Konstantin Gortinski and I went out on one of our usual Tuesday evening paddles, although this time we were able to get away on a Monday Evening. We launched from our favorite place for this, Blind Beach just behind Goat Rock, and paddled north past the Jenner Coves. Konstantin told me about a place he had been here with Roger recently. Another kayaker that we all know, Jerry Albright, often camps at a place past the Jenner Coves. I found this difficult to believe since I explored this coastline thoroughly when I first started kayaking, desperately hoping that I would find some lost beaches that could only be reached by boat. So I insisted that Konstantin take me to this magic spot and show it to me.
When we had paddled two miles past our usual turn-around point, Russian Gulch Beach, we came upon a HUGE sandy beach! I refuse to believe that I missed this beach when paddling here before. The USGS topographic maps do not show a beach here. The sand that makes up this beach must have collected here in the years since I had last paddled past this area. What I recall of the whole coastline between Russian Gulch and Fort Ross reef was a continuous row of large jagged rocks with waves breaking between them and the cliff rising behind them. We landed on the south end of this beach and went for a hike up the length of it. As we walked to the far end the jagged rocks I remembered started emerging from the water. But even when the sand ran out it was still possible to walk along the shoreline here between the water and the cliff.
Konstantin told me about a driftwood-fired hot tub that Jerry sets up here when he camps overnight. A piece of tarp with a hose attached to it is arranged in a spring running down the cliff. That generates enough pressure to trickle water through a copper coil suspended over a driftwood fire and then into a tub-sized hole in the sand lined with another tarp. We thought we found the spot where this was set up, but later I talked to Jerry and discovered that we didn’t go far enough down the beach. If we had been in the right place, we might have found Jerry’s tarps, coil, and hose, which he leaves there year round!