On a map, it looks so goddamned easy. An inch. Not even. Just a short leisurely walk up a wide, median-split, bucolic-looking, suburban-like street called North Vermont Avenue into Griffith Park. There's a bus route on nearby Los Feliz Boulevard. I'd be able to take a bus to just a tad south of the park entrance, then hike up Vermont as it segues into North Vermont Canyon Road. It winds past the Greek Theater and twists a bit but then, wha la, you're at the observatory.
Well that's sounds like a piece of cake. Just one thing. It's all uphill. And, especially as you get nearer the observatory itself, REALLY, I mean REALLY fuckin' uphill.
I scoped it out in Street View. Yes, it's a "short" walk, especially when you compare it in length with the trek I made through half of Manhattan on last year's vacation. But that hike was flat. This one's literally a mountain! (Literally. I mean, I'm not doing the common thing of misusing the word "literally," the observatory is on a promontory of Mount Hollywood.) There's also a small tunnel which doesn't look safe to walk through. It's a narrow passage encompassing a two-way traffic road and though it's short, I'd feel really queasy even "running" through it.
But of course, all this is moot with my body in its present shape. Currently, I get winded walking around our tiny campus each night here at work. A flat stroll of about five hundred yards.
I really would prefer to walk up to this attraction rather than spring for a cab when I'm out there in three weeks so I've gotta get crackin'.
Time to cut back on the carbs (especially that pesky liquid one), pick up those dusty dumbbells and recharge my iPod Shuffle. I gots me a mountain to climb!
And, c'mon, with an edifice like this greeting me, what a joy reaching the peak will be.
Not to mention views like this:
Well that's sounds like a piece of cake. Just one thing. It's all uphill. And, especially as you get nearer the observatory itself, REALLY, I mean REALLY fuckin' uphill.
I scoped it out in Street View. Yes, it's a "short" walk, especially when you compare it in length with the trek I made through half of Manhattan on last year's vacation. But that hike was flat. This one's literally a mountain! (Literally. I mean, I'm not doing the common thing of misusing the word "literally," the observatory is on a promontory of Mount Hollywood.) There's also a small tunnel which doesn't look safe to walk through. It's a narrow passage encompassing a two-way traffic road and though it's short, I'd feel really queasy even "running" through it.
But of course, all this is moot with my body in its present shape. Currently, I get winded walking around our tiny campus each night here at work. A flat stroll of about five hundred yards.
I really would prefer to walk up to this attraction rather than spring for a cab when I'm out there in three weeks so I've gotta get crackin'.
Time to cut back on the carbs (especially that pesky liquid one), pick up those dusty dumbbells and recharge my iPod Shuffle. I gots me a mountain to climb!
And, c'mon, with an edifice like this greeting me, what a joy reaching the peak will be.
Not to mention views like this: