Channel Islands National Park

April 27, 2022.

Channel Islands National Park is free to visit, and has stunning views, super cute wildlife, and endemic species that you won’t see anywhere else in the world. Yet they are one of the 25% of least visited National Parks in the US. According to statistics, I found online only 409,630 people visited the park in 2019. This is most likely because of the difficulty getting to the park – but this difficulty can also be part of the fun!

Made up of eight islands off the coast of Ventura, California, the only way to visit The Channel Islands is by boat – either private or on an Island Packers Cruise boat. These cruises are a bit more money than we like to spend on such things but I was itching to add another National Park to our list. And as a bonus – since very few people visit – it wouldn’t be crowded as so many National Parks are these days. We decided to book a trip.

(All pics are click to enlarge. Once you have them enlarged you can view them in a slide show. Also, you can hover over the pics to see captions. Captions have more interesting facts about the island!)

The day before our trip we visited the Channel Islands National Park visitor center in Ventura, CA where we saw these models of the islands.

A model of the 5 different islands you can visit in the park.

After reviewing our options for which island we’d like to visit I picked Santa Cruz. It was shortest (time-wise) to get to, one of the least expensive cruises, and seemed to have the most options for hiking. Now we just needed a place to stay near the ferry terminal. I found a Boondockers Welcome location about a 15-minute drive from the dock. We hoped to visit the island the day after we left our house sit in Joshua Tree but before I had a chance to book the Boondockers Welcome spot someone else had already snagged it. So we changed our plans and decided to go to Santa Barbara for a few days to catch up with a friend and tried to book the cruise on the next date our boondocking site was free. But then there was another snag. Because you can camp on the island people are not always going and returning on the same day which means that although you might be able to get a reservation to go to the island there might not be a corresponding return slot. Eventually, we were able to coordinate a Boondockers Welcome stay with an outgoing and return trip to the island and ended up having more time to visit with our friend in Santa Barbara.

It was pretty foggy the morning of our trip. We left the harbor at Ventura at 8 am and almost missed the ferry, jumping on in just the nick of time. We did so much mixing and matching of schedules to get the trip lined up that we misremembered when we were leaving and didn’t pay enough attention to the confirmation email. The ferry ride to the island was fast (it takes a little over an hour for the boat to cover 20 miles), cold on the deck in the wind, and a little bumpy. But we had a couple of reprieves from the bumps and cold when the boat slowed down for wildlife in the water. We didn’t see any whales on our trip but we did see Harbor Seals and Common Dolphins.

As we left the harbor in Ventura the ferry slowed down so we could gaze at these California Sea Lions.

The largest pod of dolphins I’ve ever seen greeted us as we approached the island.

The ferry slowed down and the dolphins enjoyed riding in the wake of the boat.

There are no concessions on the island – food or gifts – so we packed a lunch, and brought lots of water and snacks. Good thing for the snacks – after the bumpy boat ride I needed a little chocolate and salt to feel right again. Once we had docked at Scorpion Anchorage and rested we headed out on the Potato Harbor Trail along the northern coast of the island. This five-mile round trip hike was fairly easy and had stunning views.

The dock on Santa Cruz Island.

Looking back toward the dock. This island was occupied by the Chumash for at least 5K years before the Spanish arrived. Some of the first Spanish visitors accidentally left a valuable iron cross ashore. Before they sailed the next morning a canoe of Chumash paddled up to return the cross (or cruz), inspiring the isle’s current name.

Although hilly, the island is pastoral. During the Civil War, when wool was in high demand, sheep were raised here. Afterward there were cattle.

View from the Potato Harbor Trail.

Potato Harbor. We sat along the rocks here and ate our lunch. As we watched the waves we could hear seals barking somewhere in the distance. After a lot of searching though the binoculars Greg finally spotted them on the big rock just off the shoreline.

A close up of the seals on the rock. They are so hard to spot becasue they blend in tho their surroundings. Can you spot the seal off on it’s own on the left side of the picture?

A view from our Potato Harbor hike. In the background in the fog is Anacapa Island.

On our return trip from Potato Harbor, we stopped at the campground/picnic area. We were told that this was the best place to spot an endemic Island Fox. After waiting for a while we were just about to head on without seeing a fox when one came ambling through the picnic area paying no mind to the picnickers or me with my camera.

The Island Fox lives on 6 of the 8 Channel Islands and no where else on earth.

Tagged ravens. We saw them so often we started calling them by tag numbers: 11 and 13. The park service tagged all the ravens when they found that some were interfering with falcon nesting. These two are the mischievous couple, and will probably be relocated.

Common Side-blotched Lizard.

California Brown Pelicans. These pelicans are a subspecies of brown pelicans. While the California pelican’s range extends from British Columbia, Canada to Nayarit, Mexico, 90% of these pelicans nest in Mexico. Two of the Channel Islands, Anacapa and Santa Cruz, are where the majority of the rest decide to preform their mating ritual.

Anise Swallowtail.

Painted Lady.

As we were leaving the island on the ferry I spotted an unusual bird in the water. I didn’t know what it was but snapped a few pics to identify later. This ended up being our first sighting of a Surf Scoter. We’d actually see more riding the surf a few days later as we strolled along the California coast.

From the campground, we left the Potato Harbor Loop trail and headed down the Scorpion Loop Trail. This 4.5-mile trail was a little more strenuous and had a lot more up than the Potato Harbor Trail. It was getting later and we needed to be back to the dock to catch the return ferry at 4 pm or we’d be spending the night on the island. We decided to give the trail a try and turn around if we ran out of time or if the hike got too strenuous. It was a bit of a struggle but we made it to the high point, took in the views, and finished following the trail around back to the harbor where we had a short rest before hopping on the ferry back to Ventura.

The Scorpion Loop Traill. This was a rather grueling trail up into the hills but we were rewarded with more stunning scenery.

A view over the island from the Scorpion Loop Trail with Anacapa Island in the background.

View of the visitor center (the building in the middle-ish of the picture) and kayak rental. The visitor center was once headquarters for island ranching operations.

The ferry ride back was uneventful. But that was OK. We had spent the whole day on the island and had hiked over 8 miles. It was a lovely day trip to a place where few other people venture.

It is quite possible that I will be sharing this post on Wild Bird Wednesday or on My Corner of the World. Check out these blog hops to see what people are up to and what birds they have seen recently all over the world.