Universal Studios Hollywood

As part of the GSK trip we were allowed to select 2 excursions. Shane and I selected a day at Universal Studios Hollywood. Yeah, yeah, yeah...they have a Universal Studios in Orlando, but that park doesn't have the studio tour. We met up with the group at 8am, connected with new friends Joe and Stacy from Ohio and headed north towards Hollywood. Our tour guide, Maureen, was awesome at narrating the sights along the way. After arriving at US we set off to explore Hollywood's most famous backlot in the worlds' largest working movie studio. The tour is about 45 minutes long and travels through various lots with a few attractions along the way. Our tour guide, along with Jimmy Fallon, narrates the history of the studio. It was sooo cool to see sets for Depperate Housewives, the courthouse scene from Back to the Future, Psycho & The Great Outdoors to name a few. Attractions along wht way include: King Kong 3D, plane crash from War of the Worlds, cars from The Fast and the Furious & Jaws. After the studio tour we saw Shrek in 3D, ate a Pinks hot dog, watched the Waterworld show, Special Effects Stage and the Terminator in 3D. Whew, it was a action packed day! We had sooo much fun hangin' out with our new friends Joe and Stacy! We headed back to the resort, where I crashed and Shane went to dinner. While Shane was at dinner, GSK dropped off some fun little goodies. Another fun day comes to an end!

Fun, Sun, Shades and Shrek!

On Friday the 1st order of business for the day was to get fitted for some Maui Jim sunglasses, courtesy of GSK. This was so much fun. Shane got some sleek shades and I got some funky ones. After picking out our shades we went to hang out at the pool. The resort had 2 pools, a very large pool for all ages and a smaller, hip adult pool. Bet you can guess the pool we hung out at! They played cool music, had nice lounge chairs and cabanas at the adult pool. It was very Vegas! We spent a few hours catching rays and then headed in to get ready for the show. Shane and I drove up to Hollywood for the evening.

The night began with dinner at Providence LA located off Melrose Ave. For starters they brought us a trio of small bites including a white jumbo prawn, pastry puff with smoked salmon and creme fraiche, and a chilled carrot puree soup with passion fruit flavoring and seaweed foccacia bread. Next, we ordered the Dungeness Crab & salt roasted Santa Barbara spot prawns. The production for the prawns was rather impressive! The take live prawns, salt roast them and serve tableside. Our entrees included the striped sea bass and John Dory (a verrrry yummy fish). Delicious meal!!!

After our amazing dinner at Providence we headed over to the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood to watch

Shrek the Musical. The theatre opened in 1930, the decor is very art deco...definitely old Hollywood! We had fantastic seats on the 3rd row to the right of the stage on the end, almost center stage. Once the show began I was smiling, ear to ear THE WHOLE TIME!! Oh my wow, it was sooo magical! The actors were spot on with their depictions of the characters! What a fantastic night! 

California Dreamin'

Our latest adventure takes us out to the west coast to the beautiful Terranea resort resort about 25 miles south of Los Angeles, California. The trip is a result of supersalesman Shane's accomplishments at work. In April he recieved the Silver award for being in the top 10% of the company in 2010. Our plane landed at LAX, picked up our rental car and headed south to the resort. We took the Pacific Coast Hwy, it was an incredible drive down the coast! Once we arrived at the resort we were greeted by friendly hostesses who directed us to a fabulous hospitality suite they had set up for the winners. We picked up our room keys,  a few other wonderful items provided by GSK and headed to our room. Our room was beautiful and the view was spectacular, overlooking the Pacific oceam. This trip was off to a great start!

After settling in we ventured out to see the resort and then got cleaned up for the company dinner. The dinner was held on the lawn of the resort and was amazing! We ate beef tenderloin, salmon, risotto and a delicious spinich salad. They had a band set up, it was wonderful!