Our Trip to Point Reyes
Point Reyes was originally named Punto de los Reyes ("Kings Point") by the Spanish explorer Sebastian Vizcaino as his ship, the Capitana anchored in Drake's Bay on the Day of the Three Kings (the end of the 12 Days of Christmas), January 6, 1603.
The entire Point Reyes Peninsula is a piece of the Salinian Block transported northward by the San Andreas Fault. The San Andreas Fault runs directly under Tomales Bay.
The drive to Point Reyes was quite nice. The last portion involves winding roads, and scenic vegetation. Vegetation native to Point Reyes includes Bishop pine, Douglas-fir, coyote brush, monkeyflower, poison oak, California blackberry, salal and coast redwood, among others.
We landed up at the visitor center to gather information for the local activities. We also so a 15 minute documentary on Point Reyes, local vegetation, things to do etc. Apparently, this is pretty much located right above the San Andreas fault line, and during the earthquake of 1906, the ground had shifted nearly 20 feet !!
January has plenty of activities in Point Reyes. On a nice, sunny day, the beaches and hikes are as pleasant as ever. Though once the sun goes down (which is early), it can get chilly.
January also brings unique opportunities to witness wildlife up close.
One can indulge in Whale Watching from the Lighthouse and Chimney Rock. This event is so popular that the Park Service closes the road to the lighthouse point and runs buses from the Drakes Beach Visitors Center ($5 per person). Apparently once can see the great gray whales on their migratory path. Also later in the year, the same whales migrate in the opposite direction towards Alaska with their calves, and move closer to the coast. We did try our best to see them, but sadly didn't get to see any, though a lot of people at the Lighthouse and Chimney Rock claimed seeing some.
At Chimney Rock one also gets to see elephant seals as at this time of the year, the come to the beach and breed. They are fun to watch as they lie and shift around in the sun. Pretty playful by nature, its fun to watch the young ones and their antics.
One also gets to see Tule Elk while driving from Point Reyes to the Lighthouse / Chimney Rock. A lot more information can be found here.
All in all we had a really good time. Mahi and Mom had also made sandwiches, and we had carried some juice, crackers, chips etc, so we also ended up having an impromptu picnic while waiting for the bus to go to the Lighthouse.
As for the lighthouse, this was definitely worth the visit.
Point Reyes was one one of the most Treacherous obstacles to mariners, solely due to the fact that it is
the windiest place on the Pacific Coast and the second foggiest place on the North American continent. In fact, weeks of fog, especially during the summer months, frequently reduce visibility to just hundreds of feet. The Point Reyes Headlands, which jut 10 miles out to sea, used to pose a threat to each ship entering or leaving San Francisco Bay. The historic Point Reyes Lighthouse warned mariners of danger for more than a hundred years.
The Point Reyes Lighthouse, built in 1870, and was retired from service in 1975 once the U.S. Coast Guard installed an automated light.
Here is a brief history of the lighthouse.
The Point Reyes Lighthouse lens and mechanism were constructed in France in 1867. The clockwork mechanism, glass prisms and housing for the lighthouse were shipped on a steamer around the tip of South America to San Francisco. The parts from France and the parts for the cast iron tower were transferred to a second ship, which then sailed to a landing on Drakes Bay. The parts were loaded onto ox-drawn carts and hauled three miles over the headlands to near the tip of Point Reyes, 600 feet above sea level.
Meanwhile, 300 feet below the top of the cliff, an area had been blasted with dynamite to clear a level spot for the lighthouse. To be effective, the lighthouse had to be situated below the characteristic high fog. It took six weeks to lower the materials from the top of the cliff to the lighthouse platform and construct the lighthouse. Finally, after many years of tedious political pressure, transport of materials and difficult construction, the Point Reyes Light first shone on December 1, 1870.
The Lighthouse provided mariners some safety by warning them of rocky shores and reefs and also helped mariners navigate by indicating their location as ships traveled along the coast. Each lighthouse has its unique flash pattern and mariners recognize them according to the flash pattern. On days when it is too foggy to see the lighthouse, a unique fog signal is periodically sounded to signal the location to the passing ships. Unfortunately, the combination of lighthouses and fog signals still didn't eliminate the tragedy of shipwrecks.
Because of this ongoing problem, a lifesaving station was established on the Great Beach north of the lighthouse in 1890. Men walked the beaches in four-hour shifts, watching for shipwrecks and the people who would need rescue from frigid waters and powerful currents. A new lifesaving station was later opened in 1927 on Drakes Bay near Chimney Rock and was active until 1968. Today, it is a National Historic Landmark and can be viewed from the Chimney Rock Trail.
The lens in the Point Reyes Lighthouse is a "first order" Fresnel (fray-nel) lens, the largest size of Fresnel lens. Augustin Jean Fresnel of France revolutionized optics theories with his new lens design in 1823.
Before Fresnel developed this lens, lighthouses used mirrors to reflect light out to sea. The most effective lighthouses could only be seen eight to twelve miles away. After his invention, the brightest lighthouses could be seen all the way to the horizon, about twenty-four miles as is the case in the Point Reyes lighthouse.
The Fresnel lens intensifies the light by bending (or refracting) and magnifying the source light through crystal prisms into concentrated beams. The Point Reyes lens is divided into twenty-four vertical panels, which direct the light into twenty-four individual beams. A counterweight and gears similar to those in a grandfather clock rotate the 6000-pound lens at a constant speed, one revolution every two minutes. This rotation makes the beams sweep over the ocean surface like the spokes of a wagon wheel, and creates the Point Reyes signature pattern of one flash every five seconds.
I'd like to bring to notice that keeping the lighthouse operational was by no means an easy job - it was tough and then some more. Keeping the lighthouse in working condition was a twenty-four hour job though the light was lit only between sunset and sunrise. The head keeper and three assistants shared the load in four six-hour shifts.
Every evening, a half-hour before sunset, a keeper walked down the wooden stairs to light the oil lamp, the lighthouse's source of illumination. Once the lamp was lit, the keeper wound the clockwork mechanism, lifting a 170 pound weight, which was attached to the clockwork mechanism by a hemp rope, nine feet off the floor. The earth's gravity would then pull the weight, through a small trap door, to the ground level 17 feet below. The clockwork mechanism was built to provide resistance so that it would take two hours and twenty minutes for the weight to descend the 17 feet. And as the weight descended and the clockwork mechanism's gears spun, the Fresnel lens would turn so that the light appeared to flash every five seconds. In addition to winding the clockwork mechanism every two-hours and twenty minutes throughout the night, the keeper had to keep the lamp wicks trimmed so that the light would burn steadily and efficiently, thus the nickname "wickie."
Daytime duties for the keepers included cleaning the lens, polishing the brass, stoking the steam-powered fog signal and making necessary repairs. At the end of each shift, the keeper trudged back up the wooden staircase. Sometimes the winds were so strong that he had to crawl on his hands and knees to keep from being knocked down. The highest wind speed recorded at Point Reyes was 133 mph, and 60 mph winds are common.
The hard work, wind, fog and isolation at Point Reyes made this an undesirable post. Even so, one keeper stayed for about twenty-four years, a testament to his devotion and love of Point Reyes!
The historic Point Reyes Lighthouse served mariners for 105 years before it was replaced. It endured many hardships, including the April 18, 1906 earthquake, during which the Point Reyes Peninsula and the lighthouse moved north 18 feet in less than one minute! The only damage to the lighthouse was that the lens slipped off its tracks. The lighthouse keepers quickly effected repairs and by the evening of the eighteenth, the lighthouse was once again in working order. The earthquake occurred at 5:12 a.m. and the lighthouse was scheduled to be shut down for regular daytime maintenance at 5:25 a.m. Although the earthquake caused much devastation and disruption elsewhere, the Point Reyes Lighthouse was essentially only off-line for thirteen minutes!
To get to the lighthouse, one needs to walk a half-mile from the parking lot to the Visitor Center, and then down 308 steps. The stairs are open 10:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Thursday through Monday. When wind speeds exceed 40 mph, the steps to the lighthouse are closed for visitors' safety.
