Griffith Observatory to the Base of the Hollywood Sign

Hiked May 28, 2026. Hike 22 for the Year. My hiking pace took a dive this month, but I managed to get a few in at the end of the month, keeping me on pace for this year's target of 52 hikes. I got a boost by cloudy weather and forgetfulness. For this hike, it was the former.

I was scheduled to work a lawn telescope, but the clouds made showing anything problematic for the night, though there would have been some brief peeks at the moon, had I stuck around all night. Most of the time would have just been standing around, or showing city sights, which is allowable, but not much fun, to me. So I put in my hour, then went hiking.

I have obviously been hiking in Griffith Park since the year this blog began. Looks like I last hiked to the top of the sign about two years ago. But I think it's been a while since I was at the bottom of the sign, so I figured I would do that, and get an idea of the hiking distance and time from the Observatory.

Turns out the answer is, "A lot." The problem is, from the Observatory, the trails you need to take to get to the base are very windy, weaving along contour lines that turn in and out of various erosion creases. It was about 8.5 miles, roundtrip. And since I hadn't gone on any longer hikes in a while, I found it pretty tiring.

It was longer than it needed to be because I don't like having to cross West Observatory Road, down near the Vermont Tunnel, and I don't like walking up or down West Observatory Road, because of the foot traffic. So either staying up from the Charlie Turner trailhead, or returning over the tunnel, both add a lot of distance and altitude gain to the hike. But I usually find that preferable to the foot and car traffic, down below.

So, on this trip, I walked past the Berlin Children's Forest, then dropped down to West Observatory Road, cross West Observatory Road and Western Canyon Road then walked up the paved but gated road that is Mount Hollywood Drive. I then took Mulholland Trail over to paved Mount Lee Drive, then turned down, to the left.

Then it was west, on and along Mulholland Highway (passing on the pedestrian bypass for a gate that otherwise blocks Mulholland Highway), to a lot that is signed as 6101 Mullholland, and has a steel sheeted placesaver and a "No Tressspassing" sign on the stairs leading up to the sheet metal outline of a home. I assume the intent is to one day build there, and so to preserve their private holding, no right of public access until they do. Google maps calls the place, "The Last House on Mulholland."

Of course, if you buy and build, there, I would expect an awful lot of foot traffic around your house, and you'd probably have to grant an easement of some kind, to preserve the view of the sign.

I returned to the Observatory via the "three mile" trail, back up to near Mount Hollywood, then took the east side trail around Mount Hollywood, then back down to the Observatory, via the Charlie Turner trailhead.

A screen shot of my Alltrails recording is here: 8.79 miles, 1,053 feet of vertical. I was pretty tired, the next day, and the day after.

Unlike national park areas, dogs are permitted. No smoking is allowed anywhere in the park. You may need to share the trail with horses, and you'll definitely see horse poop and smell horse urine. Also, there's a lot shorter way to get here, if you park down near Lake Hollywood Park. Parking is free, down there. But because I'm me, I almost always park near the Observatory for my hikes in Griffith Park.

Red Rock Canyon State Park, Cantil, CA

Hiked May 18, 2026. Twenty-first hike of the year.

This was not the original plan. My 21st hike was supposed to be in the eastern Sierra, on the afternoon-evening of the 17th. But as the 17th moved from morning into afternoon, I saw what looked like a huge bank of dust, to the north of Bishop, and coming our way. By about the time I would have headed out for a hike that would end with the soft afternoon-evening light, the winds were whipping, dust was heavy and tree branches were breaking. I siren wailed.

So, yeah, no hike above Bishop on Sunday afternoon. After a few hours, the thick dust blew by, but the winds continued. The building shook. So I just hunkered down in the room, and hoped things would be better, tomorrow.

The next morning, it was still windy, but the air looked pretty clear. I considered a hike locally, but that would have meant a long, unbroken drive home. So I figured I'd try to leave relatively early, then stop and hike a bit around Red Rock Canyon State Park.

Red Rock Canyon State Park is about two hours from my home, so it's a little long for a day trip, but too close to feel like making it an overnight trip. Basically, it's Joshua Tree far, but withot a convenient gateway town to stay in. Also, the campsites are exposed, which would be a problem if it's windy, and potentially hot. In any event, I never managed to hike here, before, despite many trips through the area on the way to or from Bishop.

[Lancaster is about 45 minutes from Red Rock, but that's not enough time saved to be worth an overnight stay; Mojave is just twenty minutes away, but it's a pretty desolate area, with basically nothing but gas stations and fast food, although there is a Stater Brothers (market) in town. Overnight for Joshua Tree only makes sense because I usually stay late for astronomy.]

Stopping on the way back from Bishop broke up the drive, and let me stretch my legs for a few hours.

With no particular idea of where I would walk, I just drove to the visitor center, which, it turns out, was not open on the day I arrived. There was a roofless vault toilet in the parking lot, however, and an electronic ticketing machine. So I used the restroom, then spent a few minutes figuring out how to pay ($6 for general admission, $5 for seniors over age 62), grabbed what I needed, then started walking. I could see a very obvious far off to the south, along a ridge, so I headed that way.

At the top of that ridge, was a sign pointing to the left, saying, "Whistler's Ridge," so I headed up to that viewpoint, then came back down, and headed further south. Ran into a steap dropoff through volcanic rocks, so I turned back, again.

Then tried to make my way back towards some cliffs I saw on my way out, far to the west. This led me to a couple of box canyons, so I wound up having to backtrack all the way back to the pass I took to get here.

Once back on the CA-14 side of things, I headed a bit west, running briefly near a cliff, before arching back towards my car.

Total distance for this walk was 4 1/4 miles, according to my Alltrails recording. 584 feet of altitude gain.

Interesting formations were I walked, but not too much color. That was more near the offramp from CA-14, and further north, but on the opposite side of CA-14. Because I still had a fair walk remaining, and work, the next day, I didn't want to walk too far on this walk, anyway. So, less than two hours of walking, and a nice break. Could defintely take at least one more similar walking day to see the other areas of the park, though.

Two more hikes this week, in addition to anything I haven't blogged from earlier, yet.