Northern Exposure

The sounds and movements were more than familiar to us. The knocks, snorts, sneezes and galumphing led us to the most northern and newest northern elephant seal colony in California, and the world. 

The Lost Coast in Northern California’s Humboldt County, and beneath the mighty King Range, offers refuge for lots of wildlife; seabirds, raptors, black bears, mule deer, river otters, and many pinnipeds along a rare and roadless stretch of rugged coastline. It’s also an incredible backpacking destination for its solitude, daunting cliffs, and convergence of gushing creeks with pounding surf.

While my girlfriend Holly and I were recently backpacking what is known as the classic, 25-mile-long Lost Coast route from Mattole Campground south to Shelter Cove, we were pleasantly surprised to find a couple hundred juvenile northern elephant seals hauled out and thermoregulating on a remote nameless beach. We also ran into a graduate student studying the growing numbers of the second largest seal on the planet. She was monitoring the colony from the windswept marine terrace, but also educating day hikers and backpackers about why the elephant seals have picked yet another northerly location to breed, pup, and haul out – this time on the Lost Coast. 

Choosing Wisely

I thought the elephant seals made another wise choice for their most northerly rookery in California. Northern elephant seal pups remain where they were born during their first year. They just aren’t strong enough yet to make the journey north to the Bering Strait, their summer feeding grounds in Alaska. So, they stay put, grouping up in nurseries after their mothers leave them after only two months together.

And as their numbers continue to swell, they’ll continue to seek out other rookeries suitable for a marine mammal species that travels far each year. San Miguel Island is their largest rookery, but their rookery in San Simeon has now grown to be the second largest in the world with at least 17,000 animals. By the late 1800s, elephant seals were hunted to near extinction for oil found in their blubber. Just a few animals remained on an island off Mexico. From approximately 20 individuals, northern elephant seals now number more than 175,000. It’s estimated about 40,000 births occur annually. The rookery on the Lost Coast represents an occupation of breeding grounds considered to be outside their historic range. 

The rookery began forming in 2015. Just a few elephant seals arrived, just below the Punta Gorda Lighthouse. It’s a perfect spot for them. Perpetual northwest winds, billowing fog, offshore reefs, and beyond those reefs are deeper waters to feed. There’s little disturbance, especially from December through February when elephant seals are pupping and winter is full on. The King Range is California’s wettest location with rain totals exceeding over 100 inches each year. These are natural elements of the north coast providing for their survival. In 2024 roughly 270 pups were born and about 800 animals used the rookery.

Where the Mountains Meet the Sea

However, these elephant seals also must deal with big tidal surges. King tides below the King Range can spell doom for baby elephant seals. Just imagine a heavy downpour and flooding in the 12 creeks along the 25-mile-long coastal route. Imagine flooding occurring during the peak of those extreme high tides during a winter storm, coupled with heavy debris flows spewing from those creeks. All that water must go somewhere, plunging out of the King Range, and leaving helpless pups possibly being separated from their mothers.

In between those creeks are a multitude of natural springs spilling from eroding shale bluffs. It’s good water to drink, but it also adds to the volume of water swelling along the coast. The good news is where the newest elephant seal rookery is located, the marine terrace is not sheer or high up with several paths for young elephant seals to escape to when the incoming tides aren’t manageable on the beach.

On the bluff trail just above the jostling juvenile elephant seals and below the Punta Gorda Lighthouse was evidence that they utilized this escape terrain. Scattered around the path were patches of their fur. Adult elephant seals molt from April through August, but newborn elephant seal pups that are born during winter have black fur. They shed that first coat after being weaned from their mothers.

As Holly and I continued backpacking south along the rugged Lost Coast and its low-lying marine terraces, we came upon the first of two stretches of coast known as “Impassable Sections.” The two sections of coast are four miles long, and depending on how high the tides are, it can force backpackers and day hikers to wait out the tides. There’s plenty of stories out there of folks getting trapped, pinned, and soaked against those eroding bluffs.

Our first day on the Lost Coast saw a midday, 6.7-foot-high tide that battered the shoreline.

That first section by Sea Lion Gulch required us to pitch our tent and wait for five hours until the tide was passable. No bother, there was much to marvel at while the tide surged. Sea lions just off the coast playfully wrestled on a natural ramp of rock repeatedly sliding into the refreshing north coast waters. 

We heard them all afternoon. But, as the tide ebbed and began to recede, Holly and I trekked on until near dark. It was passable – eventually the Lost Coast always is.