San Miguel Island

Before reading this post, I recommend a look at the short Wikipedia page on San Miguel Island.

I was going to copy a bunch of information from that page and supplement it with things from my memory, but I realized that most of what I wanted to say is located on that page.

Heather and I took the amazing* trip to San Miguel Island over Labor Day weekend, an adventure we had been planning since May. I flew to L.A. on Thursday evening, and Friday morning we made it to Ventura harbor by 7 AM. As we figured out an issue with our camping reservations (which I won't go into in this blog), we got our gear, fuel, and water for 4 days and 3 nights stowed on the boat, and embarked at 8 AM.

[* = Unfortunately, here, "amazing" implies "tough for Nate to narrow down the number of photos for the blog". So, get ready for a lot of pictures.]

The boat stopped at two other Channel Islands during the 5-hour trip to San Miguel, letting off a group of 30-50 campers/day-trippers at each harbor. First up was Scorpion Harbor on Santa Cruz Island, California's largest island and known for having the geography of a "mini-California," complete with a central valley. Here's a view from the harbor.

The ocean around there is populated by huge kelp forests. This kelp apparently can grow at speeds of up to about 1 foot per day!

The long, elegant pier at Santa Rosa island. We almost ended up going here (because of our camping reservation problems) to go "backcountry beach camping," but it wasn't really the best time of year at Santa Rosa—some company owns the rights to hunt nonnative deer and elk on most of the island, and starting mid-August each year, about 90% of the island is off-limits to national park visitors. Luckily, logistics for San Miguel worked out.

Getting excited as we approach San Miguel!

Our first views of the sandy beach at Cuyler Harbor.

There is no dock or mooring spot on San Miguel. So, to get on shore, we had to take trips of 6 people (or a bunch of gear) on this little dinghy. Even so, it was a bit tricky for the dinghy operators to work around the crashing waves on the beach—once while coming back to the boat, they almost capsized and were bailing for 15 minutes.

The dinghy approaching shore

With the dinghy safely on the sand, we campers would line up for a nice little bucket-brigade to collect the backpacks and water jugs on shore.

The Islander anchored beyond the dangerous rocks near shore.

Part of the joy of being one of less than a hundred people on this island all year is to see pristine, wind-sculpted sand (even cooler-looking than new-fallen snow!)

From the beach, we gathered up most of our stuff (besides the 8 gallons of water for the weekend, which would make it on our second trip) and headed up the canyon. The campground is a steep 1 mile up from the beach.

The magnificent view back to gorgeous Cuyler Harbor


After setting up our tent, we hiked back down to the beach to enjoy the (as Ranger Ian told us) somewhat rare instance of a perfectly clear day on the beach. Right away, we started seeing signs of that clearness going away, with a blanket of clouds creeping in from across the island.


We took a short dip in the chilly water…

…then took a walk east along the beach, enjoying the lengthening shadows as the sun crept toward the horizon.


I mentioned before that the sand was pristine, but that was neglecting the occasional set of animal tracks (most likely from the endangered Channel Islands Fox.)

We loved the seemingly endless wind patterns in the sand.

On the east side of the beach, we encountered some awesome caves.

View out of the cave

Nature is quite an artist…

Cavewoman

Soon, the fog was starting to dominate the bay. Getting a little chilly, we headed to camp for the night.

There are three main hikes on the island: to the westernmost point (Point Bennett), the easternmost point (Cardwell Point), and the northernmost point (Harris Point); all three hikes must be ranger-accompanied. The first we did on Saturday, and the other two on Sunday. Along the 16-mi round-trip hike to Point Bennett, an intermediate attraction is a so-called "caliche forest." Caliche (if I remember correctly) is a kind of calcium deposit that, in this case, forms when salt water seeped into ancient trees and deposits minerals inside, forming calcium casts of the trees. Quite interesting.

The Channel Islands, and San Miguel Island itself, have a number of endemic species (plant and animal species that only exist on the island/s.) This pretty flower bush is one.

After a long (and admittedly, flat and somewhat boring) hike, we made it to Point Bennett, which is known for its huge, diverse pinniped (seal and sea lion) colony. In fact, San Miguel Island is the only known place in the world where 4 different species of pinnipeds breed and the only area where 6 species are found. We were not allowed to get very close to the bustling colony, but enjoyed watching their gregarious behavior from a distance through binoculars.


As we hiked back (which we were allowed to do on our own, without the ranger) the fog crept back in.

Near the campground is the site of the most recent ranch (burned down—in a very strange tale—in the 50s or 60s). The island served as a sheep-ranching operation from the mid-1800s to around World War II, when the Navy took over and used it as a bombing target-practice range…and (as you can probably imagine) the island has had to come a ways, and still has a ways to come, to fix the damage done in those years. More about this later.

The next day, we headed out for Cardwell Point. The fog was extremely thick as we walked down the airstrip next to the ranger station (which Ranger Ian, who has lived on the island for something like 12 years, refers to as his "driveway".)

Here's someone who loves adventures.

Admiring some of the native flora on San Miguel (which has made a comeback, thanks to the park service, on a few certain parts of the island)

Here's some evidence of the severe erosion that almost 100 years of sheep ranching created on the island. But, again, native species are making a comeback.

Cardwell Point gave us a closer look at a smaller number of elephant seals, from the top of overlooking cliffs.

They're ugly, lazy, …

…and cute.

Seal-watchers

Back at the airstrip

At the ranch site, Heather found some broken glass that, Ranger Ian explained, marked the previous location of the ranch's bar.

The campground. Each site had an L-shaped windbreak, a picnic table, and a handy fox-proof cabinet. There's one (quite new and pleasant, as these things go) pit toilet for the up to 30 campers to share.

That same day, Ranger Ian led the group to Harris Point. Almost all of our fellow campers went on all the hikes, which Ian said had never happened before. So yeah, we had a hard-core group :-)
After hiking across the canyon where another former ranch house once sat, we came above the cliffs over Cuyler Harbor. That's Prince Island in the background (a steep rock that I believe is next to impossible to land on)

Looking toward Harris Point

Ranger Ian warned us that Harris Point is "the windiest part of the island." Though we had felt strong winds almost everywhere else on the island, it was immediately apparent that his appraisal was correct: the prevailing northwest winds (which strike the other Channel Islands less heavily, due to a well-placed jutting of the mainland coast) came roaring up into our clifftop perch, and also created some vicious waves in the bay below.

Feeling delightfully windswept!


This is what much of the interior of the island looked like (although, there is some relatively interesting vegetation here). Flat, windswept, rugged.

Heather with cool wildflowers

Here's an endemic species to Southern California (I believe): the coreopsis bush, which grew in droves in the canyon that led down to the beach. In the spring, the coreopsis blooms bright yellow.

Coreopsis hillside

Near the campground, on a rise overlooking Cuyler Harbor, is a monument to "Joao Rodrigues Cabrillo, Portuguese Navigator, Discoverer of California 1542". Cabrillo apparently loved San Miguel Island, and is thought to have died on the island. Ian mentioned that some local (mainland) Portuguese-Californians maintain an annual "Cabrillo's crossing of the channel" reenactment, complete with full 16th century garb, landing on San Miguel Island in a tiny boat.

Enjoying one of our delicious camp-stove-cooked dinners at the campsite.

After dinner, I carried Heather all the way to the Cabrillo monument to read some Borges and watch the sun set.

Sorry if you're sick of seeing these two looking happy together…

Sunset over San Miguel

Getting dessert out of our nice critter-proof cabinet.

This is interesting: at the ranger station, they have the following three aerial photos of San Miguel: in 1929, in 1967, and in 1999. You can really see the transition from what Ian described as "basically just a big sand dune" during the height of the ranching years to its more recent moderately-recovered (though scarred) state.


The next morning, it was time to pack everything up and make the heavy journey back downhill to the beach.

Gotta finish that water! ;-)

Bidding adieu to San Miguel.

On the boat ride back, we went along the northwest coast of Santa Cruz island, which is well-known for being a haven for sea caves. In fact, an amazing number of the world's prominent sea caves are located in the Channel Islands. Here's a cool one.

And this, in fact, is the opening of the longest sea cave in the world: Painted Cave, on Santa Cruz Island. It extends for almost a quarter-mile into the cliffs, and its opening is large enough to admit a big boat—we can attest to that first-hand!

Another shot of some cool rock formations along Santa Cruz's coast. This is premium sea-kayaking country.

We also saw schools and schools of dolphins on the way back.

What a trip!