putting the knit in shizknitz

So last week I mention to T, “let’s go hiking on Temescal Canyon. One of my guys at work says its great.” He answers “we need a GPS system” and I start cracking up - of course, we need a GPS system, we’re 2 feet from Sunset Blvd, right? He responds with “yes, one for both of us, in case we get split up. Or a good rope, so one will carry it and the other won’t get lost”. We didn’t get any gadgets, but we did pick up some cool SPF 50 hats at REI.

His enthusiasm died quickly the very next day when the alarm went off at 6:45 AM on a Sunday (and mind you, we were up around 5:30 the day before). It continued as we parked along Temescal Canyon Road and walked into the park…. then 10 minutes into this very rocky, sweaty climb. Oh, and did I mention we had no cel reception? For me, I was having a pretty good time. There always seemed to be more people coming down than up the hill, but it was fine. I heavily recommend water and a towel in the summer - I was sweating up a storm. What great exercise!! We weren’t really sure where we were going (okay, so that GPS thing would have come in handy) but we continued to follow people and signs. It was about 2 hours for us to come along a route that took us by a waterfall, to the top of the mountain and back down again. If we did this every weekend, I would have a rock hard ass. I was surprised to find that the Santa Monica Mountains offer many trails like this one, so we have much to discover (get ready, T!).