Samuel H. Boardman State Scenic Corridor

Author's Comments

Twelve miles of coast that does not photograph the way you expect it to. I have driven this stretch of 101 in every season and the corridor keeps revealing pull-offs I had somehow missed before, small unmarked shoulders where a path drops through the salal and ends at an overlook nobody else has found that morning. Boardman is generous that way. The named stops are named for a reason - Natural Bridges in particular is a composition that almost makes itself, the twin arches framing water that goes from jade to indigo depending on the hour - but the corridor's deeper pleasure is in the stops that are not on any sign. Secret Beach earns its name. The trail down is short and steep and ends in a cove that feels genuinely hidden, with sea stacks offshore and a creek crossing the sand to meet the surf. I have stood there at low tide in late September with the entire beach to myself and watched the light turn the wet sand into something close to mercury. Golden hour is the answer here, and specifically the last twenty minutes before the sun touches the horizon, when the cliffs go warm against water that has already gone cold. A long exposure flattens the chaos of the surf into something almost still, and the stacks become the sentences of the photograph. Bring a tripod. Bring layers - the wind off the Pacific finds you even in August. And give yourself a full afternoon rather than a single stop. The corridor does not reward a quick pass.

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