Getting Into The Wild Isn't Just for Emile Hirsch

Calling all active Angelenos—

--marathon runners, power walkers, pet chasers, and even all you fist-pumpers. I think it is time to make like Princess Fiona and escape this concrete kingdom you call home (well, at least for a few hours). Take a look around the LaLa Land that surrounds you—that black asphalt tears up your knees, dogs don’t stand a chance against mobile machines, and is there really any room for fist-pumping? So I say hop on that horse with the white knight, or Shrek, if ogres are your preference, and take a ride into the natural wild side of this Megalopolis. I promise it exists and is calling your name.

I know it is tough to respond though, tough to break free of that trusty treadmill and routine walk around the block.  But believe me, exercising and exploring in a natural environment will improve your health, both in body and mind. So try. Alleviate the restriction of those four walls that surround you daily; escape the smog that blackens your lungs.  Breathe fresh, and easy.

A fairly recent resident of Los Angeles, I will be discovering with you for I came from a big city too, just one with a few more hints of grassy greens and forest groves.  I am a native of San Francisco (by native I mean born and raised);  I was spoiled there, for the first 18 years of my life and I’m not talking because I went to a private school.  This hometown of mine created spaces for shades of green, for natural lakes and wildlife, even a buffalo herd. And, venturing just outside its borders I could cross that big red bridge they call golden for a reason—it’s the pathway to the beautiful Marin Headlands and John Muir’s heavenly woods.

While it was difficult to wave goodbye to the coastline trails and goose families in the ponds of Golden Gate Park, in 2007 I made the move in down to Southern California to begin my freshman year of college.

So it has been three years now, and I still have yet to venture outside this rock-hard world of jackhammers and cement lanes. But I’m taking a stand now; no longer will I let those skyscrapers block my sunshine. So I begin my quest: to find some gems of nature in this concrete county as well as huge treasure troves just outside it. 

Want to join me?

Let’s start with a blast from the past: back in the 1900’s when the LA Baby was learning to walk, his size palm-tree feet stomped out the lush landscape and oak trees that once dominated the scene. 

Fortunately for us, he missed a few spots.

And fortunately for me, because I’m going a little stir-crazy and I think I know why—since I moved to Los Angeles, I was self-diagnosed with Nature Deficit Disorder.  My mind and body got muddled when I entered LaLa Land and I’m just now beginning my recovery phase. Watch out, you and your children may be suffering from this illness as well and I think I can help. 

Here are my credentials:

• My parents did everything in their power to get me out into the wild—going on weekend hikes and spending at least a week in a national park every summer.
• I have hiked and backpacked many parks on the west coast including Sequoia National Park in California, Olympic National Park in Washington, Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, Glacier National Park in northern Montana and Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado.
• I ventured to Europe and while I made sure to see the Hagia Sophia, I also traversed the wilderness in lands of abroad—Plitvicka National Park in Croatia, the Samaria Gorge in the Greek island of Crete, and the glacial cut fjords in the Jostedalsbreen National Park in Norway.   
• I love to breathe the fresh air of the redwood forests.
• John Muir is a friend of mine, or so I’d like to think and thus I follow his advice to keep nature close, “and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash (my) spirit clean.”   

As you know, one does not have to fly halfway across the globe to find nature’s magnificent mansions.  So, as I search for a cure to my Nature Deficit Disorder, I hope you will press the off-button on your elliptical, walk out of that stress box of a cubicle, and come with me to “explore our own backyard.”   I’ll let you bring that iPhone just in case we need a navigation tool, but know that Nature is always watching you. For as Emerson said, “Nature hates calculators,” so I’m sure it hates cell phones.