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Field Guide · Entry № 181

Anacapa Island

Anacapa is the nearest of California’s Channel Islands to the mainland, and from the beach at Ventura it looks like a low brown line on the sea. Up close it is cliffs. The boat noses up to a ladder, visitors climb a steel stair of 157 steps to the top of East Anacapa, and there is no water, no shade and no shop, only a trail, a lighthouse, a stone arch standing in the sea off the eastern tip, and more than ten thousand gulls who regard the path as theirs.

A rock arch and a sea stack off the end of a pale cliffed island topped by a lighthouse, with a bank of fog rolling over blue water under a blue sky

Photograph: Shauna Bingham, CINMS, NOAA · Public domain (PD-USGov-NOAA) · cropped

Where
Santa Barbara Channel, off Port Hueneme
Ventura County, California
Coordinates
34.0170° N
119.3570° W
Arch Rock
About 40 ft (12 m) high
(National Park Service)
The islets
East, Middle and West Anacapa
699 acres in all (Wikipedia)
Ashore
A ladder from the boat, then 157 stairs
(National Park Service)
Getting there
Island Packers, from Ventura or Oxnard
about an hour
Best visited
Year-round; March to May for the coreopsis flowers
From Tally’s diary

The boat nosed up to an iron ladder in a bare cliff, and the gulls were at the top already, like a reception committee. Every few steps another one sat on a nest beside the path and glared at my ankles. Off the far end a doorway of rock stood in the sea, going nowhere. Behind us, the mainland lay along the horizon in a long brown haze.

The short answer

Anacapa Island is a chain of three narrow islets, East, Middle and West Anacapa, in the Santa Barbara Channel off Ventura County, California. Wikipedia describes it as the smallest of the northern Channel Islands, about 11 miles off Port Hueneme and 9 miles from the nearest point of the mainland, with 699 acres between the three islets and steep cliffs on all sides. It was formed by volcanic eruptions between about 19 and 15 million years ago, and the sea has worked the old lava into arches, caves and stacks. It belongs to Channel Islands National Park, which Congress created in 1980. Visitors land only on East Anacapa, where, the Park Service explains, the cliffs leave one way up: a ladder from the boat to the landing and a stair of 157 steps to the top.

Why it's worth knowing

The gulls were drawn here first. The Park Service says the islets of Anacapa hold the largest breeding colony of western gulls in the world, with more than ten thousand birds gathering in the nesting season from May to July. Wikipedia adds that they begin nesting at the end of April, sometimes inches from the trails, that the chicks hatch in May and June, and that they fly in July; it also records the largest breeding colony of the California brown pelican in the United States on the island.

In November 1854 the United States Coast Survey hired a young draughtsman named James McNeill Whistler, and one of his tasks was an etched view of the eastern end of Anacapa for a government chart. According to the National Archives’ accounts, he finished it as instructed and then added two flocks of gulls over the coast; reprimanded for it, he is reported to have answered that Anacapa could not look as blank as the map had before he added the birds. He was dismissed on 9 January 1855, left for Paris, and became one of the most famous American painters. The gulls are still there.

The field notes

Rats, and a mouse that stayed

Black rats reached Anacapa long ago, probably in supplies for sheep ranching or for building the lighthouse, and Wikipedia records that before 2001 they attacked more than 96 per cent of the nests of Scripps’s murrelet, a rare seabird of the island’s cliffs. In 2001 and 2002, with the help of the group Island Conservation, the rats were poisoned from the air, the first time a rodenticide had been spread that way in North America, in a program Wikipedia describes as controversial. The island’s own deer mouse, a subspecies found nowhere else, complicated it: about three hundred were caught, kept, and released again once the poison had faded. Afterwards, Wikipedia reports, murrelet nesting attempts more than doubled and hatching success rose from 42 to 80 per cent.

The light on the east end

An unmanned acetylene light was put on Anacapa in 1912, and the permanent light station, with its tower and fog signal on the island’s high point, followed in 1932, the last major light station built on the West Coast, according to Wikipedia. The Coast Guard automated it in the late 1960s (Wikipedia gives both 1966 and December 1968), and the light still works as an aid to navigation. Wikipedia’s articles disagree on the meaning of the island’s name: one gives the Chumash Anyapax as “mirage, illusion”, the other quotes the Coast Guard’s history as saying it means “ever changing”. The Park Service writes the Chumash name as ’anyapax.

Stairs, and no water

The stair has its own history. The Park Service closed the island in June 2010 when a frame support of the old steel staircase was found corroded, and replaced it that December with an aluminium stair lifted in by a heavy-lift helicopter. A new wharf followed: construction began in February 2022, and the island reopened to visitors on 8 November 2022. There are no services on the island and no water, and the Park Service reminds visitors that there is no remedy for poor planning once ashore.

An aerial view of a steep brown headland topped by a white lighthouse, with a rock arch standing in deep blue water off its tip

East Anacapa from the air: the lighthouse, the cliffs and Arch Rock off the eastern tip, February 2007.

Photograph: Robert Schwemmer, NOAA · Public domain (PD-USGov-NOAA)

A knife-edge ridge in the foreground running toward the island's middle and western sections, in sea fog

Middle and West Anacapa in sea fog, from the island's east end, February 2008.

Photograph: Jerrye and Roy Klotz MD · ANACAPA ISLAND IN CHALLNEL ISLANDS N.P., CA · CC BY-SA 3.0 · cropped

A natural rock arch and a tall stack standing in calm blue water under a clear sky

Arch Rock and its neighbouring stack on calm water, September 2018.

Photograph: Craig Baker · CC BY-SA 4.0 · cropped

An engraved chart of a long, narrow island above a drawn profile of its cliffs, with a small arch and flocks of birds at the eastern end

The Coast Survey's 1854 sketch of Anacapa, with Arch Rock drawn at the eastern tip.

Engraving: US Coast Survey, 1854 (engraved by James McNeill Whistler and others; Library of Congress) · Public domain · cropped

Tally’s list
  1. Bring every drop of water you mean to drink today, and one more bottle for the stairs.
  2. Stay on the trail and go round the gulls, who will not go round you. I gave them an item of their own as a courtesy, and they took it as permission.
  3. Walk to the far point, sit down, and give the water below a long look before you give it a photograph.
  4. The island had a name before any of the boats came. Ask a ranger for it, and say it quietly on the stairs going down.
  5. Stand on the open deck on the journey home and watch the stone doorway slide past, since it does not wait while you find your camera.
The Relic

Arch Rock. A natural bridge about forty feet high standing in the sea off the eastern tip of East Anacapa, worn through the island’s old volcanic rock by waves that are still at work on it. The Park Service calls it a symbol of Anacapa and of the whole national park, and Island Packers’ boats stop beside it for photographs. It stands apart in the water, and is seen from the boats.

Tally, in the marginNot for going through, I decided eventually, a doorway with only more sea beyond it. The waves have been using it the whole time, and visitors are welcome to watch.

Getting there

How to get there. Island Packers, which Wikipedia names as the provider of public passenger access, sails to Anacapa from Ventura Harbor and from Channel Islands Harbor in Oxnard. The Park Service gives the crossing as about an hour; Island Packers says slightly over an hour from Ventura, longer when the boat stops for dolphins or whales. On landing trips you climb from the boat up a steel-rung ladder to the dock, then 157 stairs to the top. Island Packers also runs non-landing shoreline cruises of about three to three and a half hours past Arch Rock and the lighthouse.

When to go. Boats run all year. The giant coreopsis flowers from March to May, Wikipedia records, and the gulls nest from late April into July, when the trail runs between their nests.

What to arrange ahead. A seat on the boat, and some flexibility: Island Packers does not guarantee a landing, and the captain decides on the day, by the sea. Bring all your water and food, and something for sun and wind. Weigh up the ladder and the stairs honestly before booking a landing trip; the shoreline cruise sees the arch without them.

Safety. The State Department’s travel advisories cover other countries, so none applies here. The hazards are the place’s own: cliffs, sun and wind with no shade, the swell at the landing, and nesting gulls that defend their ground.

Mark this place

North America →

Common questions

Where is Anacapa Island?

Anacapa Island is in the Santa Barbara Channel off Ventura County, California, about 11 miles from Port Hueneme. It is a chain of three islets, East, Middle and West Anacapa, and the smallest of the northern Channel Islands, within Channel Islands National Park.

How do you get to Anacapa Island?

By boat with Island Packers from Ventura Harbor or Channel Islands Harbor in Oxnard, a crossing of about an hour. Visitors to Anacapa Island climb a steel-rung ladder from the boat to the dock and then 157 stairs to the top of East Anacapa, according to the National Park Service. A landing is not guaranteed; the captain decides on the day.

How big is Arch Rock on Anacapa Island?

The National Park Service describes Arch Rock, off the eastern tip of East Anacapa, as a forty-foot-high natural bridge eroded from the island’s volcanic rock, and calls it a symbol of Anacapa and of Channel Islands National Park.

Why are there so many gulls on Anacapa Island?

Anacapa’s islets hold the largest breeding colony of western gulls in the world, according to the National Park Service, with more than ten thousand birds gathering to nest from May to July. Wikipedia adds that the gulls begin nesting at the end of April, sometimes inches from the trails.

Is there water on Anacapa Island?

No. The National Park Service says there is no water and there are no services on Anacapa Island, so visitors bring everything they need. The Park Service also warns that its island campgrounds lie away from trees and shade, and that exposure to sun and wind can be a serious problem.

What does the name Anacapa mean?

The sources differ. Wikipedia gives the Chumash name, Anyapax, as meaning “mirage, illusion”; its article on the Anacapa Island Light quotes the Coast Guard’s history as saying the name means “ever changing”. The National Park Service writes the Chumash name as ’anyapax.

What did James McNeill Whistler draw of Anacapa Island?

In late 1854, as a draughtsman for the United States Coast Survey, James McNeill Whistler etched a view of the eastern end of Anacapa Island for a chart. The National Archives recounts that he added two flocks of gulls to it, was reprimanded, and was dismissed in January 1855.

How were rats removed from Anacapa Island?

Black rats were poisoned from the air on Anacapa Island in 2001 and 2002, the first aerial use of a rodenticide in North America, in a program Wikipedia describes as controversial. About three hundred of the island’s own deer mice were caught and released afterwards, and Scripps’s murrelet nesting attempts more than doubled.

Notes on sources. This entry draws on the National Park Service (nps.gov) for Channel Islands National Park: the Anacapa pages for the forty-foot Arch Rock and its description as a symbol of Anacapa and the park, the landing only at the Landing Cove on East Anacapa by a steel-rung ladder and 157 stairs, the crossing of about an hour from Ventura and Oxnard, the absence of water and services, the largest breeding colony of western gulls in the world with more than ten thousand birds nesting from May to July, and the Chumash name written ’anyapax; and the park’s news releases for the staircase closure of June 2010 and its replacement by helicopter in December 2010, and for the wharf construction from February 2022 and the reopening on 8 November 2022. Island Packers (islandpackers.com) supplied the crossing of slightly over an hour from Ventura with stops for wildlife, the non-landing shoreline cruise of about three to three and a half hours, and the statement that landing is not guaranteed. The National Archives’ magazine Prologue (archives.gov, 2013) supplied Whistler’s hiring by the Coast Survey on 7 November 1854, the Anacapa etching, the gulls, the reprimand and his reported reply, and his dismissal on 9 January 1855. All of these were reached through their indexed text. Wikipedia’s articles on Anacapa Island and the Anacapa Island Light, and the references they cite, supplied the three islets, the distances of 11 miles from Port Hueneme and 9 miles from the mainland, the 699 acres, the volcanic origin between 19 and 15 million years ago, the erosional features, the name “mirage, illusion” and the Coast Guard’s “ever changing”, the gulls’ nesting calendar, the brown pelican colony, the giant coreopsis and its March to May flowering, the rats, the attacks on more than 96 per cent of Scripps’s murrelet nests, the aerial eradication of 2001 to 2002 with Island Conservation and its description as controversial, the deer mice, the doubling of nesting attempts and the rise in hatching success from 42 to 80 per cent, the lights of 1912 and 1932 and the last major West Coast light station, the automation dates (1966 and December 1968, both given), the national park of 1980, and Island Packers. The lighthouse article dates the eradication’s start to 2003 and a rat-free declaration to 2014; the island article’s 2001 to 2002, from the published study, is used. Travel advisory: the State Department issues travel advisories for other countries, not for the United States. Checked 4 October 2026. Written and fact-checked by SockMonkey. Last reviewed 4 October 2026.