19 Years Old in LA, California. (Los Angeles, Pasadena: rental car, spring break, rental)

[salematestarz]

So I'm going to stay very close to LAX in mid-March for Spring Break with my bestfriend. We're obviously not old enough to rent a car. Our hotel does offer Manhattan Beach trolleys, trains, and other types of VIP tours, but in regards to actually being able to enjoy ourselves and have a great time, what can we do?

Night life? What can a 19 year old do at night? Clubs? Dancing?
Beaches? Which ones are closest, and most fun?
Shopping? How to get to and from a great shopping area?
Restaurants? Where are good places to grab a bite?
Sight-Seeing? Where do people go? What's popular? Great architecture?

[thelopez2]

Originally Posted by salematestarz

So I'm going to stay very close to LAX in mid-March for Spring Break with my bestfriend. We're obviously not old enough to rent a car. Our hotel does offer Manhattan Beach trolleys, trains, and other types of VIP tours, but in regards to actually being able to enjoy ourselves and have a great time, what can we do?

Beaches? Which ones are closest, and most fun?
Shopping? How to get to and from a great shopping area?
Restaurants? Where are good places to grab a bite?
Sight-Seeing? Where do people go? What's popular? Great architecture?

Beaches? Which ones are closest, and most fun? Venice to see, Hemorsa to play
The Manhattan Beach Trolley will probably take you to the Manhattan Beach Mall, but 'great' shopping, I don't know what that is. Across the street from the Manhattan Beach Mall is the El Segundo shopping mall with a few shops. North of LAX is the Westfield Foxhills Mall, and the obvious is Santa Monica, the Pier and 3rd Street.

Restaurants - Manhattan will have enough for you, but bring $$

Architecture - Walk along the bike path for beach front properties in Manhattan Beach, then end up in Hermosa beach. Play beach volleyball?

Then there are all of the places North east where many others will comment on. Griffith Park, WeHo, Hollywood, China Town, Museums, Pinks, The Hat, Johnnies, Titos.

It has been a while since I've rented are you sure you can't rent, there is always uber and lyft.

I don't know where people dance.

[highlanderfil]

So I'm going to stay very close to LAX in mid-March for Spring Break with my bestfriend. We're obviously not old enough to rent a car. Our hotel does offer Manhattan Beach trolleys, trains, and other types of VIP tours, but in regards to actually being able to enjoy ourselves and have a great time, what can we do?

You actually are old enough to rent a car, you will just have to either get creative (look for discount codes that waive the underage fee) or pay that same underage fee ($20-25/day). For example, look here. If you are any kinds of decent drivers, I would strongly recommend looking into that, because it will open the possibilities to you tremendously. Essentially, if you have a vehicle at your disposal, answering questions about beaches, shopping, restaurants and sightseeing becomes an exercise better left to Wikitravel as you will have all of L.A. available to you and then some. Public transportation being what it is, you MIGHT be able to get around the beach communities, but your sightseeing and shopping opportunities will be dramatically limited. For example, two of the best shopping areas in L.A. - Third Street Promenade (Santa Monica) and The Grove (Hollywood) are all but inaccessible by public transport from LAX. You could conceivably get to Downtown by taking the Green Line to the Blue Line, but you will spend an hour and a half each way taking in the sights of the worst neighborhoods L.A. has to offer.

Night life? What can a 19 year old do at night? Clubs? Dancing?

Unless you have a fake ID (which I strongly discourage), you won't be able to get into clubs.

Beaches? Which ones are closest, and most fun?

As far as beaches closest to LAX - since you have a way to get to Manhattan Beach, you should be pretty well-set, as that area offers plenty of places to hang out for younger folks, but does tend to attract the more affluent crowd, so that will be reflected in the prices you will pay for...well, pretty much anything. Also, "fun" is a term largely relative to each individual's idea of what a good time looks like. If you like funky boardwalk arts and crafts and creepy people, Venice Beach is your spot. If you like to kick back surrounded by mansions and potentially famous people, you'd want to get to Malibu. If you're looking for a Coney Island experience (complete with a lot of bums), you need to get to Santa Monica. Etc, etc. So we'd need more info from you to see if it's worth it for you to try to venture out beyond MB to which you already have access.

Shopping? How to get to and from a great shopping area?

Apart from the aforementioned, it will again depend on what kind of shopping you're looking to do. The closest to LAX I could think of is the general shopping area around Sepulveda/Rosecrans, which has a bunch of big-box stores (Best Buy, Cost Plus World Market, Whole Foods), as well as a little boutique-ish area (the only store I seem to remember there is Lululemon, but here, see for yourself: Plaza El Segundo. You could probably get here by bus from your hotel.

Restaurants? Where are good places to grab a bite?

Apologies as I'm going to be a little blunt here, but as phrased, this is a pointless question. At least tell us what kind of food you prefer. Even around LAX (which you will find to be far from a picturesque area in general) there are plenty of different ethnic food options, but there's no point for me to recommend to you (for example) my favorite Persian place if that's not your kind of thing. However, if you like burgers, In-N-Out is one of those California cliches you should try at least once if for no other reason than to say you have. Aside from the cultural aspect, the burgers are good and cheap.

Sight-Seeing? Where do people go? What's popular? Great architecture?

Again, this is a question that is too broad for anyone to answer. L.A. is an insanely complex conglomeration of communities, each with its own attraction and what I might find interesting, you might not. Additionally, most of the traditionally-popular spots (Hollywood Blvd., Old Town Pasadena, Downtown L.A., Beverly Hills, etc) are going to be out of your reach unless you do splurge for a rental car. If you can get on a tour bus (not sure that any pass around LAX), you might get a decent look at L.A. wholesale.

So, need a bit more info about what you're looking for and how receptive you are to renting a vehicle given the available options. Additionally, take look at Wikitravel's Los Angeles page and see if you can't answer some of these questions for yourselves.

[SpaceMonkyPunks]

When you're underage, there's not much in the way of nightlife options. Maybe look up some nearby concerts and you might find one that interests you?

[hjt123]

As long as a girl looks older than, say, 16, she could get into the majority of clubs

[c.diddy]

You can rent a car from Alamo they do charge you a 25 dollar extra per day because you're not 25.

[HarryMyhre]

Originally Posted by salematestarz

So I'm going to stay very close to LAX in mid-March for Spring Break with my bestfriend.

the metro green line ends at Redondo Beach.
Once you get on the metro line, you can ride all over southern california for not a whole lot of money.
All the way to Pasadena.
You can take the Red Line up to Universal Studios.