Palos Verdes Hike
GEO’s
Palos Verdes Coastal Hike is an opportunity to explore
California’s rugged coastline without driving half a
day to Central or Northern California.
Even though most of the hike takes place 300 feet below one of Palos Verdes’ exclusive neighborhoods, the trail is only accessible from a few streets and not that many people venture down to the rocky beaches. Don’t expect sand, volleyball nets, palm trees, or bathrooms. This stretch of boulder strewn tide pools is pretty primitive, yet incredibly scenic---virtually unchanged from the time when sailing ships set anchor offshore and brought goods to trade with Spanish rancheros.
It is important to layer your clothing for this hike which takes place in December. In the mornings it is really chilly, but the weather heats up especially down by the water. Sweatshirts usually come off by 10am. Most important is your choice of footwear. This is not a sandy beach hike. You really need excellent hiking shoes with firm ankle support or you’ll be sore and blistered for days afterward. It’s like walking over broken bricks and pottery for 6 hours. Finally, if you have any notion of getting wet on this hike, bring an extra set of clothes, so you won’t slime up somebody’s car on the way home.
The
nice thing about the Palos Verdes Coastal Hike is its
proximity to West Covina. It only takes about an hour to
get there and the drive through Palos Verdes Estates is
beautiful. The cars dump everybody off at the cliffs
above Lunada Bay around 8:30am, then park five miles
south at the take-out point. One car returns to bring
back the drivers. This gives everyone else time to
carefully maneuver their way down the 300 foot cliff to
the water’s edge. If it’s foggy, you may not see the
water until you’re right next to it. If it’s clear,
you’ll probably catch sight of the Channel Islands
some 30-40 miles off shore.
At the bottom of the cliff, we turn right or north until we reach Rocky Point, site of the shipwreck. In the 1960’s, a Greek freighter called the Dominator piled up on the reef that extends way out from the cliffs. Only the bow of the ship remains above the water. You can climb up on the rusty remnants and listen to the waves crash against it. The rest of the ship lies out there under the tide, boggling the imagination. Just how many ships met a similar fate at Rocky Point? Here, too, you can see the Santa Monica Bay curving north and west. The famed Malibu coast fades into the horizon across the water.
From
Rocky Point, we backtrack to Lunada Bay (shaped like a
crescent moon) and around Resort Point. Each point of
land signals speedy hikers to wait for the rest of the
group. On one such point, we stop for an hour lunch
break and bask in the sun. The sound of the combers
breaking upon the shore is mesmerizing and often
punctuated by screams from hikers suddenly doused with
an unexpected wave.
From there, it’s on to the tide pools. At low tide, curious hikers will get caught up poking around the extensive tide pools, teasing the hermit crabs and sea anemones. At high tide, the area features some impressive blowholes and coves that are hard to squeeze by without getting wet. This is a rugged landscape with nowhere to go but along the water’s edge. The people that we pass are usually fishing from the rocks or diving several hundred feet from shore in wetsuits. Sometimes, we spy an occasional sea lion watching our group march along the rocks. Is it man or fish? Man or fish?
