Sea Lion Caves
Florence, OR
The largest sea cave in the United States, measuring 300 feet long by 120 feet wide with a 125-foot vaulted ceiling. Steller sea lions use the cave as a winter haul-out, with hundreds gathering inside during fall and winter months. An elevator descends 208 feet through the headland to the cave viewing area.
Photography Guide
- Best Time
- any
- Crowds
- Moderate
- Shot Types
- widedetail
- Best Seasons
- fallwinter
Author's Comments
The cave is dark in a way that surprises you. You step out of the elevator after that long descent through the headland and your eyes need a full minute to adjust, and then the scale arrives all at once. A vaulted ceiling more than a hundred feet overhead. The smell of the animals before you see them. The sound, which is the part no photograph will ever capture - a low continuous roar that bounces off wet rock and seems to come from everywhere. This is a difficult place to photograph and I want to be honest about that. The light is poor. The viewing area is fixed. You are shooting through a chain link barrier into a cavern lit mostly by the sea entrance at the far end, which means you are working into backlight in near darkness. Push your ISO higher than you are comfortable with. Open up all the way. Accept the grain. What works here is not the wide shot, though I have tried. What works is the silhouette. A single sea lion on a rock at the cave mouth, the surf flaring white behind him, the bulk of the animal reading as pure shape against the only real light in the room. November and December are when the cave is fullest. Come on a stormy afternoon when the swell is pushing into the entrance and the spray is catching what light there is. The wide shot is for memory. The silhouette is for the photograph.
Gallery
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