What should I avoid in Los Angeles?

Hollywood Boulevard between Highland Avenue and La Brea Avenue is the single biggest disappointment most first-timers in Los Angeles report. The Walk of Fame, laid in 1958, sounds like a pilgrimage until you're dodging someone in a knock-off Elmo costume who grabs your arm for a photo and then demands $10-20. The CD hustlers work in teams of 2-3 along the block near the Dolby Theatre. They press a disc into your hand, ask you to sign it "for my mixtape," then demand $20 because "you touched it." The Dolby Theatre exterior is worth a look. The rest of the block smells like hot asphalt and vape smoke. If you want to see the brass-and-terrazzo stars without the hassle, go at 7:30am on a weekday when the concrete is still cool underfoot and the sidewalk is nearly empty.

Never take a taxi from LAX. The cab queue runs $50-70 to Santa Monica, $55-80 to Hollywood. The FlyAway bus leaves every 30 minutes from every terminal and drops you at Union Station for $9.75, where you connect to Metro. Rideshares pick up at the LAX-it lot, which is a free shuttle ride from baggage claim (about 5-8 minutes), and run $25-40 to most central Los Angeles neighborhoods. A rental car on your first day is a mistake too. You'll spend 90 minutes crawling the 405 between the airport and your hotel, gripping the wheel through six lanes of traffic that moves at 15 mph while your phone GPS recalculates. Get the car on day 2 or 3, after you've had a night's sleep and oriented yourself.

Skip any restaurant on Hollywood Boulevard with a sidewalk barker and laminated photos of the food. The pink stucco tourist joints near the TCL Chinese Theatre charge $26-32 for rubbery pasta that tastes like it came from a microwave. Walk 10 minutes east into Thai Town along Hollywood Boulevard past Western Avenue, where a plate of pad kra pao at any of the 30-odd Thai restaurants runs $12-15 and arrives with the sharp sting of fresh Thai basil and bird's eye chili. The same principle applies at the Santa Monica Pier. The pier restaurants charge view premiums for frozen-then-fried fish. Walk 4 blocks inland to Bay Cities Italian Deli on Lincoln Boulevard for the Godmother sandwich, a $14 stack of Genoa salami, prosciutto, capicola, mortadella, and provolone that has had a line out the door since 1925.

Venice Beach Boardwalk has been in decline for several years. The stretch between Windward Avenue and Rose Avenue currently tends to smell like stale cannabis and hot sunscreen. The t-shirt vendors sell the same printed designs you'd find at any tourist zone on earth, and Muscle Beach draws more phone cameras than actual lifters these days. If you want a proper beach day, drive 20 minutes north to El Matador State Beach in Malibu, where sandstone sea stacks rise out of the sand and the parking lot holds about 30 cars at $10 each. Worth noting, Beverly Hills is better as a 10-minute drive-through on Santa Monica Boulevard than a walk-around destination. Rodeo Drive's storefronts are designed to make you feel unwelcome unless you're carrying a $3,000 handbag.

June in Los Angeles brings "June Gloom," a marine layer that rolls in from the Pacific and keeps the coast at 16-18°C until noon or later. First-timers pack for California sunshine and then stand shivering at the Santa Monica Pier at 9am in fog so thick you can't see the Ferris wheel. It burns off by 1pm most days, and inland areas like Pasadena and Burbank stay warm and dry. September through November is wildfire smoke season. Check the AirNow app before hiking in the Santa Monica Mountains or Griffith Park. On bad air days the San Fernando Valley fills with a haze that stings your throat and turns the sunset a flat orange. The UV index still hits 9-10 on clear summer afternoons, even when the temperature feels mild at 26°C. Sunscreen is not optional for a 20-minute walk to lunch.