With a duck pond, Franklin Canyon Lake and a wonderful nature center, there’s a lot at Franklin Canyon Park to love. We usually start out on the Blinderman Trail near the nature center, head toward the lake and follow the trail around in a giant loop. This easy, 1.5-mile jaunt is great for toddlers and preschoolers as there’s plenty of opportunity to meander, look up to the tops of gorgeous oaks, smell all the scented plants and watch the ducks and turtles.

The Audubon Center at Debs Park is literally a nature playground for kids. Start your adventure at The Audubon Outfitters shop, which doubles as a mini nature center. It provides park information and rentable trail supplies, including strollers, backpacks and binoculars.

Adjacent to the Center is the kid-friendly ¾-mile Butterfly Loop Trail, perfect when combined with time spent in the Children’s Woodland area (that nature playground I mentioned before). The easy, flat trail will be a hit with even the youngest explorers. Once you’re there, you might be inspired to check out some of the other trails at the 280+-acre Ernest E. Debs Regional Park.

Fort Tejon is found just off the Grapevine Canyon, the main route between California's great central valley and Southern California. Here you can step back in time as you wander among restored adobes from the original fort, which operated between 1854 and 1864. The park’s museum features exhibits on army life and local history. The park also has a number of beautiful 400 year-old valley oak trees.

What kids will like: Unless you visit on the one Saturday a month when there are living history demonstrations, think of Fort Tejon as a great place for kids to stretch the legs and enjoy a picnic. Grab a table under the oaks, then walk the 1/2-mile self-guided loop.

This is a great enclosed park ideal for young kids or for solo parents watching multiple kids. Playground features include a huge sand area, a faux rock structure designed for little climbers, swings, a large play structure with multiple slides & the perfect climbing tree.

The non-playground part of the park features plenty of grass for running, kite flying and Frisbee throwing; there are also some basketball courts here outside the playground area.

A few things to know:
• Can get very crowded on weekends & weekday mornings.
• A few picnic tables are available outside the playground, but we prefer to picnic on a blanket on a grassy spot within the playground gates.
• No dogs allowed in the playground area.
• Restrooms are conveniently located adjacent to playground.

Malibu Bluffs Park is a 6-acre community park with baseball diamonds, a soccer field, a community center, a small enclosed play area, a small sand play area, a walking trail & a whale watching station PLUS access to several trails from the park’s edge down toward the beach.

Several picnic tables are scattered throughout the park; there’s also plenty of grassy space if you prefer to sit on the ground.

The Community Center hosts several classes and sports leagues, so the park is busy on weekends and late afternoons.

You could easily visit Malibu Bluffs Park just for the hiking. The 1.2-mile trail that begins at the edge of the parking lot loops around the entire park and offers stunning views of the Pacific the entire time.