I visited Los Angeles for the first time last year, and I had an amazing time. I’d been wanting to visit for years to get a feel for it as I plan to move out there to pursue a career in television comedy writing. I recently visited LA for a second time, and it only solidified my goal.

This year, we stayed in Santa Monica at the Huntley Hotel. The view was gorgeous from their rooftop dining floor called The PentHouse, where we had breakfast each morning. My sister came with us on the trip as she and I are interested in moving to California and renting an apartment together. She had to leave after only a night though due to school and work obligations, so it was just my mom and I for the rest of the trip.

Our first day there, we checked out the Third Street Promenade, which has a lot of luxury shops and boutiques. It was particularly fun to visit California in late November as there were lights and Christmas decorations everywhere, so we got to enjoy the start of the holiday season without being in the bitter cold. The following day, we walked along the path on the beach with pedestrians and bikers leading up to the Santa Monica Pier. We also headed to Main Street for some shoppin.

Monday was one of the highlights of our trip and the whole reason we flew out to California this time around: my mom had gotten priority tickets for The Price Is Right! It was an extremely fun experience, one I highly recommend, especially if you’re a fan of the show. The energy is electrifying being in the studio as you play along and root for the contestants to win.

We spent the rest of the afternoon shopping at The Grove, which we’d visited last year as well, but it was even more fun this time around seeing all the lovely lights and decorations for the holidays.

On our last day of the trip, we went on a tour of Paramount Pictures Studio. Our tour guide, Nicole, was extremely knowledgable of the studio’s rich and interesting history. There were seven people in our tour group, which made the experience more engaging as it was easier to ask questions and chat with everyone in the group. We got to walk around the sets of Dr. Phil and the Netflix series, Grace and Frankie, and we saw some props used in a bunch of different movies. We also saw various spots where scenes were filmed for classics such as Titanic, Top Gun and the iconic movie, The Godfather. I got to take a picture sitting on one of the four original benches used while shooting Forrest Gump. After the tour, we headed to Larchmont Village, a nice little shopping area where we found some great stuff.The trip was an absolute joy and, as mentioned, it fueled my desire to move out to California to pursue my TV writing career. I’m hoping to make that dream a reality in the year ahead.

“The greatest art in the world is the art of storytelling.” — Cecil B. DeMille, co-founder of Paramount Pictures