After
breakfasting in Mendocino, we headed out to do what we had planned to do when
choosing it as a base for a couple of days and headed back down the coast
towards Manchester, or more specifically Manchester Beach which was supposed to
be a spectacular beach noted for being the point where the San Andreas Fault
moves out to sea and for the spectacular range of driftwood that gets deposited
upon it.
As we pulled
into the car park containing one of those restrooms that are simply best not
talked about, we found that we had the entire place pretty much completely to
ourselves, apart from the Turkey Vultures, and staggered off through the dunes
towards a wide open beach that we promptly photographed for the next hour or
so, because those pieces of driftwood – which it is illegal to remove,
apparently – were being just so very photogenic as the clouds brewed up out to
sea.
There was a
little bit of bird-watching to be done as well, of course, and my Beloved still
has fond memories of seeing a little bird to a somersault right in front of
her, even though my own memories of a vulture picking at the headless corpse
of a gull are slightly less pleasant.
Looking
northwards, the light was lovely, but looking south, with the bleaching effect
the sunlight was having on the low-lying mist, was slightly more painful,
although you could just make out the lines of Point Arena Lighthouse, and so we
decided to pay that a visit too.
It is, of
course, the replacement Point Arena Lighthouse, given that the one it replaced
crumbled during the 1906 earthquake and had to be rebuilt, although it retains
the metal spiral staircase from the previous building which, incidentally, by
remaining upright, saved the life of the Keeper on that fateful day.
Naturally we
took the opportunity of climbing the 140-odd steps to the top and got some
spectacular views, not least of the passing Pelicans, as we were told about
coastal erosion and how the entire point may no longer exist in about fifty
years time, when, in these less romantic and more austere times, when much of
its work has been replaced by GPS systems, depth sounders and Radar, it might
just end up being a small lamp on a long pole.
After all, it
might seem unlikely, but we were informed that the already the vast and rather
impressive lamp from the first rebuild still housed in the ubiquitous “Visitor
Center” has been replaced by a much smaller lamp doing the same job with the
kind of ridiculously tiny bulbs that might be found in the average modern torch.
Still, the
lighthouse was pretty enough, and the bird-life plentiful enough for us to remain
upon that crumbling headland for long enough to take far too many photographs
of it before finally heading back north towards Mendocino where the gathering sea fog
promised a spectacular sunset which it ultimately failed to deliver.
Instead the fog
rolled in and gave the town a very eerie “Scooby-Doo” air, especially with the
ghosts and pumpkins of the previous week’s Halloween celebrations still lurking
about, and the Ravens squawking and chattering from various vantage points, whih they were still doing a few hours later as we
headed back out into the night for a rather wonderful meal at a little place
called “Trillium…”
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