A Little Slow Fun

Robert Louis Stevenson wrote, “To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive,” which is a line you may want to repeat--over and over--if you try out the corn maze at the Sepulveda Dam Recreation Area this summer.

Elaborate labyrinths cut into growing fields of corn have been sprouting up all over the country, including next door in Ventura County. But the 3.3-mile maze of maize that opened earlier this month is the first in a big city like Los Angeles.

That’s part of its draw. Like the pumpkin patches that spring up around town every October, a cornfield in the middle of a city is a charming anachronism. It’s a welcome respite from the hectic pace of urban life.

After all, there is nothing fast about finding your way through a maze.

If speed’s your thing, the most direct path out of the Sepulveda Basin maze, which is cut into the shape of a California bear and a star, is about a third of a mile long--if you can find it. Just in case, you will be given a tall red flag so that the park staff can spot you. If you need help, you can wave your flag up and down. A lifeguard perched on an observation tower keeps watch. Rest stations with umbrellas, water fountains and mailboxes containing clues are scattered throughout the maze.

This particular maze is the brainchild of Encino-based Seasonal Adventures Inc. With a permit from the Los Angeles Recreation and Parks Department, Seasonal Adventures developed an eight-acre section of Woodley Park, just northeast of Burbank Boulevard and Woodley Avenue.

Whether the developer will make a profit (admission to the maze is $7 for children and $9 for adults) won’t be known until the cornstalks dry out and the attraction closes, probably in the early fall. But the arrangement is already a win for the city, which receives fees for the use of what had been an empty lot full of weeds and for irrigation water. And when the maze closes, the dried corn will be plowed under to provide feed for Sepulveda Basin’s migrating geese.

As for those of us who live in the San Fernando Valley and surrounding areas, we get a pleasantly low-tech, environmentally benign and family-friendly answer to the eternal question of what’s there to do come summer.

We also get a few life lessons in the process. Like: Consider the big picture, but one step at a time.