The Adventure Attitude
In real estate, the mantra is: location, location, location. Over a quarter-century as a travel writer, I’ve learned that the equivalent mantra for travel is this: attitude, attitude, attitude. While it is wonderful to travel halfway around the world to have adventures, with the right attitude, you can discover adventures all around you, even in your own back yard.
I re-learned this lesson in a vivid way on my recent five-day foray to LA.
What do the words Los Angeles conjure for you? For me they have long conjured smog-shrouded urban sprawl, an almost infinite cityscape of houses and office buildings punctuated here and there by isolated stands of skyscrapers. It’s a relentless – and to be honest, relentlessly bleak – urban landscape.
But on this trip I discovered an altogether different side of LA. It all began when I met with a friend named Ariane on Thursday. Ariane has been living in the LA area for two years, and at one point in our conversation she began describing the day-hikes she loves to take in the wilds of the Santa Monica Mountains. Mountain day-hikes? In LA?
My packed plans hadn’t included a day-hike, but DG’s road rule #1 is this: When serendipity offers you a gift, open it. That’s adventure travel! With a little schedule-scrambling, I figured I could carve out space for a Sunday morning hike and still get to LAX in time to make my mid-afternoon plane.
Happily, Ariane was able to re-scramble her schedule too, and three mornings later, we met in the parking lot at Temescal Gateway Park, just beyond the car-swooshing, brake-grinding, engine-revving intersection of Sunset Boulevard and Temescal Canyon Road in Pacific Palisades. She led me on to the Waterfall Trail, and within ten minutes we were in a completely different world: surrounded by dense scrub brush, berry bushes, and sycamores, heady with the scents of new mud and rain-nourished brush, sweet-strung with the chirpings of birds; ahead rose great green folds of mountain and beyond them a crystalline blue sky.
We huffed and puffed up the winding trail, my city shoes and slacks taking on a chic muddy sheen. We paused briefly at the reduced-to-a-trickle waterfall – “you’ll have to come back after there’s more rain,” a fellow hiker advised – then joined the Temescal Ridge Trail.
After about 45 minutes, we emerged out of the brush and branches; a few dozen steps brought us to the trail top -- and a truly mind-stretching panorama. To the left was my stereotypical LA: the vast urban valley and the skyscrapers of Westwood and Century City and beyond them downtown. But that sprawl morphed westward into a shimmering slice of coast, sandy beaches arcing uninterrupted from Santa Monica, Venice, and Marina del Rey to Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach and Redondo Beach, all the way to the misty green hills of Palos Verdes. The scene in front of me was the antithesis of the urban sprawl I’d associated with LA: elegant – and some just plain over-the-top -- homes gracing winding suburban streets, swimming pools and lawns glinting blue and green. And to my right, looking north and inland, the Santa Monica Mountains rolled away in lush green waves. Except for a line of extravagant homes perched on the tip of the ridge, this land was wild, all tree and brush and bird, pristine.
Ariane and I stood for a long time in the sun at the top, swigging water, absorbing this scene.
A fresh breeze blew off the ocean, and I thought about inertia and discovery, about the clichés we construct and the everyday adventures that, when we are lucky and open to them, sweep those clichés away.
Then Ariane turned to me, her smile as wide and bright as the day. Opening her arms as if to embrace the entire visible world, she said, “Welcome to LA.”
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Culinary adventures: I had two wonderful dinners on my recent trip. AOC in L.A. offered a delicious selection of small-plate Mediterranean savories -- don't miss the roasted dates wrapped in bacon -- with a world-class wine list, all in a warm and inviting ambience. At its new second home in Santa Monica, Tengu served melt-in-your-mouth yellowtail sushi and succulent sea bass, along with palate-stretching sake flights.
Sleep set: I stayed at the recently re-opened and stylishly renovated Hotel Angeleno, located at the intersection of Sunset Boulevard and the 405. Remade in signature Joie de Vivre fashion, with an elegant sand-bone-chocolate palette and whimsical flourishes, the hotel offered a beguiling combination of comfort and convenience.
More adventures: Whether you're looking for adventures near or far, the Adventure Collection's destinations and tours are sure to offer something to inspire you. Check them out at AdventureCollection.com.
