Full Moon Rambler

Maybe this is just the fantasy-nerd in me talking, but if you're going to call your organization "Treepeople", there better be some 30-foot-tall half-tree/half-human motherfuckers up in there. Otherwise, you're just inviting disappointment. 

Alas, Treepeople failed to live up to my imagination. (Most things do.) They turned out to just a non-profit that owns an open-to-the-public "urban forest" atop Coldwater Canyon. But what they lack in Lord Of The Rings-style ambulant fauna, they more than make up for in other ways -- for example, full moon hikes.

How it works: RSVP online (the next hike is on February 7th), get to the park before 7:30 PM, pick whatever hiking level you feel comfortable with (long, medium, kiddie hike), and a young hippie-ish guide will lead your group off into the darkness to SACRIFICE YOU ALL TO PAZUZU show you the splendor of tramping through a forest by moonlight.

Flashlights bouncing, you descend the wooden steps of an outdoor ampitheater and on through tunnels of trees. Distant mansions distance flicker like candles in the black. You'll hump your way up hills and down gulleys. Mountain bikers with headlamps snake past like lightning bugs. Packs of prowling coyotes can be heard in the hills, shrieking to cause disorientation and panic in their prey; it's not a coincidence that they sound like the stabbing violins of a horror movie score. You find yourself overlooking the glowing sprawl of the  valley, blankets of sodium lights looking almost ethereal in the haze. The night ends with you and your fellow ramblers pausing atop a perch to howl at the moon. It's all tinged with a rare kind of beauty and danger.

Bring water, a flashlight, and a week's worth of frustrations to howl at the heavens.

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• WHAT: Full Moon Hiking
• WHERE: Treepeople Park in Coldwater Canyon
  
• WHEN: February 7th, 6:30-8:30 PM
  
• $$$: $5 per person, RSVP necessary