I went to the Golden Door hoping for glitz. Well, it's the place that spearheaded the spa revolution when it opened in 1958, and it remains the byword for beauty in La-La Land. I imagined excessive vulgarity. I imagined breast-enhanced, blonde Hollywood types. I imagined Courtney Love would be there, and at least one Hollywood star would be trying unsuccessfully to overcome their drug or drink addiction. After all, it's the former hang-out of Zsa Zsa Gabor, and she was hardly understated. Nicole Kidman's been here. And Alicia Silverstone, Olivia Newton-John, Oprah Winfrey, Barbra Streisand. The exercise rooms would be marble, at least. The facials maybe using caviar. It would surely be super-glamorous.

If I had to survive in the bush, I'd kill a buffalo," announces my son, Michael, aged 19.

"How?"

"I'd get a huge stone and crash it on his head."

The young Masai warrior who is with us begins to laugh, long and deep. This is clearly the funniest thing he's heard in a while. It's like a Masai telling us he would survive in London by asking a passer-by for £100.

Los Angeles is a land where conventional time no longer exists. "There are no seasons, it's always the same sunny blue sky day after day, so you never feel you're getting any older," said a friend, tranquilly. Here you can pause the passing of the years, or even rewind a little - breasts can be pert again, skin taut, forehead uncreased.