California’s Topanga State Park

At high noon on a recent Sunday at Topanga State Park, a crow swooped down out of a hazy sky and plucked a rattlesnake off a boulder. Half an hour later, a red-tailed hawk flew by, a rat writhing in its talons.

I watched the birds and their prey as I strode up one of the wide fire roads from the parking lot on the western side of this 9,000-acre park, all of which lies within L.A. city limits, stretching eight miles in the Santa Monica Mountains from Topanga Canyon in the San Fernando Valley to the Pacific.

My destination: Eagle Rock, a magnificent volcanic outcropping a couple of miles from the trail head at Trippet Ranch. On the way, I passed a couple on horseback, the man tipping his cowboy hat, and mountain bikers pumping their legs as they made their way uphill.

Soon the gargantuan rock appeared. People stood or sat atop it, conversing or simply admiring the vistas of rolling hills and sandstone canyons that have been eroded by gently flowing creeks over the millenniums.

The rock no doubt has changed little since Native Americans inhabited the canyons 7,000 years ago. They made shampoo from leaves of white sage, soap from yucca stems, dye from the roots of poison oak, bows and arrows from chemise branches, according to the park’s nature center.

Although the park is intended mostly for day use, there’s a hike-in campground less than a mile from the Entrada Road entrance, where eight sites allow you to escape the city — and your car. Access is easy, maybe 30 minutes tops, on a good trail.

By day, visitors can hike through shadowy oak forests, deer-studded grasslands, sandstone canyons and volcanic cliffs. After sundown, it’s a different twist on L.A. night life.

At the nature center, I also learned about the park’s nocturnal dwellers: Virginia opossums, striped skunks, gray foxes, bobcats and, of course, mountain lions. Ranger Lee Hawkins says campers are far enough from the urban hub to hear the yap of coyotes outside their tents. (They generally aren’t a threat to the visitors.)

Trippet Ranch is named for a federal judge whose retreat now serves as the park’s headquarters, complete with offices and housing for rangers and the nature center.

Here, too, there are shaded picnic areas and, at the edge of the parking lot, trail heads to 36 miles of multiuse trails. Hiking, mountain biking and horseback riding these dirt trails — most are well-maintained fire roads that are easy on the feet — is what staying in this park is all about.

Morning is the best time to view wildlife on any of the trails. It’s when fence lizards do push-ups, songbirds croon most animatedly and mule deer, perhaps emboldened by having survived another night in cougar country, graze in plain sight.

Indeed, the biggest and peskiest problems encountered at Trippet Ranch and the rest of the park are poison oak and ticks, both of which you can avoid if you’re careful.

With the wide berth provided by fire roads and well-maintained hiking trails, brushing up against brush is easy to avoid. All the more reason to put this destination on your list of L.A. must-dos.