Pashnit Motorcycle Forum - The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

Forget that double yellow stuff, the road becomes one lane, one way, and quite narrow.

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

absolutely georgeous

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

Backside of ole gun emplacements. All that remains on the other side of these old bunkers is where the guns were placed. They were designed to fold down below the surface of the land. They were loaded, then popped up above the surface and fired. It was said that the guns were so large, when they fired (Civil War era), they shook all the windows of San Francisco which is across the Bay.

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In this one, you can see the observation post up top to where'd they'd sight in the attacking armada- either the Confederates or even the Japanese fleet of the 1940's. While the Japanese did invade and take some islands off Alaska during WWII (& were soon pushed off in heavy fighting), the much-feared invasion of the United States mainland never came.

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

Gettin' closer...

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

Notice how narrow the road is.

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

Point Bonita

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Unfortunately, my time constraints didn't allow me enough time to walk out to the lighthouse to get some new photographs of it. Last time I was there, was burning through a roll of film with my ole 35mm.

Here's a pic of it pulled from the link below:

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Here's how it looks from space- you can even see the suspension bridge out to the massive rock that the lighthouse sits atop.

http://www.pashnit.com/maps-keyhole/...ointBonita.jpg

http://www.pashnit.com/maps-keyhole/...nHeadlands.jpg

For the lighthouse buffs

http://www.rudyalicelighthouse.net/C...a/PtBonita.htm

http://www.parks.ca.gov/default.asp?page_id=22011

Quote:

The Point Bonita Lighthouse was first lit on May 2, 1855. Lens: Fixed, second-order Fresnel purchased from Paris for $7,000. First fog signal used on the U.S. West Coast was at Point Bonita. An Army-surplus, eight-foot long, 24-pounder siege gun from the Benicia Arsenal. The "fog signal" was operated by a new keeper, one Sgt. Maloney, U.S. Army Ret., who fired the gun every half-hour during foggy weather starting August 8, 1856.

This photo (follow the link) looks across the suspension bridge, towards the lighthouse. Another unique feature of Point Bonita: it is the only American lighthouse to be reached by a suspension bridge. A replica of the Golden Gate Bridge, naturally. The original lens room was moved from the 1855 cliff-top site to its current location in 1877. The lens room contains the second-order, French-built lens with a "fixed" characteristic (light was on constantly, no flashes). In 1855, Point Bonita's light was unique to the area so there was no need to distinguish it from other lights. A lighthouse was identified by a unique pattern of light flashes, separated by periods of dark. That came latter for this light. Point Bonita shares a feature with the Frallon Island light, both have iron gargoyles in the form of American eagles at each of the rain spouts.

This is an example of an "oops." The arrow points (follow the link) to the original, 1855 location for the Point Bonita Lighthouse. A site high on the cliff top, a breath-taking 306 feet above the sea, was chosen for the lighthouse by the 12th District Lighthouse Inspector, Campbell Graham. On the East Coast, taller sites were better sites for lighthouses. However, this rule of thumb didn't fit the West Coast where taller means foggier. By the 1860s, the local fog pattern had been discovered. At 300 feet above sea level, the lighthouse was often covered by high fog so dense that its second-order lens was invisible from the straights below. In 1877, after many construction challenges, including the need for a handcarved, 118-foot long, hard-rock tunnel, the lighthouse was moved to its current location.

Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

This was about as far as you could go, after this you had to walk out to the lighthouse. These are concrete structures that are part of the gun emplacements. Across the Bay is San Francisco.

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

Thingy on the grab rail is a RAM Mount to mount the rear facing Video Camera

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Re: The Marin Headlands to Point Bonita Lighthouse - A Pashnit Ride

One more of the gun emplacements all built into the hillsides overlooking the Pacific

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