New York Moments: Santa Ynez Falls Hike

This is by my favorite hike that I have discovered in LA so far. It is in Topanga Canyon State Park in Malibu. It's the perfect mix of mountain hiking with a view, and canyon hiking with a waterfall. (Well, usually just a trickle, but it's still a great hike.) I realized that I really love hiking in the woodsy areas where you hardly even feel like you are in the city. The hike to me feels out of a storybook as the scenes change as you continue the hike. You walk along the side of a mountain, then into the tress, through bamboo forest, past the cave holes, mounting boulders, skipping through streams. Its pretty magical. I went first on my own and didn't encounter another person for the first 45 minutes of the hike. This was also wonderful. I have been on too many hikes where its so crowded with people you can hardly notice the peaceful sounds of nature. I went a second time with my sister when she came up to visit me in LA. I love hiking with my sister because she makes me do things I would never do on my own. She pushes me to challenge myself. My moto when I am hiking with her is, "I may look like a fool doing it, but I can do it." This was definitely true on this hike. (See below). Yes, Malibu is a bit of a drive but so worth it.

This is the little cave we found. We wondered if people have slept there before.

At the top of the waterfall.

When we found the waterfall, I also saw an old friend of mine that I went to Ghana with. I haven't seen him in years. What a random place to run into each other! His friends were climbing up this rock on the side of the waterfall. At first it looked way to hard for either of us to try it. There was a rope but no place to really even get your footing. I was surprised that my sister didn't even want to try because she's usually up for anything. Then she asked me, "Do you think I can do it?" Since I saw this other girl do it about her size, I said, "Yeah you can do it." She easily climbed the rock. It didn't look so bad so I thought I would give it a try. As I started to mount the rock, I realized that I really couldn't get a footing. I told my sister that I didn't think I could do it. To which she responded, "You just have to trust yourself that you can pull yourself up." To which I did, without much trouble at all. There was not much to see at the top of the waterfall, climbing was more to just say that we did it. I had seem a few people go down this rock, and it did look tricky but I thought getting up would be harder. When my sister went down, I don't think I was paying too much attention because I was taking pictures of her. As I went down, I am still not really sure exactly what happened. Maybe I thought it wouldn't be that bad because getting up ended up being so easy. But somehow I ended up just danging from the rope screaming, "Oh sh**, oh sh**!" I clung to to rope for dear life, waiting for my feeble arms to give out. I expected at any moment to drop, crashing down into the rocky water below and breaking a limb. My sister was laughing and telling me to stop cussing in front of kids who were now approaching the bottom of the waterfall. Obviously my language was not at the forefront of my mind as death seemed a possible outcome in that moment. After a moment of realizing that I should do something before my bony arms gave out, I somehow managed to inch my way down the rope not scraping up my arm too badly on the way down. However, my jeans were ripped and muddy and my shirt was almost all way pushed up. Another embarrassing sight in front of the children. I survived much to the humor of my "rofl" sister. So my moto always is, "I may look like a fool doing it, but I can do it."