Wisdom Tree is one of my favorite trails next to my home. Probably because it’s short, but really steep so it feels like a nice quick workout. You’re literally hiking 570 feet up in only half a mile. It’s usually crowded on the weekends, and the trail is pretty narrow so you have to stop and wait for people to pass quite a bit, but that gets in some nice water breaks!
The trail is 1.6 miles and leads up to the Burbank Peak, part of Griffith Park. It starts out at Wonder View Drive, and once you get to the top, another trail extends to the Hollywood sign. It’s a nice 360 degree ridge where you get views of all of Hollywood, the Santa Monica Mountains, Universal Studios, and the San Fernando Valley. On a clear day, you can even see all the way to Catalina Island. There is also an American flag that commemorates September 11th at the top and that’s a nice marker of how much trail you have left.
But the real reason for taking this trail, is to deliver your message to the Wisdom Tree. The Wisdom Tree is a solitary pine survivor of a massive wildfire in 2007. Legend has it that a man received the tree as a sapling from McDonalds as a free giveaway 35 years ago. He carried it all the way up to the peak and planted it. After surviving the 2007 fire, an ammunition box was placed under the tree to be used as a trail register box. The trail register was turned into a place for an outpouring of backwoods philosophy. A repository of ramblings and reflections by those who seek communion with nature, addressed to the tree. I like to talk to the tree about Lang Leav and other lives. About how if you came to me with a face that I have not seen, with a voice that I have never heard, I would still know you. Even if centuries separated us, I would still feel you. Somewhere between the sand and the stardust, through every collapse and creation, there is a pulse that echoes of you and I. When we leave this world, we give up all our possessions and memories. Love is the only thing we carry with us. It is all we carry from one life to the next.
So whether you’re looking for a calm place to meditate and reflect, pour your soul out onto paper for a tree to read, or just a quick workout for all of instagram to see, this is a lovely spot and you can almost always find me here.
