Stride StoriesRunning tour · Los Angeles
Santa Monica to Venice
4.7 mi run
How it works. Press start and go. As you reach each place, a narrator tells its story, timed to your pace. Your music drops down while a story plays and comes back after. Tours download to your phone and play without a connection.
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The stories on this route
Palisades Park
Look along the edge of the bluffs: tall palms, and fencing that keeps you back from the cliffs. They're prone to erosion and landslides. This park runs about 1.6 miles along Ocean Avenue, from the pier north to Adelaide Drive, with views of the ocean and the coastal mountains.
Santa Monica Pier
Look for the Hippodrome, near the landward end of the pier. Its tent-like roof rises to a bulbous tower, like the onion dome on a Russian church.
Original Muscle Beach
Look at the rings, bars and ropes on the sand here, just south of the pier. Muscle Beach is called the birthplace of America's physical fitness boom. It started here in 1934, mainly with gymnastics.
Venice Boardwalk
Look along Ocean Front Walk: performers, fortune-tellers, vendors. A Library of Congress record calls it circus-like. It started with cigarettes.
Venice Skatepark and Dogtown
Look down into the bowls on the sand. They look like empty swimming pools. That shape has a history.
Muscle Beach Venice
Look at the fenced pen with the Muscle Beach sign, and the lifters working out in the open air. Next to it, in the sand, are gymnastics bars and climbing ropes.
Venice Canals
Look along the water: narrow walkways, little boats and docks, and little arched footbridges.
Stories researched October 2026 · every fact checked against a source
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