Bodega Bay and Harbor

The bronze lists the ships that anchored here and skips the bay's own people and its nearest miss. This is Coast Miwok shoreline, and the company's Aleut hunters, as the plaque calls them, were Alutiiq and Unangan men brought south for sea otters. In 1958 PG&E set out to build a nuclear plant on Bodega Head, almost on the San Andreas Fault. Rancher Rose Gaffney, residents and scientists fought it until the company gave up in October 1964. Its foundation pit, the Hole in the Head, is now a pond.

What the plaque says

Bodega Bay and Harbor Discovered in 1602-03 by the expedition of Vizcaino. It was named by Bodega in his survey of 1775. The harbor was used in 1790 by Colnett and by the Kusov expeditions in 1809 and 1811. The Russian-American Company and their Aleut hunters used the bay as an outpost until 1841. Stephen Smith took control in 1843. Pioneer ships of many nations used Bodega Bay as an anchorage. California Registered Historical Landmark No. 833 Plaque placed by the State Department of Parks and Recreation in cooperation with the Westerners and Sonoma County Parks and Recreation. May 24, 1970

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Goat Rock and the Russian River Mouth — 9.8 mi
  A headland blasted for a jetty that never kept the river open, at the mouth where harbor seals haul out.
• Tomales Point — 9.9 mi
  The northern tip of Point Reyes, where tule elk were fenced in for forty-six years and are fenced in no longer.
• Cypress Tree Tunnel and Coast Station KPH — 16 mi
  A radio company's driveway that grew into a tunnel, leading to the coast station that kept Morse code on the air.
• Point Reyes Lighthouse — 22 mi
  A light set halfway down a cliff on purpose, because that was the only way to get it under the fog.

More markers nearby

• St. Teresa's Church — 4.9 mi
• Cooper's Sawmill — 15 mi
• Fort Ross — 18 mi
• Walters Ranch Hop Kiln — 18 mi