Point Loma – Cabrillo National Monument

It is noon and we’ve been waiting 2 hours for the fog to dissipate. If we stay here on Point Loma for a few more hours, some 400 plus feet above San Diego Harbor, maybe it will lift. But we have places to go and pictures to take. I guess we’ll just have to settle for what is in range of my telescopic lens, while occluded by fog. Like this schooner taking a group out on a tour.

Here stands Juan Rodriquez Cabrillo, first European to explore the West Coast of what later became California. He made a landing somewhere in San Diego Harbor in 1542 and died only months later (at age 44) from an infection following a fall that left him with a compound fracture of the arm. Born in Spain or Portugal, he was raised in Cuba and lived during the “Age of the Conquistadors”. He participated in the conquering of the capital city of the Aztec’s under direction of Hernando Cortez, but is remembered by Californians for discovering San Diego Harbor.

A lighthouse shares the point with Cabrillo. Once called the “Star of the Silver Gate”, the lighthouse sits on the highest ground on Point Loma at 422 feet. Construction began in early 1854 and the lighthouse was in continuous operation from 1855 to 1891.

What’s this? Your guess is???? Well, the truth is that it is the spiral staircase that leads to the lens room at the top of the tower, looking down from the top.

I think this picture is the highlight of the day, taken thru the fog inside the Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. The cemetery sits inside the Fort Rosecrans Military Reservation (navy and marine I think). Passing through the Fort is the only access to Point Loma, and the cemetery was a surprise treat. Do I sound a little too “happy”, well I had to concentrate on the beauty of the grounds and not how it got filled. Didn’t want to spend the rest of the day in a gloomy mood.

The day before this was spent at the San Diego Zoo, touted by some as one of the top three zoo’s in the world. I posted a blog for it at the same time as I posted this one, so the Zoo was stuck into the archive. You can get to it using the archive section at the top left of this page.