Fleming, editor of the LA Times' L.A. Walks section and our favorite hiking expert, posted this walk in the paper last November. The promise of clear skies and warm weather made it an easy choice for Barbara and me today. Located south of Foothill Blvd in Lake View Terrace, Hansen Dam was built in 1939-40 to prevent flooding from the Big Tujunga Wash. The surrounding grounds developed into a major recreational center with picnic areas, fishing ponds, water slides, and a golf course—none of which we visited today. We headed into the wild, leaving the Hansen Dam Ranger Station to follow a circular path through the dried scrub in the basin bed, barely a bird, lizard, or four-legged creature in sight. The humans were running/walking the dam crest line high above us. And although the temp was warm, strong, gusty, and dusty Santa Ana winds painted the sky—and us—in shades of clay. A peaceful hike through flat brush, our only challenge was standing tall against the wind. Came home covered in grit from my hair, eyes, ears, and teeth, to my skin and clothes. The hiker's badge of honor!

Walking L.A. #28, East Silver Lake: Modern Masterpieces Above Sparking Waters, 2 miles, 730 stairs. 

it would be cold this weekend (hey, 43 in L.A. is COLD), Barbara and I headed to staircase-rich Silver Lake to work up a heart-pumping swe...uh, glow. Accessorized in hats, gloves, scarves, and hoodies, we walked north on Silver Lake Blvd. then into the hills up Duane Street to Rockford Rd. At the top of the road we were treated with a killer view of Silver Lake. Drained in 2015, the city turned on the faucet last spring and returned the reservoirs to their focal-point beauty. But we came to get a workout, and the 163-step Mattachine Staircase on Cove Ave, beckoned. The steps were named for the Mattachine Society, America's first gay rights movement started in the 1950's in Harry Hay's home at the top. By the time I lumbered up the last step, I had dropped the hood on my jacket. Next stop, Loma Vista Place and its 348 steps. Goodbye scarf and gloves. The houses along the stair/walk street, some with entrances mere steps from the stairs, are a mix of contemporary, rustic, and whimsical. (How do residents schlep their groceries home?) At the bottom of Loma Vista, Allensandro Street led us to Earl Street. Its zigzagging, 219-step staircase took us back up to the top and a sweeping view from the mountains in the valley to downtown L.A. Pocketed my hat and unzipped my jacket. At the bottom of Earl Street we detoured into Neutra Place, a cul-de-sac filled with showcase homes by architect Richard Neutra (1892-1970), one of the leaders of the SoCal Modern Architecture movement. Silver Lake is filled with innovative architecture, large and small, and most with views of the lake, but Neutra earned his own street! Warmed up and worked out, Barbara and I headed south along the reservoir for a celebratory mocha at Lamill Coffee. Exhilarating!

Walking L.A. #9, Leimert Park Village: Preserving African-American Business and Culture, 2.8 miles.


A great weekend for Barbara and me to explore Leimert Park, Curbed L.A.'s 2016 Neighborhood of the Year, an area John Singleton called "the black Greenwich Village." The village occupies one block along Degnan Blvd., east of Crenshaw and about a half-mile south of Martin Luther King Jr Blvd. We started at a Starbucks one mile north, for a stroll south on Degnan Blvd through a charming neighborhood of well-kept 1950s post-war homes and 1940s duplexes. Builder Walter Leimert developed Leimert Park in 1928. Eventually, the small village on Degnan between 43rd St. and 43rd Place became a culture focal point for jazz and art patrons and artists, including Ella Fitzgerald and Ray Charles, Leimert Park residents in the 1940s. First stop, the Fernando Pullum Commercial Arts Center, a non-profit center for kids 5-20 years old, founded by educator and musician Pullum, father of the first music magnet program in So. L.A. We passed jazz singer Barbara Morrison's 2009 Jazz & Blues Museum, detoured for an amazing mural facing the Vision Theater parking lot, then into the alley across the street for the LAST STAND: UNITE mural of African anti-colonial leader Patrice Lumumba and jazz musician Eric Dolphy. Sika's is a jewelry, clothing, and collectible shop owned by the "sage of Leimert" (rumored to be the best nose-piercer in town.) Next door, part of the 20,000 sq. ft. campus of Art + Practice, a non-profit education and cultural center for So. L.A. foster youth. East on 43rd Place to the remarkable Vision Theater, a 1931 L.A. Historic-Cultural Monument by the architects who designed the El Capitan and Mayan theaters. Across the street, Leimert Park Plaza and it's landmark fountain, the end of our route and the destination of tomorrow's MLK Day Parade. I had heard that Leimert Park had culture and class, but a sidewalk tour tells the real story. A community treasure!

Walking L.A. #8, Downtown Culver City: Holding Onto Its Place in Movie-Making History, 5 miles. 

By sheer chance, Barbara and I chose a hike through Culver City, "The Heart of Screenland," on the morning of the Golden Globes. I doubt that founder Harry Culver intended the area to be a film center when he first established the city in 1913, but in a chance meeting with producer/director/mogul Thomas Ince on the set of a western in Ballona Creek, Culver convinced the filmmaker to move his, DW Griffith's and Max Sennett's Triangle Motion Picture Company to Washington Blvd. in 1915. Ince broke from his partners and moved up the street to form the Thomas Ince Studios in 1918—now Culver Studios, and the first stop on our hike.



The lot's main structure is the Mansion House, a landmark modeled after Washington's Mt. Vernon estate. Classics filmed or edited on this lot include Gone With The Wind and The Andy Griffith Show. Up the block, another National Historic Landmark, the 6-story Culver Hotel built by Culver in 1924 as the Hotel Hunt.


A walk through the lobby and upstairs bar took us back to the days when Clark Gable, Garbo, Garland, Fairbanks, Sinatra, the cast of GWTW, and the Wizard of Oz munchkins stayed and played there.



Over the years the hotel passed hands from Culver to Charlie Chaplin, who lost it in a poker game to John Wayne, who donated it to the YMCA, and now it's a 4-star boutique hotel.


After a pause for me to ham it up with a statue of Harry Culver and his family, we hiked along Washington's restaurant row to City Hall, and then to the Sony lot, punctuated by a 94-ft. rainbow, a public art installation commemorating the Wizard of Oz.


This lot, originally Ince's Triangle location, became MGM in 1924, and boasts a film history from Ben Hur to the Wizard of Oz to Singing in the Rain, and all the way up to today's Shark Tank and The Goldbergs.



A turn south took Barbara and me into and through Carlson Park then down Overland to the Ballona Creek walk and bike path (where Culver met Ince) for a pleasant mile-long stroll leading us to Duquesne Ave and the entrance to Culver City Park. Moving from film history to an Interpretive Nature Trail, we climbed the zigzagging wooden walkway to the top and a killer view of West L.A. and the ocean.



If you're looking for a West Side hike that covers everything from silver screen history to great restaurants and hiking paths, this is the one!