The Obscure Murphy Ranch

B and I kicked off this past weekend with a hike—an obscure one that was featured in a recent L.A. Magazine feature “10 Great Walks.” To get there we wound up through swanky Pacific Palisades neighborhoods, parked, and the article gave careful directions on where to walk to get to the Rustic Canyon entrance of the Topanga State Park—Don’t take the wood steps, those are private property. Walk up the paved path about 15 minutes and be on the look out for the break in a chain link fence on the left...


As we began, we smiled. Finally, at long last, we weren’t in the middle of traffic, and we couldn’t see any other people! The view from the top of the canyon was incredible. We could see the city, Santa Monica, the beach all the way south to where we live.

We smelled honeysuckle, heard the soft gurgling of a stream at the bottom of the canyon, saw lizards zig zag in front of us, and saw some beautiful, strange flowers that they don't have in Minnesota. It felt good to be off pavement and quiet. But we also learned why this hike is obscure...

Turns out we were hiking on what used to be Murphy Ranch, owned by Jesse Murphy in the 1930s, but not really. Jesse Murphy was made up by Winona and Ramona Stephens who bought the land under that name to create a home, a compound, for the Fourth Reich, which was sure (they thought) to begin in America once WWII was over. The mastermind behind this, and the one who persuaded the Stephens to buy the land was a guy named Herr Schmidt. Ironically, Schmidt was arrested by the FBI the day after the U.S. joined WWII. So, he started work on Murphy Ranch with a greenhouse, a water tank, and power plant (now super creepy with lots of graffiti), but his big dreams never came to fruition. Rumor has it the FBI caught him transmitting short-wave radio messages to the Germans.

As the sun began to set, I started wondering if we maybe should have done the not-so-obscure Hollywood Pub Walk instead? We did make our way out of the scary iron-gated Murphy Ranch entrance though and continued on our merry weekend way.