La Verne unincorporated, CA

Nearly all of unincorporated La Verne is given over to recreation, a strip of Los Angeles County foothills above the city's northern tracts. It holds a regional park, a public golf course and trail access into the canyons, and very little else. Riders, hikers and mountain bikers all use the same canyon trails, which makes an early morning here a mix of hoofprints and tire tracks. Horse trailers pull into a dedicated lot by the entrance before a ride, and on cool weekends that lot is often the busiest spot in the canyon. Marshall Canyon Golf Course sits just downhill, a county-run 18-hole course laid over the rolling ground below the park. It is open to anyone with a tee time, and from much of the course the view runs straight up the canyon toward the ridges. Private housing barely exists up here. The nearest homes belong to the city, on northern blocks that climb toward the foothills and end against the brush line. Food and errands mean heading down into town. Old Town has Passport Wine Bar, which rotates its wine list monthly and serves Spanish plates, and Fourth Street Mill, a gastropub known for fish and chips and French dips. Supermarkets line Foothill Boulevard. Because nearly every acre is park or fairway, living in unincorporated La Verne is barely possible, and anyone drawn to the canyon settles on the city blocks lower down. From those streets, a trail ride or a round of golf fits easily into an ordinary Saturday morning.