California's Breathtaking National Forest Outside Los Angeles Offers Mountain Views, Camping, And Trails

California flaunts more natural treasures than perhaps any other state. Okay, so it's not quite the frontier that is Alaska, America's least-visited state, and a land of breathtaking parks and mountains. But it is the state with the most national parks in total, which include totemic things like the iconic natural wonder of Yosemite's Half Dome and the sun-scorched canyons of Death Valley, the USA's largest national park. What's more, you don't even have to venture that far from big cities in the Golden State to meet Mother Nature. Take the Angeles National Forest, which sits around 30 minutes from the star-studded boulevards of Hollywood on the north side of big old LA.

Close as it is to the great sights and sounds of the City of Angels, the Angeles National Forest is a world away from the metropolis. In the time it takes to dust off a classic Dodger dog, you can swap the downtown streets for the peaks of the San Gabriel Mountains. Within, there's a plethora of hiking paths that conquer canyons and soaring summits alike. There are scenic highways that showcase sweeping vistas of chaparral-clad ridges, and oodles of campgrounds for those longer stints in the wild.

The Angeles National Forest sprawls across 700,000 acres, which means there are multiple access points on different sides of the reserve. Coming from Los Angeles, you can access the southern sectors via Interstates 10 and 605 in under an hour, though it takes around a full hour to come in from the big airport at LAX. You can also enter from the east via Mountain Top Junction, some 35 minutes north of San Bernardino, or off State Route 14 in the north via the scenic Angeles Forest Highway.

There are stacks of hiking to be done in this reserve. According to the National Forest Foundation, the federal organization that manages state forests across the U.S., there's a whopping 557 miles of maintained trail on offer, not to mention one huge section of the world-famous Pacific Crest Trail. But it's not just the sheer number of miles that makes it a tempting destination for trailheads. There's variety, too, it seems — the outdoors app AllTrails lists everything from canyon walks to waterfall trips to summit treks on its list of the top 10 paths in the Angeles National Forest.

Top of that particular list is the Mount San Antonio and Mount Baldy Notch Trail, a hardcore 10-miler that takes you all the way to the highest point in the whole LA region: The summit of Mount Baldy itself. It also whisks you past waterfalls, and along a knife-edge ridge known as the Devil's Backbone, where things can get a bit tricky. The payoff for all that effort? As one past hiker puts it on AllTrails, the upper sections are "full of incredible views of the mountains, valleys, LA and OC and on a good day the coast including the Channel Islands."

The Los Angeles Times offers some suggestions when it comes to easier hikes in the Angeles National Forest. Among them is the Crystal Lake Trail, a simple 1-mile loop around a shimmering dash of water with mountains and forests rising all around. They also namedrop the West Fork National Scenic Bikeway, a riverside path that's fully paved from tip to toe, wiggling deep into a gorge amid the San Gabriels.

Looking to set up camp out in the mountains for a real breath of fresh air away from the LA hubbub? The good news is that the U.S. Forest Service has four pages of listings for campgrounds within the boundaries of the Angeles National Forest, so you should have plenty of pitches to pick from. That said, LA hiking expert Casey Schreiner of the Modern Hiker blog notes that, while there are indeed around 50 separate sites in these parts, only a few are accessible to vehicles.

Drivers could pick the highly-rated Buckhorn Campground, a spot that scores an enviable 4.6 out of 5 on Google. One past visitor even hails it as "the 'Yosemite' of Los Angeles County" for its redwood forests and charming mountain setting. Alternatively, there's the more under-the-radar Monte Cristo Campground, which beckons you up to rugged high-desert reaches of the reserve along the scenic driving courses of the Angeles Forest Highway.

The vast majority of other camping here is primed for backpackers on multi-day treks. If that's the sort of thing you're after, then multiple posters on a thread on the r/SoCalHiking subreddit pick out the Little Jimmy Trail Camp as one of the finest. They say it's relatively easy to hike into and has a natural water spring on site. That spot also happens to sit right alongside the Pacific Crest Trail, not to mention other paths that'll take you to the pinnacle of Mount Islip for gorgeous views over the tops of the peaks.