PIGEON POINT

Hooking up with the folks at Tree Frog Treks was definitely one of the best moves I made out here. This weekend I got to go on their trek to Pigeon Point Lighthouse, and I brought Mike and Jessie along, all at a serious discount. Pigeon Point lighthouse has a Fresnel lens that isn’t actually used anymore, but gets lighted once a year, so that’s what TFT structured the trip around. To me, this was secondary to the opportunity to do some tidepooling. When we got there, we volunteered to go pick up the wine (donated by Bonny Doon Vineyards in Santa Cruz), and, of course, availed ourselves of the free wine tasting. None of us know anything about wines, or understood anything our server was telling us, but we did enjoy it, especially the raspberry dessert wine served into a tiny chocolate cup at the end.

When we got back it was tidepooling time. Shore life on the West Coast is amazing, usually much more interesting than back east. All the rocks at a certain distance from shore were covered with sea palm, which is this sea weed that looks like a miniature dull green palm tree. It clings to the rocks, resisting the impressive force of the Pacific surf. I tried standing on a rock in the middle of waves and got knocked down pretty quickly, so I guess I’ll never marry a sea plam. We also saw all the wonderful little barnacles, crabs, anemones, and mussels I usually see by the shore, and we caught some kind of sculpin in one the pools. The tide was high so we didn’t see as much as we could, but someday I’ll plan a trip to a good pool spot at low tide, and maybe we’ll find some nudibranchs, and then I’ll be able to die happy.

Food was excellent, thanks to Nicole. I think she caramelized the walnuts in the salad, if that’s even possible. They were sugary. And the lighthouse was unbelievable. I wasn’t exactly excited about it before the light went on, but the Fresnel lens is truly a sight to behold. Instead of a single beam of light, there are about 12-16, and the light is visible for 24 miles, so when you’re standing right under the lighthouse, the beams stretch to the horizon all around you. It looks like the sky is striped. Viewing it from afar, it looked like a crown of light, or a Japanese rising sun flag. This pic doesn’t even do it justice.

Yay for cheap fun.