Great small hikes near Los Angeles, CA ?

[timmus]

Does anyone has suggestions for great small hikes in the City of Angels area ? Pasadena is where I'll stay.

We'll be with 8-10 years old, and it has to be maximum 4h RT. We would like to have views of the city and the ocean.

Canyons, waterfalls, summits, it doesn't matter.

Thanks !!!

 

[ferrisjrf]

There's a trailhead right next to NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab, in the Altadena area. That's a good place to access the Angeles National Forest (ANF) trails.

You could also take Angeles Crest Highway north out of La Canada Flintridge, where you'll find trailheads that start at higher elevations. It's a nice drive. Lots of trailheads up there. Note that trails are sometimes closed for fire season, so you probably want to look into that before driving too far.

Verdugo Mountains (north of Glendale) offer pretty extensive fire roads with great views, although it's not as "wildernessy" as ANF.

Griffith Park also has a decent number of trails.

Further away from Pasadena (but not bad if you're headed to the west side beaches) is Topanga State Park. Nice stuff there.

 

[wardsgirl]

You might pm Stinkyfeet, who is familiar with the area and helped me a lot with info when I went to LA.