When I moved to CA I looked at the National Park map and said "hey there are islands off the southern coast that are part of the national park system!" who knew?? I didn't. The channel islands are similar to the Galapagos Islands of Darwin fame in that a few species on these islands only exist here or have adapted to their secluded island environment. As our kayak guide put it. "Big things get smaller and small things get bigger." There were fox on the island the size of cats. It was nice. They didn't make me nervous when I saw them running around the campground at night!! : )
For more information on the channel islands, see the park page link.
http://www.nps.gov/chis/historyculture/index.htm
So, I decided to try camping on the island and sea kayaking in the local sea caves of Santa Cruz Island. Here I was thinking the Painted Caves in the top 10 largest sea caves in the world are on the island so these will be big! NO! These were all small caves and arches being beaten by waves!! We went through Aqua sports which has been out on the island since before the park service. I highly recommend the company. We took one of the guided tours. I WAS NOT going to sea kayak in caves without someone experienced with me!
I think this falls into the most adventurous thing I have done yet!! (Insane/Adventurous, whatever you want to call it!) Seriously!! This beats driving through the desert of Utah and Death Valley alone with no cell or radio reception!!
We started off the trip on a boat from Island Packers heading to Santa Cruz. Winds were gusting up to 25 mph so most of us were getting a little green to say the least. Luckily I was wearing a green shirt to begin with so you couldn't tell that I was slightly green!! (see below!) I was doing fine standing outside in the wind!!
Having a blast on the ride over!!
Seals hanging out on a buoy decided to show off for us on the way over.
Lots of volcanic rock
We arrived at the island and all lined up along the pier to empty the boat of all the camping gear. We took our gear up to the kayak storage area and left it in a cart there. It needed to be secured so the birds and mice didn't get into the bags or food! (sure enough I came back to find a zipper open on a small pocket of my bag and a pair of socks on the ground! : )
These carts caused quite a stir!! The campground is a good 1/3 of a mile walk from the pier. The kayak companies are the only ones allowed to use them on the island. The national park doesn't allow anything with wheels. Why? I don't know.. but everyone was asking us where we got these!!
Can you figure out why this is called Elephant point?
We kayaked right under the trunk!!
I will post more pictures soon. In the mean time enjoy the kayaking pics I posted on my facebook Page. You don't have to have an account to see these. Just click on
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2062849&id=1520514194&l=d6b4677bad
We were supposed to go kayaking again on Sunday but the winds picked up from 25 mph gusts to 30 mph gusts. We decided to opt out of kayaking and explore the island. I posted the pics on facebook again. I will put a few more up here soon. see link below.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2063103&id=1520514194&l=7b51cde542
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