Ramble On

Monday, June 16, 2014

The Glass Beach at Fort Bragg


This week I’ll continue with a few more posts from our recent vacation in Mendocino, CA.  First up, Glass Beach at Fort Bragg, California –

As Mary and I started researching some of the sites we could visit while we were on the North Coast, I came across the Fort Bragg Chamber of Commerce website, and from there I learned about “Glass Beach,” which is part of MacKerricher State Park.  There’s a beautiful traditional beach there, but the surprise is the namesake phenomenon.

Apparently, this stretch of beach was used as the town dump for a few decades.  There was an industrial site (I seem to remember some lumber facilities from past visits) there too, which eventually led to closing off the dump.  The sea did its incredible, inexhaustible work and broke done everything that was tossed there, leaving only polished sea glass behind.

We made a point to visit and also to hike along the beach there.  While collecting the glass is discouraged, and there are signs to that effect, there were several people out there scooping up fragments – it’s a popular complaint that most of the colorful pieces are gone (we heard this in the CVS where we asked for directions, and from a woman we met walking there who is a docent at one of the other heritage facilities nearby).

Mary scooped up a handful to show how accidentally beautiful the place is.  There is literally no sand – all polished glass. 


There’s a Wikipedia page here, if you want to look into it:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_Beach_(Fort_Bragg,_California)

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