typical Instagram day in LA, I learned that a lot of people live in and tour LA. I thought I’d be used to crowds because I went to school in Toronto, but this was no comparison. Photographers and Influencers do a really great job and work hard to be at these locations at unconventional times to avoid crowds, and I really respect that. Otherwise, there’d be no way to not get at least 3 people in the background in every photo.
My trip was fun, and I’d definitely want to visit again. However, I think next time, I want to visit somewhere else in California for a change.
What’s the earliest you’ve woken up to take an Instagram photo?
Looking to travel around the United States? Check these out:
- 16 Instagram Worthy Places on Texas Tech University
- 5 Free Must Do Things in San Juan, Puerto Rico (as recommended by locals)
- What You’ll Find in the Dallas Arboretum Botanical Garden
Follow me on Instagram @itsevachung for more pictures!
