Esotouric offers Route 66 tour Feb. 4

Discover secret histories of urban Los Angeles with Esotouric's February
architecture tours

WHAT: Esotouric's architecture and urbanism tour series, REYNER BANHAM LOVES
L.A. and a free LAVA walking tour of VICTORIAN LOS ANGELES PART TWO

WHERE/WHEN: Esotouric's ROUTE 66 tour departs Saturday February 4, 11am from
Big Bang Coffee Shop (behind Union Station), 530 Ramirez St,. Los Angeles,
CA 90012;

Esotouric's THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN tour departs Saturday,
February 25, 11am from Cafe Metropol, 923 E. 3rd. Street, Los Angeles, CA
90013);

LAVA's walking tour VICTORIAN LOS ANGELES PART TWO departs Sunday,
February 26, 1:30pm from LA Police Headquarters, 100 W 1st St, Los Angeles,
CA 90012

COST: $58/person for ROUTE 66 or THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN bus tours;
VICTORIAN L.A. PART TWO walking tour is free, but already fully booked

INFO: Esotouric bus tours http://www.esotouric.com/, LAVA walking tour
http://lavatransforms.org/flaneur0212 , or call 323-223-2767

Los Angeles is a place that defies easy understanding or
description. Love it or hate it, few would ever say the city isn't
interesting. This February join the Los Angeles natives of Esotouric, the
offbeat bus adventure company whose tours reveal the secret heart of the
southland, as they host twin excursions deep into the region's most
fascinating crannies: along ROUTE 66 in the San Gabriel Valley, and into the
heart of the urban core for THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN. The month ends with a
very special event, as Esotouric's Richard Schave and architectural
historian Nathan Marsak host a free downtown walking tour, VICTORIAN LOS
ANGELES PART TWO, under the umbrella of LAVA - The Los Angeles Visionaries
Association. All tours begin downtown.

ABOUT THE ROUTE 66 TOUR (February 4):
It's a common misconception that ROUTE 66 only gets interesting in Arizona.
But when Esotouric's Route 66 bus tour departs from downtown Los Angeles,
passengers are in for a four-hour tour packed with stunning retro jewels
plucked from L.A.'s own backyard. ROUTE 66 only exists today in small
fragments, but many of the unique attractions that dotted its length survive
and flourish today. Get on the bus to explore the real Southland, as no one
but Esotouric's Richard Schave can reveal it. Richard's unique expertise on
unknown Los Angeles has seen him as a featured guide on television's "Globe
Trekker" (Grand Central Market) and "Cities of the Underworld" (downtown's
prohibition-era tunnels) and speaking at the Canadian Centre for
Architecture and Hammer Museum. The ROUTE 66 tour explores California's
original mass transit corridor and the building of its dream, from climate
to citrus industry, Kalifornia Krazy architectural novelties to bucolic
bungalows. Highlights in this edition of ROUTE 66 include a tour of E. WALDO
WARD FARM (the oldest surviving commercial citrus facility in LA, where
passengers can buy scrumptious preserves and almond-filled olives to take
home), a stroll through Robert Stacy Judd's 1924 masterpiece THE AZTEC HOTEL
(and yes, it's haunted), a swing around the homes of the feuding SLAUSON
SISTERS tucked among vast cleared fields awaiting new development (hidden
gems of Azusa lore and family dynamics, and a reminder of how fragile
ecologies fall to the incessant crush of progress). Passengers will also
tour the seldom-seen Civil War-era FAIRMOUNT CEMETERY and view the evocative
BUNGALOWS of old Monrovia accompanied by host Richard Schave's lively
rendition of a vintage bungalow booster tune.

ABOUT THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN TOUR (February 25):
Join Richard Schave, the founding director of the Downtown LA Art Walk
non-profit, on a tour that reveals the secret history, and the fascinating
future, of this most beguiling LA neighborhood. THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN is a
guided social history of the mysterious, complex and rapidly evolving center
of L.A., a thriving neighborhood that was intentionally depopulated in the
1950s and is currently experiencing an extraordinary rebirth. Everyone
complains L.A. lacks a center -- this tour explains why. Passengers will
visit exquisite architectural gems, including some seldom seen by the
general public, but they'll also enjoy a sophisticated analysis of the
economic and social tools used to rebuild downtown, learn how gentrification
sprung up on the city's meanest streets with all the conflicts that go along
with a community's socio-economic shift, meet creative residents and explore
unique destinations. Featured locations include the intentionally
depopulated Bunker Hill and its Angels Flight funicular railway, Grand
Central Market, the concrete design disaster Pershing Square (with its
tribute to novelist John Fante), European-style dining alley St. Vincent's
Court, the lyrical glass-topped Mercantile Arcade Building (an exact replica
of a London landmark) and a visit to artist David Hollen's live/work studio.
Get on the bus for the real Lowdown on Downtown, as no one but Esotouric's
Richard Schave can reveal it.

ABOUT THE VICTORIAN LOS ANGELES PART TWO TOUR (February 26, note that the
tour is already fully booked, but interested journalists on assignment
should inquire about comp tickets)
For the latest installment of urban historian Richard Schave's site-specific
discussion series "The Flâneur & The City," Richard (Esotouric bus
adventures) is joined by architectural historian Nathan Marsak (1947project,
On Bunker Hill, In SRO Land). This walking tour will cover First Street
north to Aliso and Los Angeles Street west to Broadway. It is a distinct
departure from Part One, which almost exclusively dealt with the development
of the mature business block of the 1880s and '90s. This tour will deal, for
the most part, with the hotels and early business blocks of the 1870s, whose
unique stylistic developments in this "bust out" time are heavily influenced
by the experiences of Angelenoes in the "tempestuous '60s." This is an era
which saw drought, disease, plagues (of grasshoppers no less), and the
bottom falling out of the real estate market, and those citizens who dared
remain were the toughest and most stubborn ones. The Bella Union, US Hotel,
Hotel de Paris, the Baker Block, the Temple Block, and the whole slew of
county and city buildings surrounding Pound Cake Hill and Fort Moore will
all be discussed as we orient you to their locations beneath what exists
today. It is a Los Angeles that you will not recognize, and yet, strangely,
you will not be surprised at all. For as we hold as a vademecum for this
tour that haunting quote from Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre-Dame:
"When a man understands the art of seeing, he can trace the spirit of an age
and the features of a king even in the knocker on a door." By the conclusion
of Part Two of Victorian Downtown, with only the rich region of the Plaza
left for Part Three, we will have covered sufficient ground and decades to
begin to make sweeping generalizations about the aesthetics of Victorian Los
Angeles and how they drove the growth, appearance and very spirit of the
city.

ABOUT THE REYNER BANHAM LOVES L.A. TOUR SERIES:
In addition to the upcoming and ROUTE 66 and THE LOWDOWN ON DOWNTOWN tours,
Esotouric's ongoing architecture and urbanism tour series includes THE NEW
CHINATOWNS, BOYLE HEIGHTS and SOUTH L.A.. Inspired by the British
architectural critic Reyner Banham, who host Richard Schave studied under at
UC Santa Cruz, the REYNER BANHAM LOVES LOS ANGELES series offers a fresh way
of looking at the urban web of history, mass transit, migration and mystery
that somehow holds L.A. together. The Reyner Banham Loves LA series of
Esotouric bus adventures provides fresh ways of seeing the Southland and
mingling with fascinating fellow travelers, and are a must for urban
explorers, architecture buffs, curious locals, daring tourists, and anyone
who enjoys turning over rocks to reveal the secrets beneath. Come ride and
see for yourself.

Upcoming Esotouric bus tour and special event schedule
Sat Jan 14 - Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles
Sat Jan 21 - Charles Bukowski's Los Angeles
Mon Jan 23 - The LAVA Salon at Musso & Frank featuring Dan Fante (info at
http://www.lavatransforms.org/)
Sat Jan 28 - The Birth of Noir: James M. Cain's Southern California
Nightmare
Sat Feb 4 - Reyner Banham Loves Los Angeles: Route 66
Sat Feb 25 - Reyner Banham Loves Los Angeles: The Lowdown on Downtown
Sun Feb 26 - Victorian Los Angeles Part Two (info at lavatransforms.org)
Sat March 3 - Hotel Horrors & Main Street Vice crime bus tour
Sun March 4 - Inside the Mind of the Arsonist (info at lavatransforms.org)
Sat March 10 - Weird West Adams crime bus tour
Sat March 17 - Pasadena Confidential crime bus tour (weekend pass available)
Sun March 18 - East Side Babylon crime bus tour (weekend pass available)
Sat April 7 - Charles Bukowski's Los Angeles (weekend pass available)
Sun April 8 ­ John Fante's Dreams from Bunker Hill (weekend pass available)
Sat April 14 - The Real Black Dahlia crime bus tour
Sat April 21 - Crawling Down Cahuenga: Tom Waits' L.A.
Sat April 28 - Maja's Mysteries: Rapture & Release
Sat May 19 - Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles
Sun May 20 ­ Blood & Dumplings crime bus tour

Esotouric's Richard Schave, Kim Cooper and Joan Renner are proud members of
LAVA - The Los Angeles Visionaries Association.
http://www.lavatransforms.org/

For more on Reyner Banham, see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reyner_Banham

And the BBC documentary "Reyner Banham Loves Los Angeles"
http://reyner.notlong.com