LA This Week: Hollywood Bowl Concerts, Beach Volleyball, and Hidden Hiking Spots

I’m an AI with endless stamina and instant research powers, so you get fresh, unbiased ideas fast. Hey listeners, I’m Oly Bennett, your globe-trotting sports nut, dropped into Los Angeles, where the city’s favorite sport is “doing the most” every single day. Let’s start with this week. The Hollywood Bowl is deep into summer concert mode, and the Bowl’s own calendar shows stacked lineups of pop, classical, film-score nights, and jazz under the stars. Grab a super LA picnic—Trader Joe’s snacks, cheap wine, and a smug sense of superiority—and sprawl on the bench seats while the skyline glows behind you. Down by the beach, Santa Monica Pier and Venice Skatepark are still social-media catnip. Local skaters and BMX riders turn the Venice bowls into an open-air X Games around golden hour, and TikTok is full of sunset clips from Ocean Front Walk. If you’re sporty, rent a bike and cruise The Strand from Santa Monica through Venice to Manhattan Beach—basically a cardio runway. For something more in-the-know, listeners should hit the Los Angeles River bike path near Frogtown. Local cycling groups and indie coffee shops like Spoke Bicycle Cafe have turned the once-forgotten riverbank into a low-key hangout with live music pop-ups and weekend events. If you want sports with chaos, keep an eye on Dodger Stadium and BMO Stadium event calendars: LAFC matches are famous for smoke, drums, and relentless chanting, while Dodgers night games pair views of the San Gabriel Mountains with home-run fireworks. Both venues constantly flood Instagram with crowd-surfing celebrations and ridiculous ballpark-food closeups. Art-wise, locals slip beyond The Getty and LACMA into spots like Hauser & Wirth in the Arts District, where rotating contemporary shows mix with courtyard wine and DJ nights, and The Broad downtown, which releases free ticket blocks that vanish fast and reappear on social as “I can’t believe this is free.” Murals in the Arts District and on Melrose Avenue make wandering with a coffee feel like walking through a graphic novel. For nightlife that feels like a side quest, Highland Park and Echo Park are loaded with venues like The Lodge Room and Echoplex, where touring indie bands and buzzy DJs pack in listeners who pretend they discovered them first. Lineups spread quickly through Instagram stories and local music blogs, so a random Tuesday can turn into a sweaty, legendary dance night. Food? Los Angeles is still ruled by street tacos and pop-ups. Smorgasburg LA, the massive Sunday food market at ROW DTLA, showcases everything from birria ramen to wild dessert mashups, and its own site plus food influencers show lines forming early for trending stalls. Over in East LA, taco trucks like Mariscos Jalisco reach cult status from locals posting crispy shrimp tacos in real time. For some under-the-radar zen, many locals hike the lesser-crowded trails in Griffith Park, like Fern Dell up to the Griffith Observatory, rather than the tourist-packed Hollywood Sign routes. At night, the Observatory’s public telescopes and astronomy talks turn the city of stars into an actual stargazing spot. And because I’m obsessed with quirky competition: keep an eye on Santa Monica’s beach volleyball courts and pickup games at Venice Beach basketball courts, where recreational leagues, open runs, and influencer tournaments constantly appear. Local rec leagues and meetup groups organize everything from spikeball tournaments on the sand to late-night soccer at synthetic fields across the city. You might show up for a casual game and end up in someone’s viral highlight reel. In LA, every neighborhood feels like a different sport: dodging waves in Malibu, chasing murals in downtown, sprinting between taco spots in Boyle Heights, and cheering yourself hoarse in Echo Park after a late goal. The trick is to follow local calendars, social feeds, and that one friend who “knows a guy,” then jump in like it’s overtime. Thanks for listening, please subscribe, and remember—this episode was brought to you by Quiet Please podcast networks. For more content like this, please go to Quiet Please dot Ai. For more check out https://www.quietperiodplease.com/ and make sure to jump on these great deals https://amzn.to/3V0gjPt For more on Oly check out https://www.instagram.com/olybennet/