There is a corner of Griffith Park that most Angelenos have walked past a dozen times without ever truly stopping, and that is a genuine shame. Tucked into a quiet canyon just off the main park road near the Los Feliz entrance, the Old Zoo Picnic Area is one of those rare Los Angeles places that rewards curiosity the way a good detective novel does — the more you look, the more you find.
The backstory alone is worth the visit. This stretch of the park was home to the city’s original zoo from 1912 until 1966, when the animals were relocated to the brand-new Los Angeles Zoo up the hill. What was left behind were the old enclosures themselves: curved concrete grottos, iron-barred cages, stone-walled pits, and moss-covered dens that nature has spent the better part of six decades slowly reclaiming. Today they sit open and accessible, converted into a kind of unplanned outdoor sculpture garden that families, film crews, picnickers, and curious wanderers share without any apparent coordination.
Walking through on a weekday morning, the light filters through the oaks and sycamores in a way that is frankly cinematic — which is probably why you will occasionally spot a small production crew setting up a shot in one of the old bear grottos. Kids scramble in and out of the enclosures with the kind of unselfconscious joy that is hard to manufacture. Couples spread blankets across the broad lawn. Dogs trot by on leashes, occasionally pausing to investigate the ironwork with the same puzzled reverence their humans bring to the place.
There are shaded picnic tables scattered generously throughout the area, and the grassy clearings are wide enough that you never feel crowded, even on a busy weekend afternoon. The adjacent trail system connects easily to the larger Griffith Park network, so it works beautifully as either a destination in itself or a starting point for a longer hike toward Bee Rock or the old Amir’s Garden terraces higher up the hillside.
What makes the Old Zoo genuinely special — and different from the more polished park experiences around the city — is its texture. Nothing here has been sanitized or interpretively labeled to within an inch of its life. You are free to wander, wonder, and draw your own conclusions about what you are looking at. Children love the tunnels. Photographers love the light. Writers and anyone who appreciates a little productive melancholy love the atmosphere of noble decay.
Pack a proper picnic — there are no vendors here, so bring everything you want. Come in the morning when the air is still cool and the canyon holds a faint smell of sage and damp stone. Arrive by the Griffith Park Drive entrance near Crystal Springs, and follow the signs toward the Merry-Go-Round; the Old Zoo is a short walk from there.
Los Angeles does not always make room for places that are simply allowed to be. The Old Zoo Picnic Area is one of the few spots in this city where time moves at a slightly different pace, and that, more than anything else, is why you should go.
