Los Angeles is a difficult city to date in badly and a wonderful one to date in well - the difference is almost entirely in what you plan. Here are eleven date ideas that actually give you something to talk about.
1. Griffith Observatory at sunset. The view does the work, and the walk up gives you something to do with the first awkward twenty minutes.
2. A morning hike, then coffee. Fryman Canyon or Runyon - a date with a natural end point, which is a kindness to both of you if it isn't going well.
3. Grand Central Market. Twenty places to choose from means nobody has to commit to a two-hour table with a stranger.
4. The Getty, on a clear day. The tram, the gardens, and the view are worth as much as the art, and it's an easy place to wander rather than shuffle.
5. The Venice canals, not the boardwalk. Ten minutes away and a completely different city - quiet, walkable, and genuinely lovely at golden hour.
6. A taco crawl in Boyle Heights or East LA. Cheap, moving, and much more revealing than a tasting menu.
7. The Hollywood Bowl or the Greek. A shared experience with a structure to it, and a long enough evening that the conversation gets past the introductions.
8. Record and vintage shopping. An hour of picking things up and putting them down tells you more about someone than an hour of questions.
9. The Huntington or Descanso Gardens. Enormous, quiet, and a rare corner of the city where nobody is performing.
10. A drive up the PCH with somewhere to stop. The drive is the date. Pick a destination anyway, so it has a shape.
11. A comedy or storytelling night. Largo, UCB, or whatever's on - low stakes, and you learn a lot from what makes someone laugh.
The thing that actually matters
The best date ideas aren't the most impressive ones - they're the ones that give two people something to do together, react to together, and talk about afterwards. In a city built around driving somewhere, choosing a plan worth the drive is most of the work.
Elsewhere: London, New York, Dubai. Related reading: Getting Back Into Dating: 5 Tips to Start.
