Did I ever tell you the story about the time I almost fell off a cliff but was saved by a ghost?
It was a long time ago, I was in the Navy and stationed at a small classified facility directly on the coast adjacent to the Point Sur lighthouse hill.
The hill sat out alone from coastal beach, a tall hill of stone and dense low shrubs , mostly succulents or coniferous bushes.
I’m not sure how high it is, maybe a couple hundred feet, maybe a bit less.
Anyway, this little base of less than a hundred officers and enlisted plus families, was located about 25 miles south of Carmel California directly off Highway 1 and about five miles north of the small village of Fernwood and in between those spaces there was nothing, no homes, no businesses, no farms, ranches or anything,
I could walk 15 miles north from the base for hours and hours and never see another set of footprints in the sand,, it was amazingly beautiful and peaceful, but it was also amazingly boring at times.
My friends and I would spend time up on the lighthouse hill, there were (and are) buildings on the top, several structures as well as the lighthouse.
The lighthouse itself was closed along with the entire facility and all of the buildings, closed down a decade ago ( then , 1974) with the original classic lighthouse having been closed and a new high power automated light installed And erected a few dozen yards from the lighthouse.
We had found our way into all of these buildings but mostly we hung out in the lighthouse itself, it had the best view of the coast, especially to the north.
We’d hike up the road that wound its way up to the top in a gentle spiral path and sit in the lighthouse and get stoned and drink wine or trip on acid..
it was a great place to hang out, it was really close to the base but almost nobody but us ever went up there.
The sides of the hill were fairly steep and knarly for climbing because the rock was all jagged and sharp, sloping steeply down to sea.
There were a few reasonable climbs down the ocean front side that led to small shelves and rock where you could sit or stand just a few feet above the water which was very deep out at the point.,
We used to climb down there to sit and talk and smoke, drink and just decompress from our duties at the base.
One day when I had a day off with no duty I found myself very bored seeing as how all of my friends were either working or had duty and couldn’t leave the base .
I decided to fill my wine skin, roll a couple of joints and go climb the rock by myself for the afternoon.
So I got out there and started up the winding road to the top, I walked back to the lighthouse on the far side of the top approaching from the south. There was a way down to the water’s edge from there and then if you were a decent climber you could climb across the sheer face of the rock to various sections of stone where you could sit or stand around.It wasn’t easy but we did it all the time.
On this particular day I was alone, I didn’t see anyone else around and would have been shocked if I did!
I far as I knew only me and a very few of my friends ever climbed down to the edge of water like that.
So I climbed down from the north end of the hill and made my way back north along the cliff face at the water’s edge,
I came to a spot that I knew just at the south end of the cliff before it turned back towards the beach.
So I sat down on the rocks, smoked a joint drank some wine.
It was a beautiful clear day with a little wind off the water.
I sat there for quite a while when suddenly something astonishing happened, a killer whale, an Orca . Jumped out the water right in front of me, maybe fifteen yards away from the rock, I was sitting about two feet above the water.
It was right there in front of me, it was big and the distinctive white and black markings left now doubt what it was.. as I sat trying to process what I just saw. It happened again, only this time it was closer to me!!
Only five or six yards from where I was sitting but it wasn’t the same whale , it was smaller? And it seemed like it came out of the water just to look at me , it was like sea world and the trained whales but these weren’t trained and this wasn’t sea world,
After the second whale breached and went back under water BOTH came up and breached together side by side right out of the water, it was incredible!! After the breach they swam around in front of where I was sitting, making big circles before finally swimming off , heading south and then they were gone.
I sat there for a while regretting that I decided not to bring my camera which I almost always carried when I was hiking.
I had another drink of wine and decided that the show was over and nothing would beat that for today so I might as well head back.
Now as I had said, it’s a long tricky climb around the waterline back to north end and up,
I was standing contemplating the crossing when I glanced up at the cliff which was pretty much vertical for a good hundred feet from my starting point.
But as I looked up I felt like I could make the climb, the rock face was very jagged with ample hand and foot holds ( so I thought )
And I decided to make the climb, it would save me a good half hour or more going back the way I came.
So I took a little sip of wine and started climbing, I was looking up the nearly sheer rock wall and up there, about a hundred feet above me I could just make out the guard rails on the road that led to the top,
All I had to do was climb up and grab the guard rail, pull myself over it and I’d be on the road!! Easy peasy .actually not quite.
So I started climbing up and there were plenty of hand and foot holds and the climb was quite easy until I got near the top, only about fifteen feet from the guard rail the hand holds disappeared.
I was nearly a hundred feet above jagged rocks and surf on a vertical wall and I couldn’t see anything to grab onto to keep going up, I looked around me and there was nothing I could discern, then I saw it!
A nice knuckle of rock sticking out, the perfect size to grab and hold, the problem was that it was about a foot higher than I could reach, there were no solid footholds either.
I looked at it for a long time before I decided to just go for it, the climb down would be kinda hard.
All I had to do was lunge up and grab it, it wasn’t too far but I was nervous because I’d have to lose my foothold and my only solid handhold.
But I was pretty confident so I took a good long look and then I lunged for it and I got it!
I grabbed a hold and started to pull myself up to the next handhold and just as I did the chunk of rock I was holding came out of the wall! A big chunk like a brick!
It was pretty big and heavy and when it came out my hand flew back with this ten pound chunk of rock pulling me right off the face of the cliff.
I let go of the rock and tried to grab back the face of the cliff but it was too late, I was falling backwards, I was well past vertical with no hope of recovery looking over my shoulder at the rocks below thinking it’s over.
Then suddenly I felt a slap on the middle of my back, a hard slap and a strong shove!
I could feel the hand in the middle of my back pushing me forcefully forward against the cliff,
I scrambled to grab hold of the rock and gripped it hard getting myself balanced again , and I immediately turned around and said “thanks man” but there wasn’t anyone there, I was alone on the cliff, as I had been all day, and even if someone had been there in order to slap me back up against the cliff like that they would need to be directly behind me floating in midair.
There was nobody around anywhere.
I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what happened and how,
It was a while before I even told anyone..
After regaining my composure I climbed the rest of the way and pulled myself over the guardrail and lay in the road for a little while trying to wrap my head around what happened..
That’s it , a ghost? A guardian angel? I don’t know but it was definitely something extraordinary and it saved my life.
The hill sat out alone from coastal beach, a tall hill of stone and dense low shrubs , mostly succulents or coniferous bushes.
I’m not sure how high it is, maybe a couple hundred feet, maybe a bit less.
Anyway, this little base of less than a hundred officers and enlisted plus families, was located about 25 miles south of Carmel California directly off Highway 1 and about five miles north of the small village of Fernwood and in between those spaces there was nothing, no homes, no businesses, no farms, ranches or anything,
I could walk 15 miles north from the base for hours and hours and never see another set of footprints in the sand,, it was amazingly beautiful and peaceful, but it was also amazingly boring at times.
My friends and I would spend time up on the lighthouse hill, there were (and are) buildings on the top, several structures as well as the lighthouse.
The lighthouse itself was closed along with the entire facility and all of the buildings, closed down a decade ago ( then , 1974) with the original classic lighthouse having been closed and a new high power automated light installed And erected a few dozen yards from the lighthouse.
We had found our way into all of these buildings but mostly we hung out in the lighthouse itself, it had the best view of the coast, especially to the north.
We’d hike up the road that wound its way up to the top in a gentle spiral path and sit in the lighthouse and get stoned and drink wine or trip on acid..
it was a great place to hang out, it was really close to the base but almost nobody but us ever went up there.
The sides of the hill were fairly steep and knarly for climbing because the rock was all jagged and sharp, sloping steeply down to sea.
There were a few reasonable climbs down the ocean front side that led to small shelves and rock where you could sit or stand just a few feet above the water which was very deep out at the point.,
We used to climb down there to sit and talk and smoke, drink and just decompress from our duties at the base.
One day when I had a day off with no duty I found myself very bored seeing as how all of my friends were either working or had duty and couldn’t leave the base .
I decided to fill my wine skin, roll a couple of joints and go climb the rock by myself for the afternoon.
So I got out there and started up the winding road to the top, I walked back to the lighthouse on the far side of the top approaching from the south. There was a way down to the water’s edge from there and then if you were a decent climber you could climb across the sheer face of the rock to various sections of stone where you could sit or stand around.It wasn’t easy but we did it all the time.
On this particular day I was alone, I didn’t see anyone else around and would have been shocked if I did!
I far as I knew only me and a very few of my friends ever climbed down to the edge of water like that.
So I climbed down from the north end of the hill and made my way back north along the cliff face at the water’s edge,
I came to a spot that I knew just at the south end of the cliff before it turned back towards the beach.
So I sat down on the rocks, smoked a joint drank some wine.
It was a beautiful clear day with a little wind off the water.
I sat there for quite a while when suddenly something astonishing happened, a killer whale, an Orca . Jumped out the water right in front of me, maybe fifteen yards away from the rock, I was sitting about two feet above the water.
It was right there in front of me, it was big and the distinctive white and black markings left now doubt what it was.. as I sat trying to process what I just saw. It happened again, only this time it was closer to me!!
Only five or six yards from where I was sitting but it wasn’t the same whale , it was smaller? And it seemed like it came out of the water just to look at me , it was like sea world and the trained whales but these weren’t trained and this wasn’t sea world,
After the second whale breached and went back under water BOTH came up and breached together side by side right out of the water, it was incredible!! After the breach they swam around in front of where I was sitting, making big circles before finally swimming off , heading south and then they were gone.
I sat there for a while regretting that I decided not to bring my camera which I almost always carried when I was hiking.
I had another drink of wine and decided that the show was over and nothing would beat that for today so I might as well head back.
Now as I had said, it’s a long tricky climb around the waterline back to north end and up,
I was standing contemplating the crossing when I glanced up at the cliff which was pretty much vertical for a good hundred feet from my starting point.
But as I looked up I felt like I could make the climb, the rock face was very jagged with ample hand and foot holds ( so I thought )
And I decided to make the climb, it would save me a good half hour or more going back the way I came.
So I took a little sip of wine and started climbing, I was looking up the nearly sheer rock wall and up there, about a hundred feet above me I could just make out the guard rails on the road that led to the top,
All I had to do was climb up and grab the guard rail, pull myself over it and I’d be on the road!! Easy peasy .actually not quite.
So I started climbing up and there were plenty of hand and foot holds and the climb was quite easy until I got near the top, only about fifteen feet from the guard rail the hand holds disappeared.
I was nearly a hundred feet above jagged rocks and surf on a vertical wall and I couldn’t see anything to grab onto to keep going up, I looked around me and there was nothing I could discern, then I saw it!
A nice knuckle of rock sticking out, the perfect size to grab and hold, the problem was that it was about a foot higher than I could reach, there were no solid footholds either.
I looked at it for a long time before I decided to just go for it, the climb down would be kinda hard.
All I had to do was lunge up and grab it, it wasn’t too far but I was nervous because I’d have to lose my foothold and my only solid handhold.
But I was pretty confident so I took a good long look and then I lunged for it and I got it!
I grabbed a hold and started to pull myself up to the next handhold and just as I did the chunk of rock I was holding came out of the wall! A big chunk like a brick!
It was pretty big and heavy and when it came out my hand flew back with this ten pound chunk of rock pulling me right off the face of the cliff.
I let go of the rock and tried to grab back the face of the cliff but it was too late, I was falling backwards, I was well past vertical with no hope of recovery looking over my shoulder at the rocks below thinking it’s over.
Then suddenly I felt a slap on the middle of my back, a hard slap and a strong shove!
I could feel the hand in the middle of my back pushing me forcefully forward against the cliff,
I scrambled to grab hold of the rock and gripped it hard getting myself balanced again , and I immediately turned around and said “thanks man” but there wasn’t anyone there, I was alone on the cliff, as I had been all day, and even if someone had been there in order to slap me back up against the cliff like that they would need to be directly behind me floating in midair.
There was nobody around anywhere.
I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what happened and how,
It was a while before I even told anyone..
After regaining my composure I climbed the rest of the way and pulled myself over the guardrail and lay in the road for a little while trying to wrap my head around what happened..
That’s it , a ghost? A guardian angel? I don’t know but it was definitely something extraordinary and it saved my life.
