Day 19 - 17/09/2022 - Fort Bragg

One of the requests I had made to my very patient friend Joseph was that I wanted to see Glass Beach. And yes, it was because of Instagram. I had seen the photos of all of the colourful pieces of glass lining up the beach and had decided that I just had to see it, even if subsequent YouTube videos I watched warned people that, after so many tourists had picked up the glass (particularly the rarer blue pieces), it didn't look the same anymore. With the innocence of an European, I had assumed that it was a given I would see it during my visit after I found out that it was in California. In thinking this, I had, of course, forgotten about the sheer size of California. It turns out that Glass Beach is actually four hours away by car from Santa Clara, making it totally nonsensical as a destination for a day trip, but, to my luck, Joseph was willing to make a weekend out of it. We passed by some other beaches on the way, stopped by a woodland area where I heard a falcon for the very first time (the only other time had been in a Baywatch episode), and saw the funkiest little sea snail-shaped church I have ever seen, the Sea Ranch Chapel.

We arrived at Glass Beach at around 5pm, where I was absolutely ecstatic to find out that, despite all the warnings, the quantity of glass on the shore is still enormous, making the beach look absolutely beautiful and like nothing I had ever seen. I took out my Dad's camera to film and took photographs of the glass from every angle, and felt that I could have stood there for hours. Funny how something that is the result of pretty bad pollution (the sea glass having been created from years of garbage being dumped into this area of the coastline) should have become one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen.

At the end of the day, there was only one problem: it was 8pm, we had virtually not eaten all day, and we could find only two places in the local area where we could get food that were still open. We picked the one that sounded like it would have more options for me, which turned out to be the Sea Ranch Restaurant, where the prices were scary (my little European salary really can't compete with California prices) but the food was amazing. And as we talked to the incredibly nice waitress serving us, we found out that one of the last people who had visited the place was Mark Zuckerberg, who had, apparently, not ordered anything there.

Sea glass at Glass Beach

The gorgeous Glass Beach

The Sea Ranch Chapel