Hike Point Lobos State Park in Monterey, California Where Land Meets Sea for Spectacular Views
Story, photos by Cassie Hepler
Park by the road. That’s the best advice I can give you and best of all, it’s free. Also, get there early or it won’t matter anyway as the park will be packed.
Point Lobos State Park in Monterey, California is a scenic coastal area featuring a variety of sea animals and wildlife, hiking, diving and a whaling museum. Point Lobos has been named “the greatest meeting of land and sea in the world” and “the crown jewel of the state park system.” It has diving unmatched on the California coast (check out the Point Lobos State Reserve website for maps and dive site videos), great hiking, perfect picnic spots, vistas, wildlife just begging for painting or photography and an old whaler’s cabin. In the winter, migrating gray whales are visible from the shore. The ocean at Point Lobos is home to sea lions, harbor seals, elephant seals, sea otters, and is a year-round stopping point for orcas. Visitors can even whale watch without leaving dry land because gray whales migrate past this area from December to April and can easily be seen from the coast.
There are even more animals on land at Point Lobos than there are in the ocean. Though many of them, such as the gray foxes, raccoons, coyotes, striped skunks, opossums, and mountain lions, are primarily nocturnal, you may still see them during the day. You may also catch sight of weasels, deer, badgers, bobcats and rabbits. While Pacific Grove is known for its Monarch butterfly sanctuary, not many people realize that Point Lobos also provides an important wintering-over spot for these flying jewels.
Point Lobos is also a bird lovers paradise. Smaller birds include the chestnut-backed chickadee, pygmy nuthatch, Anna’s hummingbird, spotted towhee, dark-eyed junco, scrub jays, wrentits, white-crowned sparrow and California quail. Turkey vultures, red-tailed hawks, and the American kestrel can also be spotted. Seabirds regularly seen at Point Lobos include the brown pelican, rock pigeon, black oystercatcher, Brandt’s cormorant, western gull, killdeer, great and snowy egrets, and great blue and black-crowned night herons.
Download Discover Point Lobos for iPad free from the App Store or pick up a paper map while there, it’s virtually impossible to get lost though and helpful strangers will lead you the right way.
