Sunset Cliffs Natural Park: Hidden Sea Caves, Spalding’s Sunken Bridges, and San Diego’s Most Dramatic Coastal Bluffs
The dramatic Cretaceous sandstone cliffs of Sunset Cliffs Natural Park, plunging into the Pacific swells along the western rim of Point Loma. Every evening along the western edge of Point Loma, a quiet migration takes place. Locals with woven Mexican blankets, photographers adjusting carbon-fiber tripods, surfers drying off beside vintage station wagons, and couples carrying insulated flasks line up along the jagged rim of Sunset Cliffs. Below them, heavy Pacific swells slam into honeycombed sea caves, sending plumes of whitewater roaring through subterranean blowholes. As the sun sinks beneath the offshore horizon, the 75-million-year-old sandstone cliffs glow in ferocious shades of ochre, copper, and rose. Stretching for one and a half miles along the Pacific Ocean, the 68-acre Sunset Cliffs Natural Park is San Diego’s rawest coastal spectacle. Unlike the manicured lawns of La Jolla or the flat sandy boardwalks of Pacific Beach, Sunset Cliffs is an untamed geological fronti...