Things to Do in North America

This pint-size picturesque park in the heart of Pacific Grove offers up plenty of outdoor fun, with easy access to ocean waves that are idea for swimming, surfing, kayaking and more. Travelers can rent bikes and cruise along the coastal drive where urban landscapes meat salty sea.  Visitors can pack a picnic lunch and relax on stretches of sandy beach or break into a sweat at one of the popular beach volleyball courts. There’s a children’s swimming pool to keep the little ones happy and a lush green lawn is perfect for a game of Frisbee or unwinding in the shade of one of the park’s towering trees.  

Located on the outlying border of the famous French Quarter, the Louis Armstrong Park is a lovely 32 acre haven, full of beautiful grassy knolls, lagoons, and cultural auditoriums and structures that are everything jazz.

In the southern corner of the park is the historic Congo Square, a cobblestone laden open space that was used in the 17th century as a gathering point, where African-American slaves came to socialize and make music, one of the earliest signs of African influence in jazz.

Behind the square lay a plethora of buildings such as the Mahalia Jackson Center for the Performing Arts, Jazz National Historical Park, and the recently renovated Perseverance Hall, where there is now a jazz exhibit and a line of scheduled performances throughout the year. All these places and more are a testament to Louisiana’s long and prospering music tradition in the face of oppression and hard times.

A historic Los Angeles landmark, the Los Angeles Farmers Market is a bustling market of food stalls, eateries, prepared food vendors, produce markets, and much more. You can easily spend a morning or afternoon here browsing the more than 100 restaurants, grocers and tourist shops.

Opened in 1934, the Farmers Market is a popular destination for foodies in search of the market’s wide assortment of flavors and cuisines. The market started when a dozen nearby farmers would park their trucks on a field to sell their fresh produce to local residents. It quickly grew in popularity, especially when CBS Television City opened next door and began providing those working or visiting that television studio a convenient place to shop or eat.

You’ll find more than just food here. Buy bath and bodyworks, get a shave and a haircut at the Barbershop Club, find exotic candles, browse children’s clothes, find gifts and toys, browse designer and one-of-a-kind fashions, and bring home teas and jewelry. When a break from shopping beckons, you can marvel at some of the historic displays including Gilmore History Kiosk, Earl's Service Station, and the Farmers Market Clock Tower.

Fun for all ages, the Louisiana Children’s Museum has got everything you need to entertain you and your young ones for hours on end. Over 30,000 square feet of fun with everything that might spark interest or creativity, in the Louisiana Children’s Museum not only do kids get to be kids, but adults get to have fun and partake as well. Play shop in the Little Winn-Dixie grocery store, pretend to captain a tug boat down the mighty Mississippi with a working crane, launch ping-pong balls off of self-made rollercoaster ramps, take apart modern technology, or leave a lasting impression in the glow-in-the-dark booth. Arts and crafts are also encouraged, as the museum’s ethos is to educate as well as entertain.

The City of Angels, La La Land, Tinseltown – whatever you want to call it, Los Angeles is America’s playland, where tanned sun-worshippers frolic on the beach in Malibu, surfers catch waves down in Huntington, families meet Mickey Mouse in Anaheim, well-dressed ladies shop for designer goods in Beverly Hills, and movie stars (and wannabees) make their fortunes in Hollywood.

The sprawling city offers more than you could ever see in a day (or five), so if your cruise starts or ends in LA, it’s worth your while to extend that vacation by a few days and see what all the fuss is about (who wants to go back to work, anyway?).

How to get to Los Angeles

Most cruise ships dock at the World Cruise Center in San Pedro, about 20 miles (70 km) south of downtown LA. Most Carnival ships, however, dock at the terminal in Long Beach. Los Angeles is not a walking town, nor is public transport very prevalent, so you’ll want to rent a car if you’re exploring the city on your own.

One Day in Los Angeles

Gas up your rental car (it’s going to need a full tank) and hit the freeway for a day of LA’s greatest hits. Start in Hollywood with a walk down the Hollywood Walk of Fame, looking for the stars of your favorite actors. Then drive to the Farmer’s Market for a snack, keeping your eyes out for famous faces.

Enjoy a ride through Beverly Hills, marveling at the mansions and perfectly manicured lawns, on your way to the Getty Center, one of the city’s best places to see art. The architecture of the building itself is just as impressive as the work on the walls, as is the view.

Now you deserve to relax, so head to Santa Monica. Take a few spins on the Ferris wheel and try your hand at vintage carnival games before finishing your day with a stroll on the beach.

With its 1,200 finned, feathered, and furry friends, a visit to the Los Angeles Zoo is a must for kids of all ages (parents will love the zoo, too). Even on a hot day the zoo is a welcome respite, thanks to the shady garden-like grounds. Meerkats are the current squeezables of the Disney set and one well-placed, big-eyed Timon wows kids entering the zoo. From there, undisputed crowd-pleasers include swinging gibbons, frolicking sea lions, posturing chimpanzees, and cuddling koalas.

Cleverly designed habitats highlight a visit here. The chimpanzees of the Mahale Mountains has plenty of primate activity, while orangutans lumber about in the Red Ape RainForest. The Campo Gorilla Reserve provides a habitat for six African lowland gorillas that closely resembles their native West African homeland, and at the Pachyderm Forest, elephants and hippos relish in a climate-controlled environment, complete with an underwater viewing area. Tots gravitate toward Adventure Island with its petting zoo and hands-on play stations as well as the Children's Discovery Center.

Designed in 1971 by Charles Luckman, architect of Madison Square Garden and LAX’s famous Theme Building (now known as Encounter Restaurant & Bar), this largely featureless behemoth of a convention complex sprawls over several blocks’ worth of Downtown and plays host to dozens of industry showcases, genre expos and special events each year. Expanded in the mid-1990s (with a design by Ingo James Freed) and updated in the early 2000s, in 2008 it became the first U.S. convention center (and large building in Los Angeles) to be awarded LEED certification for its energy efficiency.

One of the largest convention centers in America, the LACC long seemed marooned in an increasingly-fading swath of Downtown, but in the late 1990s, it received a huge commercial boost from the creation of Staples Center and the adjacent L.A. Live entertainment/dining/hotel complex. The area surrounding the LACC is now booming with revitalization efforts which have rippled across the whole of Downtown.

Convention attendees are now spoiled for choice when it comes to lodging, high-end chain restaurants and bars, concert and sports venues, and a multiplex movie theatre.  A popular coffee-meeting spot is the lobby of the J.W. Marriott Hotel, which features an Illy coffee café, and a Metro Rail station on the Red Line right beneath L.A. Live means that conventioneers can easily travel to other sections of Downtown, as well as Hollywood and Culver City.