Winding Way Trail

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Short Video

Map

Trail Description
DISTANCE 4 to 5 miles depending on your climbing ballsiness.
ELEVATION GAIN 200 feet.
PARKING Get there early or ride a moped.
SPF 10.5
CHANCE OF INJURY Lower falls 1% Upper falls 101%
WEIRD SMELLS "Water"
TIME 2 hours.
FEATURES Falling rocks, Rope swing (minus the swing) Pack rat condos, Smelly waterfall
ANIMALS Lizards, horses, lizards, direwolves, lizards, pack rats, lizards.
CELEBRITY SIGHTINGS Lucan the wolf boy
DOG SHIT If dogs are horses… yes.
ANYTHING ELSE? College co-eds, Malaysian airliners, addicts from Malibu Passages.
Directions
Driving Directions
If you love car sickness and killing cyclists, take Las Virgenes Road from the 101 towards the coast. Now this is important - instead of driving into the ocean, turn right on PCH. If you are coming from the city, take the 10 freeway and cruise along PCH from Santa Monica. After Pepperdine University start looking to the right. Winding Way Drive is after Via Escondido Drive and that big Malibu Pottery place that no one can afford. Park in the lot right there off of PCH. No you can't park up that road. Don't believe me? Go ahead and drive up there…. see?
Hiking Directions
Yes you have to walk a mile through a rich Malibu neighborhood - but how rich are they really - they can't even afford sidewalks. At the end of the road the trail starts to the left. A shady, chill trail follows the stream for about a mile until you reach the first waterfall. In late summer, you may have to imagine the stream. Might as well imagine a kick-ass stream 'cause it might be all you get. Scaling the hillside to the second falls might be illegal and dangerous and intimidating but, I watched a 50 year old fat man do it in flip flops - so it's not really as hard as it looks. Is it worth it? Meh.
The Story
When Jacques Cousteau built his giant home/aquarium in the hills above Malibu in the 60's, the hammerhead sharks continually smashed holes into the walls of the tank. It was easier to helicopter tanks of sea water into the tank than to retrain the sharks not to smash the walls. Hammerhead Sharks are huge Hulk fans. They can't stop saying, "Hulk Smash!" and then smashing things. The continually leaking tank created the Escondido Creek that you see today. Instead of being seasonal, the flow of the creek is entirely dependent upon whether the sharks have just watched an Avengers DVD recently.