Channel Islands National Park was quite the drastic change after spending 3 days in the desert at Joshua Tree National Park . There are five islands that make up this park which formed approximately 18 million years ago and were never connected to mainland California. We visited Santa Cruz Island.
We took a ferry boat to the island - the journey took about an hour, and we got to see some wildlife along the way! This was actually one of the coolest parts of the whole trip: we drove by a pod of hundreds of dolphins who were swimming under and around our boat, jumping and splashing, and surrounding us as we cruised by. It was almost surreal to see so many at one time!
When we arrived at the island, we had to take a skiff from the boat to the shore because a storm had washed out the dock. We made it ashore and went immediately to the sea kayaking tour we had booked with Channel Island Outfitters and suited up!
The kayaking trip was amazing. I was so nervous because I've only been kayaking a few times and I'm not great with boats in general so the idea of taking a kayak into the ocean made me a little hesitant. I powered through my anxiety and made it onto the water - once we were in the kayak (luckily, we used double-kayaks!) I felt a lot better. We had two tour guides who were a lot of fun and very knowledgable about the islands and the nature that we saw which included seals, sea lions, pelicans, pigeon guillemots, and cormorants. A lot of these are things you wouldn't be able to see if you only visited on land, so it was really cool to see them in the ocean. Part of the trip included kayaking through coastal caves! It was mildly terrifying, especially when a wave hit while we were inside of one of the caves. I'm so glad I didn't chicken out from this adventure even though I tend to avoid water, small dark spaces, and anything that causes an adrenaline rush. It was totally worth it.
We weren't able to take any photos while we were out on the water, but the guides snapped a few of us going through the caves!
After kayaking, we spent some time hiking and exploring the island. We saw the Channel Island Fox, which is endemic to the islands... and is also very adorable and teeny!
The island is gorgeous - we wish we could have spent more time there! Next time we think we will camp on the island because it's really the only way to spend more than a few hours exploring the islands and there is so much more to see (four more islands, in fact)!
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