topanga walks

free guided nature walk Sundays at 1:00 pm from January 1 through June 30

This program takes you on a two hour, easy nature walk in Topanga State Park with a docent who knows the trails and the plants and animals.  Several trails are available - the Nature Trail, the Musch Trail, the Parker Mesa Overlook Trail, the Dead Horse Trail.  Each has different features.  These walks are scheduled every Sunday between January 1 and June 30 at 1:00 pm.  Meet your docent at the bulletin board in the corner of the parking lot.  Of course, if it rains or the park is closed because of fire danger we'll all stay home. 

The walks are free, but the State charges $6 for parking.  You may need to pay for parking at the unmanned honor station, so bring exact change.  Bring your family and friends, wear long pants and sensible shoes.  There are restrooms with running water next to the parking lot, and picnic tables, so you can come early and bring lunch.  You can read more about the park history and view some nice photos below.

Also bring all your questions about wildflowers, birds, snakes, geology, plant uses, insects, land grants and native Americans.  Our docents are knowledgeable friendly, trained volunteers.  The park is beautiful, and on a clear day you can see Catalina Island.  If you've never visited, you may want to print out our map & directions and our site map.  These are in PDF format, so you'll need Adobe Reader®.  You can download Adobe Reader® here.

	Trail	Length	diabase rock
From Trippet Ranch parking lot
	Dead Horse/Backbone Trail	1.1 easy miles
	Eagle Rock Loop	6.5 moderate miles round trip
	Musch Trail/Backbone Trail	2 easy miles
	Parker Mesa Overlook	8 moderate miles round trip
	Santa Ynez Canyon Trail	6 miles round trip
From Old Topanga Canyon Road
	Hondo Canyon/Backbone Trail	3.3 miles
From Will Rogers State Park
	Rogers Road/Backbone Trail	5.3 moderate miles one way
	Rustic Canyon Trail	4.6 moderate miles round trip
From Reseda Boulevard
	Garapito Canyon Trail	2.5 moderate miles	california sister butterfly
	Temescal Peak	5.6 moderate miles round trip
From Sunset Boulevard
	Bent Arrow Trail	0.4 easy miles
	Bienveneda Trail	0.4 miles
	Calle Deborah Trail	0.5 easy miles
	Leacock Trail	0.5 miles
	Los Liones Canyon	3.2 moderate miles round trip
	Parker Mesa Overlook	8 moderate miles round trip
	Santa Ynez Falls	2.6 easy miles round trip
	Temescal Ridge Trail	5.2 moderate miles
	Trailer Canyon	2.2 moderate miles

hawk	web	wood rat's nest
wild cucumber tendrils	toad track on the fire road	walnut tree

topanga parkland history

11,000 acres of Topanga State Park once part of Mexican land grant

California was claimed for Spain by Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo in 1542, but substantially ignored for two hundred years. Then in an effort to support its claims in the face of growing British, French and Russian colonization, Spain began to establish a system of Pueblos, Missions and Presidios in Nueva California. Santa Monica bay was visited in 1769 by Gaspar de Portola and Father Junipero Serra. Then in 1775 Juan Bautista de Anza left Mission San Gabriel and camped at the mouth of Malibu Creek with a group of settlers bound for San Francisco.  In 1781 a group of 44 settlers left Mission San Gabriel to found the Pueblo of Los Angeles. With all this effort, by the time Mexico became independent from Spain in 1821, Los Angeles only had a population of 650. Land was given to soldiers with just a few years service. In 1828 the Mexican Governor of Alta California granted Francisco Sepulveda provisional title to the more than 30,000 acres called Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica. The rancho included the eastern portion of the City of Santa Monica, Santa Monica Canyon and the mountains to the ridgeline on the west bank of Topanga Creek. Sepulveda used the flat portions for grazing crops, but the mountainous portions, which were unsuitable for sheep or cattle, were not used.

When California became part of the United States in 1848 it had a non-indian population of 14,000, mostly in the north.  When settlers rushed into central California in 1849 and 1850 during the gold rush life in Los Angeles changed very little.  Eventually ownership of the Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica grant was confirmed by a US Land Claims Commission. 

Trippet Ranch homesteaded

Property in Topanga Canyon along the creek and in the mountains to the west, which had been so undesirable as crop or range land that the Spanish and Mexican governments could not give it away, passed to the United State government and became available to homesteaders.  The Homestead Act allowed settlers, who occupied and improved government owned land, to get title to 160 acres after 5 years for a small fee.  A number of homestead claims were filed in the Santa Monica Mountains, including one by a beekeeper named McAtee, whose claim was on the western edge of Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica along what became Entrada Road. 

By 1872 Los Angeles had grown to 3,500,000 people, the entire Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica  was sold to Colonel Robert Baker for $54,000.  Three years later Baker and a partner began developing what became the city of Santa Monica on what had been pastureland.  The mountainous portion of the grant remained undeveloped until the 1920s when Will Rogers bought his property and Alphonzo Bell began development of Bel-Air. 

US Judge Oscar A. Trippet, Sr. acquired half of the McAtee homestead in 1917. During the 46 years the Trippets owned the property they lived in Los Angeles and use the old homestead only as a get-away. After Judge Trippet died in 1923 his wife Cora built a small stone house that was destroyed in 1938 in a 15,000 acre wildfire accidentally set by her superintendant. In 1940 Trippet's son Oscar Trippet, Jr. (who later inherited the property) hired noted Los Angeles architect Sumner Spaulding to design the Monterey Revival style superintendant's house, stables and skeet lodge. Spaulding is also known for the design of the Harold Lloyd Estate, Edwin Loeb Estate, buildings at Pomona College, and the Avalon Casino. Trippet Jr. gave the Topanga property the fanciful name Rancho Las Lomas Celestiales and used the lodge for weekends with family and friends, where they enjoyed outdoor barbeques and skeet. In 1956 Trippet built the stock pond now located at the northeast corner of the parking lot. Then in 1963 the land was sold to a developer.

Topanga State Park purchased

The very next year voters approved a Park Bond which included money to acquire the 174 acres of Trippet Ranch and an adjoining parcel. Like the nearby Will Rogers estate (acquired in 1944), Trippet Ranch is unusual among gentlemen's ranches in avoiding subdivision.   By the time Topanga State Park was opened to the public in 1974, it included 7500 acres from the old Rancho San Vicente y Santa Monica Spanish land grant. 

An additional 1500 acres was added when Palisades Highlands was developed.  Neighboring Santa Ynez Canyon was purchased by the City of Los Angeles in 1989 to use as a landfill, which fortunately has been prevented by the City's inability to get a paved access road approved.  Most recently, in 2002 the 1600 acre Los Angeles Athletic Club property near the mouth of Topanga Creek was added to Topanga State Park. 

Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area (SMMNRA) created

If completed, it would have been the world's largest urban national park extending 46 miles from the Hollywood Bowl to Point Mugu, separating West Los Angeles from the San Fernando Valley.  Although Congress designated the National Recreation Area in 1978, it has never made a significant effort to acquire parkland, and today preservation is a cooperative effort between the National Park Service, California State Parks, the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, and dozens of county and city governmental agencies and non-profits.  California State Parks owns about 2/3 of the parkland acquired to date.  Although the SMMNRA cover 150,000 acres, the original plan was to protect about 100,000 acres, leaving 50,000, including the City of Malibu, in private hands.  In SMMNRAs first 27 years, about 65,000 acres have been protected.

largest park in the SMMNRA

Topanga State Park has more than 36 miles of hiking trails, including the a section of the Backbone Trail which links Griffith Park to the Pacific Ocean.

Topanga State Park is home to hundreds of animal species, among them are mountain lions, bobcats, foxes, coyotes and deer.  A dozen species of raptors nest  in the park and two dozen species of reptiles and amphibians.  Live oaks, walnuts and sycamore trees line the trails of the park.  There are variety geologic formations including earthquake faults, marine fossils, and volcanic intrusions, as well as a variety of sedimentary rocks.  Most of the trails give you panoramic mountain, valley or ocean views. 

sunday public walk	meadow	red-tailed hawk
male anna's hummingbird	racoon tracks at the pond's edge	coast live oaks
chinese houses	stock pond	poison oak leaf