When I arrived, one of the first lessons I learned is that just about everyone hikes… a lot. It wouldn’t take long to find out why: there are hikes in the city, tons of them. The Department of Parks and Recreation estimates there are 367 miles of trails in LA county alone. It was completely foreign to someone whose only concept of nature in a city was a carefully cultivated square patch of grass dotted with memorialized benches.

In Los Angeles, it was different. There were canyons, mountains, grottos, beaches, and forests sheltering everything from waterfalls to abandoned film sets. There were smaller city parks, sure, but you didn’t need to use them as an escape. In the beginning I didn’t stray far from the county limits, because there were 125 good reasons to stay close.

Hikers at Runyon Canyon in Los Angeles, CA (Photo by Luke Kingma)

It wouldn’t be long before my first conversation about Yosemite. I had always known it was out here somewhere, but I’d never felt compelled to seek it out until it was just 3.5 hours from my front door to the valley floor. I would say I’m fortunate to have gone in with such formless expectations, but I don’t believe anyone’s mind could paint a more beautiful ideal than the reality you’ll find there.

It was (sorry for this) love at first hike. Scaling Upper Yosemite Falls brought me back to my time in Iceland, a place I thought would never find a bedfellow, let alone one in America. We camped under the stars and gazed into a sea of a million solar systems burning far, far away. The next morning we would be back in the city, just like that. “LA” was getting bigger.

Upper Yosemite Falls in Yosemite National Park (Photo by Luke Kingma)

Next stop, for me, was Big Sur. I’ve always been an unapologtetic Jack Kerouac fan (the tattoo on my left forearm reads “What’s Your Road, Man?”), and in many ways Big Sur is a manifestation of his life and literature. Now six months into my first year, I was also long overdue for the fabled Highway 1 roadtrip. Over the course of a weekend my brother Josh and I zigzagged up the California coastline until civilization all but disappeared.

Ironically neither of us were prepared for just how big it would be. Guys — Big Sur is big. Everything about it is — the redwoods, the cliffs, the bluffs, the bridges. We were driving through a living, breathing picture book that none of us deserved to be a character in. We were at once a short drive and an entire world away from the City of Angels. “LA” was no longer just expanding outward. It was expanding upward.

Bixby Creek Bridge in Big Sur, CA (Photo by Luke Kingma)

I’ve never been a ‘hot weather’ guy. In New York I ran an air conditioner 365 days a year (I went through 3 of them in my 4 short years there) and ran off to cooler places in the summer as often as I could. It was strange to me, then, that when I moved to California I found myself inextricably drawn to the desert. Maybe it’s the wild west literature class I took my senior year of college, or my affinity for ‘desert bands’ like Lord Huron. Perhaps it’s simply the fact that the desert is where hot weather actually belongs (not on 23rd street in Flatiron on garbage day).

Whatever the reason, I knew I’d find whatever I was seeking in Death Valley. For me the park stood as a silent testament to the relentless power of nature and the earth — there are places humanity should just not settle down, and this is one of them. Still, speeding down a highway 282 feet below sea level while the sun beats down on your car at 115 degrees is an experience that nourishes the soul. This time “LA” had extended downward toward the center of the earth. I’d be back in my apartment later that day.

A ghost town near Death Valley National Park (Photo by Luke Kingma)

Last on my list but far from least were the mountains. The name “John Muir” had regrettably never been part of my vocabulary until I moved to Los Angeles. Once you know it, like an obscure word you’ve just learned and claim you’ve never seen before, it begins appearing everywhere. I would find out it was because of him that many of the most serene places I had been over the last year were protected.

I became obsessed with the man, and he’d eventually lead me up Interstate 395. As he said best, The mountains were calling, and I had to go. Little did I know I’d feel so at home I’d never want to leave. On the drive back down to LA, I realized I could no longer separate my new city and my new state — they were too connected, the lines too blurred. “LA” was everywhere.

The Little Lakes Valley Trail near Tom’s Place, CA (Photo by Luke Kingma)

Like many east coast transplants, I came out west with a narrow concept of what a city could be. Over the past 12 months my understanding has been radically altered. I’ve come to realize that you don’t just move to Los Angeles. You move to California. In some way, then, I suppose this wasn’t One Year In Los Angeles at all. It was one year leaving it.