What’s the best hotel in Los Angeles? According to Travel + Leisure magazine, which came out with its World’s Best Awards last week, it is Oceana Santa Monica.
The hotel is located on Ocean Avenue, and readers (who do the voting) said they loved the oceanfront views. But they also touted such hotel amenities as surf lessons, waterfront yoga and, of course, its beach butler service. A discount inn it is not: Rooms start at $712 a night in August but go up over $1,000 on weekends, according to its website.
On a separate ranking, The Ranch in Malibu was No. 1 on Travel + Leisure’s list of U.S. destination spas. The magazine said the Ranch’s multiday programs blend low-impact exercise classes with rigorous hikes, “and the consensus seems to be that the experience is transformative, helping to break unwanted habits and kickstart improved well-being.”
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A push is on to get more nonstop flights from Los Angeles to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, which is the only airport to have a perimeter rule.
That federal rule limits the number of nonstop flights to that convenient Washington airport beyond a perimeter of 1,250 miles, which is about halfway across Kansas. That means businesspeople in Kansas City, along with those in Chicago and St. Louis, have a better chance of getting a nonstop flight to Washington National than their counterparts in Los Angeles or any other city in the West.
Nonstop flights go to Washington’s other airport, Dulles International, but it is further out of town, and flights there make it less likely for a business traveler to book a one-day or even a two-day trip.
Now, only four round trip flights a day are allowed between Los Angeles and Washington National; eight go to Dulles. If the perimeter rule were relaxed, several flights a day could be added to Washington National, although the exact amount is undetermined.
The perimeter rule comes up for reauthorization every five years; this fall is the next deadline. A group called Capital Access Alliance has been formed to lobby for repeal. It is made up of some airlines but not others along with various business groups.
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Great to see that Dr. Susan Love’s passing garnered good recognition. She was, as the New York Times put it, “one of the world’s most visible public faces in the war on breast cancer.” She pushed to curtail radical mastectomy as a routine procedure.
Besides big articles in the New York Times and Los Angeles Times, the Today show did a two-minute story on the surgeon, writer, lecturer and founder of the Dr. Susan Love Foundation for Breast Cancer Research in Santa Monica.
She died of leukemia July 2 at her home in Los Angeles at age 75.
The Insider is compiled by Editor-in-Chief Charles Crumpley. He can be reached at [email protected].
