Point Loma attractions, part 2: Lucky low tide

I wish I could tell you how many times, when traveling, we've just blundered into trip highlights. Taking what we thought was a wrong turn somewhere and ending up in a place we weren't expecting but ended up loving.

Well, it happened again in San Diego. We were finishing up our lighthouse touring up on top of Point Loma, and thought since we were so close we should go down to the waterline and enjoy the ocean for a bit. Not having checked tide tables or anything, because, well, that would have been astute trip planning.

Then, completely undeservedly, we manage to get to sea level just a bit before low tide, so that there was still space in the parking lot but the tidepools were almost at their most scenic! We couldn't have timed it better!

What an amazing place! It's essentially a couple of acres-worth (very approximate measure) of the kind of plant and animal life that you normally can only get an aquarium's-worth at a science museum touch pool.

Plus, they have very helpful volunteers on duty (presumably only at low tide) to help you know what you're seeing. Which was very helpful for us. For example, as clueless tidepool newbies, we looked at this rock face and just saw what we thought were—oh, I don't know—salt encrustations?

When it turns out, as we learned, even the tiniest little irregularities are intertidal creatures...

(We know our Adorable Granddaughter, aficionado of all things teeny, would love seeing these miniscule Californians.) 

And somethings that we probably thought were rock outcroppings at first, are really these amazing Gooseneck Barnacles...

And we thought, perhaps, we'd just imagined movement when we touched these piles of seashell bits...

....but no! They are sea anemones! 

We have a helpful volunteer to thank for alerting us to the wonders all around us in this fascinating place. In my previous unguided experience with tidepools on the Gulf and Maine coasts, I just looked in the big pools for larger critters and plants. 

no big critters here, but plenty of small ones!

seaweed on a rock at low tide

But once you know the scale at which to look, there are thousands of amazing creatures to observe. You won't be able to tell from this picture, unfortunately, but, trust me, there are dozens of tiny hermit crabs in this little pool!

The Park Service website provides this handy guide to intertidal species, but I couldn't find this amazing specimen on the list. I know our friendly volunteer identified it for us, but for the life of me I can't remember what it's called. It's super-cool anyway, though, isn't it?!

I wished we could have spent more time here. (And, if we had been better planners, we'd have worn more appropriate footwear and could have tromped further afield.) But it still is a highlight of our time in San Diego, where we crammed a lot of great sight-seeing into just a few days. The travel gods were smiling on us!