Los Angeles

Los Angeles has a lot of beach. The shore runs for more than 100km from the coves and long sands of Malibu, such as Zuma and El Matador, past Santa Monica and Venice to Manhattan, Hermosa and Redondo in the South Bay and on to Long Beach. Beach life is part of the city's identity: volleyball nets, the bike path along the sand, lifeguard towers, surf breaks and boardwalk people-watching.

The catch is the water. The Pacific here is cool, around 15°C in spring and rarely above 20°C to 21°C even in late summer, so most visitors wade or surf in a wetsuit rather than swim. Early summer often brings a grey morning marine layer, and rip currents mean you should swim near a lifeguard. August to October is the best time for the water. The beach makes a good afternoon out from the city, but for a warm-water swimming vacation it is the wrong coast.

Eating is one of the best reasons to come. Los Angeles is a city of immigrant food communities, and each one cooks at full strength. Tacos come from trucks and stands on street corners across the Eastside and South LA. Koreatown has charcoal barbecue and late-night soup houses. The San Gabriel Valley holds some of the best regional Chinese cooking outside China. Thai Town, Little Armenia, Little Ethiopia, the Persian shops of Westwood and the Oaxacan kitchens of Mid-City add more.

On top of this sits a serious chef-driven dining scene and a strong coffee culture. Grand Central Market downtown and the Original Farmers Market are easy places to graze, and farmers' markets show off California produce all year. The catch is distance: the best food is spread over a huge area, and you will drive to it.

The culture here is modern and spread out. The Getty Center sits on a hilltop in Brentwood, with its collection, gardens and views, and the Getty Villa in Malibu holds antiquities. LACMA, the Broad and the Museum of Contemporary Art make a deep art circuit. The Huntington in San Marino adds a great library, collections and botanical gardens. Griffith Observatory looks over the basin towards the Hollywood Sign.

Hollywood is a landmark in itself, with the Walk of Fame, the old movie palaces and the studio lots. Architecture fans come for the Walt Disney Concert Hall, the mid-century houses and the Art Deco downtown. What is missing is an old city. Olvera Street and the mission at San Gabriel are small, and seeing much of it means long drives between neighbourhoods.

Going out here is big but fragmented. Hollywood has the clubs with velvet ropes and promoters' guest lists. West Hollywood's Santa Monica Boulevard is one of the great gay nightlife strips in the country. Downtown has rooftop bars and cocktail rooms in old bank buildings and lofts. Silver Lake, Echo Park and Highland Park lean towards dive bars and natural wine. Venice and the South Bay beach towns are more casual, with sunburnt crowds.

There are limits. Bars stop serving at 2am, and getting between districts means a ride, so a night tends to stay in one neighbourhood. The best parties are often private or roving, so they are hard for a visitor to find. It is a strong city to go out in, but not one that runs all night.

For a city of this size, wild country is surprisingly close. Griffith Park is one of the largest urban parks in the country, with trails up Mount Hollywood. Runyon Canyon and the Hollywood Hills give quick hikes with views. The Santa Monica Mountains run west to the sea, with chaparral canyons and ridge trails above Malibu. Behind the city, the San Gabriel Mountains rise above 3,000m, with pine forest, waterfalls and winter snow at Mount Baldy.

On the coast there is surfing at Malibu and the South Bay, kayaking, and whale watching from the harbours in winter. Boats also run out to the Channel Islands. The dry, sunny climate means you can be outdoors in almost every month, though summer heat and fire season make inland trails hard going. Traffic is the real obstacle.

The best day out is Santa Barbara, up the coast. It is a Spanish Colonial Revival town with a historic mission, red-tile streets and wine tasting rooms, and the Santa Ynez Valley vineyards lie behind it. Catalina Island is about an hour by ferry and has the small harbour town of Avalon. Down the coast, Laguna Beach has galleries and Mission San Juan Capistrano has old adobe ruins.

Inland, Ojai is a quiet arts town in an orange-grove valley, and Temecula has a wine country of its own. Palm Springs, with its mid-century modern houses, and San Diego's old town and waterfront are possible at the outer limit. Traffic decides everything: a two-hour drive at dawn can take three by afternoon, and the list is good rather than deep in history.

Few cities offer children this much. Disneyland and its sister park in Anaheim are within reach, and Universal Studios Hollywood mixes rides with a working studio. There are also Knott's Berry Farm and the roller coasters of Six Flags Magic Mountain. The California Science Center displays a space shuttle, the Natural History Museum has the dinosaurs and the La Brea Tar Pits show fossils still being dug up. Add the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, the Los Angeles Zoo and the Santa Monica Pier with its small fun fair.

The beaches, the mild weather and a relaxed, child-friendly culture help. The hard part is the logistics. Every outing means a drive and time in traffic, so families do best picking one area per day and keeping a car.

Los Angeles is built for the car, and visitors feel it. The sights are scattered across a basin of dozens of separate cities. Hollywood, downtown, Santa Monica, Pasadena and the beaches are each a long way from the others, and the freeways between them are often jammed. The Metro rail lines do link downtown with Hollywood, Pasadena, Long Beach and Santa Monica, and they are useful for those trips. But they leave large areas uncovered, and buses are slow.

Individual neighbourhoods such as Santa Monica, Venice, Old Pasadena and parts of downtown are pleasant to walk. Between them, most visitors hire a car and pay for parking, or rely on ride-hailing. Plan each day around one area to avoid hours in traffic.

Shopping here is spread out but deep. Rodeo Drive and the streets around it in Beverly Hills hold the luxury houses. Melrose Avenue and Melrose Place mix streetwear, designer boutiques and vintage. Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Venice is lined with independent fashion and homeware shops. Silver Lake and Los Feliz suit design objects, records and secondhand clothes.

The big open-air malls are destinations in their own right, and the Santa Monica Third Street Promenade covers the chains. Downtown's Fashion District sells wholesale fabrics and bargains, and the flea markets at the Rose Bowl and in Melrose are serious hunting grounds for vintage. Local style means surf, denim and relaxed Californian labels. You will need a car to shop more than one area in a day.

This is an expensive city to visit. Hotel rooms in the popular areas of Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, West Hollywood and downtown are costly. Sit-down meals carry sales tax and a customary tip on top of the menu price. Most visitors also have to pay for a hire car, fuel and parking, or for frequent rides across long distances, and theme park tickets are steep.

The saving grace is cheap food. Taco trucks, Koreatown and San Gabriel Valley restaurants and market stalls feed you well for little. The beaches, Griffith Observatory and the Getty's collections cost nothing to enjoy. Staying away from the coast and hotspots helps too, but this is not a budget destination.

Los Angeles is one of the great music cities. The Los Angeles Philharmonic plays a top-rank orchestra season at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. In summer it moves outdoors to the Hollywood Bowl, where picnics under the hills are a local ritual. The Music Center downtown is also home to LA Opera and the big touring and resident theatre productions, and the Pantages hosts Broadway tours.

Below that sits a huge live-music circuit. Historic rock rooms on the Sunset Strip, theatres in the Wiltern and Greek mould, and small clubs in Silver Lake and Echo Park host bands every night. Hollywood's comedy clubs and improv theatres are among the best anywhere. Jazz has its own long line in Leimert Park.

The surprise here is Koreatown, which has one of the largest concentrations of Korean bathhouses outside Korea. Hot and cold pools, steam rooms, body scrubs and heated floors for napping are open late or around the clock, and some take mixed-gender groups in their communal areas. Beyond them, wellness is part of Los Angeles life: yoga studios on every block, the luxury spas of Beverly Hills and Santa Monica, and juice-bar culture.

The city itself is not restful. Traffic and distance eat into the days. For real calm, people go out of town to the retreat centres of Ojai or the desert spas and mineral springs around Palm Springs.