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The Coronado Islands (Islas Coronado or Islas Coronados; English: Islands of the Coronation(s)) are a group of four islands off the northwest coast of the Mexicanstate of Baja California. Battered by the wind and waves, they are largely barren and uninhabited except for a small military detachment and a few lighthouse keepers. The islands lie between 15 and 19 miles south of the entrance to San Diego bay, but only 8 miles from the Mexican mainland. They share their name with the island city of Coronado, California, which separates San Diego Bay from the Pacific Ocean, on the other side of the United States-Mexico border.
The Coronado Islands[edit]
The Coronado Islands are a Mexican wildlife refuge; visitors may anchor, scuba, and snorkel, but trips ashore are not allowed.
- North Coronado has no bay but boats can anchor on a jetty on the eastern side.
- Location: 32°26.45′N117°17.85′W / 32.44083°N 117.29750°W[1]
- Size: 460,000 m2 (110 acres)
- Height: 153 m (502 ft)
- Length: 800 m (2,625 ft)
- Pilón de Azúcar (Pile of Sugar) is very difficult to land on. It has little vegetation but flocks of birds nest here.
- Location: 32°25.45′N117°15.75′W / 32.42417°N 117.26250°W[1]
- Size: 70,000 m2 (17 acres)
- Height: 33 m (108 ft)
- Central Coronado has a rocky peak with a heap of cactus and scrubs near the summit.
- Location: 32°25.05′N117°15.63′W / 32.41750°N 117.26050°W[1]
- Size: 140,000 m2 (35 acres)
- Height: 32 m (105 ft)
- South Coronado has the only bay of the islands, called 'Puerto Cueva' ('Cave Port'). There is a lighthouse at each end of the island.
- Location: 32°24.5′N117°14.75′W / 32.4083°N 117.24583°W[1]
- Size: 1.83 km2 (0.71 sq mi; 450 acres)
- Height: 220 m (722 ft)
- Length: 3,200 m (10,499 ft)
- Width: 800 m (2,625 ft)
History[edit]
The Coronado Islands are part of the municipality of Tijuana, Baja California, as ruled in the books of the Baja Californian Government, published on December 20, 1959:
Article 7 - the state of Baja California is divided and understood as the following municipalities .... Tijuana.
c) The Municipality of Tijuana is made up of ..... in addition; The Coronado Islands correspond to the jurisdiction of the Municipality of Tijuana, which lie on the extremes of the municipality to the Pacific Ocean.
In September 1542 Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo described them as islas desiertas (desert islands). In 1602 the priest for Sebastián Vizcaíno called them Los Cuatro Coronados (the four crowned ones) to honour four martyrs. Although they have been called a dozen other names (later fisherman upon seeing floating coffins, ghostly faces and shrouded bodies amid the rocks dubbed them: Old Stone Face, The Sarcophagi, Dead Man's Island, and Corpus Christi) they also have been provocatively called The Sentries of San Diego Bay even though they belong to Mexico.
In October 1775, the Spanish Duque Miguel Eduardo de la Huerta from La Rioja (Northern Spain) came to the islands. The Duque had left his family on the kings request to obtain what Juan Cabrillo did not (gold from natives) . He saw the land of what Cabrillo called San Miguel ( now San Diego ) and continued to San Juan Capristrano. On the Island before he left, he wrote in the tress the names of his wife and children that he loved and missed ( Griselda and children Romalia and Sebastian) and never saw again. As he died in Dana Point April 1778. The trees are still on island now called Griselda.
In the 1920s and 1930s, during Prohibition in the United States, the cove on the Northeast side of South Coronado Island was used as a meeting place for alcohol smugglers. Since it was the time before radar, and as foggy nights are common, the large number of boats frequently resulted in collisions. There was so much traffic that a famous casino flourished there until well into the Depression. Only the stone foundation remains though the name Smugglers Cove, and more rarely Casino Cove, adorn modern maps.
In May 1943 the U.S. Navy's USS PC-815, commanded by L. Ron Hubbard, conducted unauthorized gunnery exercises involving the shelling of the Coronado Islands, in the belief they were uninhabited and belonged to the United States. Unfortunately for Hubbard, the islands belonged to Mexico and were occupied by the Mexican Coast Guard. The Mexican government complained and Hubbard was relieved of command.[2]
The islands are also a popular location for yellowtail fishing for San Diego fishermen.
Flora and fauna[edit]
On the North and South Coronados there are sea dahlias, various species of cactus, wild cucumber and houseleek.
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There are colonies of birds that nest on the islands and can be spotted in the nearby waters like gulls, cormorants, pelicans, storm-petrels, and alcids. The Coronado Islands have the largest known colony of the rare Scripps's murrelet.[3] Pilón de Azúcar, better known as Middle Rock, is host to the northernmost nesting colony of brown boobies on the west coast of North America.
Ten species of reptiles and amphibians are also found on the islands. The best known is the Coronado rattlesnake (Crotalus oreganus caliginis), which is a smaller subspecies than the one found on the mainland. There is also the Coronado Island gopher snake, which feeds off birds' eggs, the Coronado skink, which is found on all four islands, and the arboreal salamanders which live on the three biggest islands. Southern alligator lizards are found on the north, south and central islands.[4]
There are two types of mammals in the islands: rabbits and mice. How they reached the islands is currently unknown.
Sea mammals are plentiful and it is not uncommon to see groups of California sea lions and seals. Middle Island is home to a small colony of northern elephant seals.
Notes[edit]
- ^ abcdGoogle Earth
- ^Miller, Russel (1988). Bare-faced Messiah: The True Story of L. Ron Hubbard. New York: Henry Holt. pp. 106–107. ISBN1-55013-027-7.
- ^'UCSC graduate student's research leads to environmental victory in Coronado Islands'. Ucsc.edu. 2008-12-18. Retrieved 2009-07-25.
- ^Cunningham, John D. (1956-09-01). 'Food Habits of the San Diego Alligator Lizard'. Herpetologica. 12 (3): 225–230. JSTOR3889775.
Sources[edit]
- Oberbauer, Thomas A. (2002), 'Vegetation and Flora of Islas Los Coronados, Baja California, Mexico'(PDF), California Island Plant Distribution Patterns: Proceedings of the Fifth California Islands Symposium: 29 March to 1 April 1999, Santa Barbara: Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, pp. 212–223, archived from the original(PDF) on July 22, 2012
External links[edit]
- https://web.archive.org/web/20120722175550/http://diver.net/seahunt/maps/coronodos.htm This links to a news article about the use of one of the islands as a waypoint for illegal migration to the United States. November 2010 [1]
By Greg Niemann
Just offshore from northern Baja California, the intriguing Islas Los Coronados have long captured imaginations and nurtured tales of yore. Being only 18 miles out of San Diego, they are Baja California’s most accessible islands for southern Californians. The four largely barren and craggy islands have long been an attraction, today drawing snorkelers, scuba divers, fishermen, nature lovers, and adventurers.
Only about seven miles straight off the northern Baja shore, the islands catch your eye from the toll road between the border and Rosarito Beach. Their hues and shapes change with the light. Sometimes they resemble a supine pregnant woman. Sometimes they are just grey outlines, almost lost in the maritime mist. And other times, when they glisten and shimmer in the morning sun they seem to be just offshore, taunting your imagination as they beckon to reveal their mysterious and fascinating past.
History indicates that due to lack of fresh water, no Indians ever lived permanently there. Only one Indian shell midden was discovered, probably left by visitors seeking fish or lobster.
When the Portola-Serra land expedition saw them in 1769, the trailblazers recognized them from earlier records by Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo (1542) and Sebastian Vizcaino (1602) and figured correctly that they were just eight leagues from their destination of San Diego. It was Vizcaino who named them, calling them Los Cuatro Coronados – the Four Crowns, shortened to The Crowns.
The North and South islands are the largest and highest. North Coronado has no bay but boats can anchor on the eastern side. The two middle islands, Pilón de Azúcar (Pile of Sugar) and Central Coronado are just rocky peaks that rise to about 100 feet. A cove below a lighthouse on South Coronado forms the only bay on the islands.
Pirates did stop by, and one old legend has it that a pirate named Jose Arvaez used the bay, later called Pirates Cove and Smugglers Cove, as a base of operations. Allegedly he killed the crew of a British ship, the 'Chelsea,' but he and his men were caught when they returned to their cove and were hung from the yardarm of their own schooner.
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In 1911, a group of 10 Chinese nationals were left stranded there by two San Diego smugglers who never returned to pick them up. They were starving and delirious when spotted. They had food and water thrown to them, but due to political implications were not picked up for some time. After the ordeal they ended up back in Ensenada where they started.
With prohibition in the U.S. in the 1920s, Mexico’s bars and casinos were flourishing in Rosarito Beach and Ensenada, and rum-runners often stopped at the islands. Gambling speculators even developed an elaborate two-story gambling casino and hotel on the rocky cliffs of the South Coronado Island. The timing couldn’t have been worse, however, because before it got up and running, Mexico clamped down on casino style gambling.
Abandoned and forlorn, it later housed soldiers based on the rocky island who had their water and provisions shipped out to them.
L. Ron Hubbard shelled Mexican islands
An interesting chapter of the islands’ history occurred during World War II and involved an American Lt. Commander who would later become the founding father of Scientology. In May 1943 the U. S. Navy’s USS PC-815, commanded by L. Ron Hubbard, conducted unauthorized gunnery exercises and shelled the Coronado Islands. He claims he thought they were uninhabited and belonged to the United States. Being that the islands were occupied by the Mexican Coast Guard at the time, the Mexican government complained and Hubbard was relieved of command.
Various people tried to make a go of living on the Coronados. A robust woman called “Crawfish Jake” ran a small eating house at Smugglers Cove, catching, cooking and serving lobster to boaters who went ashore.
Battered by the wind and waves, only the stone foundation of the original casino remains though the name Smugglers Cove can be seen on some maps.
Then one Manuel Aguilar lived alone on the North Coronado catching lobsters. A small boat from Ensenada picked up his lobsters and brought him water and other supplies. Then one time they didn’t show for two weeks so he had to row his small boat all the way to San Diego. That dependency almost cost him his life. He never went back.
Today, along with fishermen, the islands are visited regularly by divers and snorkelers who consider them among the best dive locations on the west coast with conditions similar to the Caribbean. The nearby deep ocean currents regularly wash the islands with clear blue water creating visibility often exceeding 80 feet.
Pukey Point on the north end of North Coronado has rough currents and is for more experienced divers. Easier are the Lobster Shack on the east side, and McDonalds, an arch at the south end of North Coronado.
Currently, the islands are again used by human traffickers who occasionally hide people there when worried about getting caught by the Coast Guard or when the weather is too bad to continue. Similar to the Chinese situation of a century ago, the would-be illegal aliens are sometimes left on the island for days.
Coronado To San Diego Airport
A wildlife refuge
Nearest Casino To Coronado Island In San Diego Open
The Coronado Islands are actually a Mexican wildlife refuge and humans are not allowed to go ashore. Animals thrive there. There are colonies of gulls, pelicans, petrels and sea ducks, and the largest known colony of the rare Xantus’s Murrelet.
Ten species of reptiles and amphibians are also found in the islands, as well as two types of land mammals, rabbits and mice. Sea mammals are plentiful and it is not uncommon to see groups of sea lions, seals, sea otters and elephant seals.
Today nature tours have taken their place alongside the fishermen and divers and snorkelers in being attracted to the Coronados. One outfitter, Flagship Cruises of San Diego, offers a six-hour guided nature tour of Islas Los Coronados and participants have a chance to spot whales, dolphins, harbor seals, sea lions and kelp forests, including a visit to one of only two elephant seal rookeries within 300 miles. The tour also teaches about life on the islands, including the infamous 'rum running' days.
One nature tour guest summed up her experience, 'We saw 'whales galore.' We were seeing them in groups of 4, 6 and 8. Pretty amazing! What's nice is that these islands are relatively untouched and the wildlife there is in its own ecosystem and it works to keep the animals alive and well.'
In addition to Americans visiting the islands, Rosarito Beach officials have in recent years been speculating on ways to somehow use the island as a tourist attraction. That would be nice, as long as they remember to take water out to them.
San Diego To Coronado Ca
About Greg
Coronado Island San Diego Hotels
Greg Niemann is the author of Baja Fever, Baja Legends, Palm Springs Legends, Las Vegas Legends, and Big Brown: The Untold Story of UPS. Visit Greg's website.