Poche Beach in San Clemente sits on the
northernmost end of San Clemente beaches. San Clemente is best known as
the Western White House home for former President Richard Nixon.
Poche, or "pocket" accurately describes this northernmost section of
beach in San Clemente where parking is scant and the beach is small.
A volleyball net sits on the beach for play, but the size of the beach
and limited access make it less popular than surrounding beaches that
offer such things as an Amtrak train stop directly onto the beach and
Ole Hanson's Beach Club, a public sports facility with a gorgeous
outdoor lap pool and meeting space near the beach.
Poche Beach is popular for surfing, though the waves here are inconsistent, surfers tell us. Poche
Beach offers sand for sunbathing but has no restrooms or parking.
Locationn: 2798 N. El Camino Real, San Clemente, California.
A piece of driftwood barely noticeable in
the picture contains an American flag that was placed atop the piece of wood
after 911. Today a flag continues to grace this piece of wood stationed
upright in the sand. Colony Cove is an enclave of mostly single story, single
family homes that sit close to the beach at the bottom of a series of hills that
also contain ocean view homes. A San Clemente City Council meeting agenda listed
stabilization of the cliffs at Colony Cove as a project that required attention.
When California's premier nonprofit
organization dedicated to obtaining (and maintaining existing) public beach
access to California Beaches took a walk from the northern coast of California
to the San Diego, their trek through this region appeared in their
momentous journal.
Here is an excerpt from a portion of the walk as they passed
by Poche Beach:
September 13, Orange County
Doheny State Beach to San Clemente State Park. 8.7 miles
We began at a bluff top gazebo overlooking the Dana Point Harbor. A short walk
through city streets took us to a bronze statue of a 19th century sailor – too
muscular to be Richard Henry Dana, author of “Two Years Before The Mast” by his
own self description -- in the act of throwing a cow hide off the bluff top to
his waiting comrades below. Thus, cowhides from California began their journey
to the shoe factories of Massachusetts.
In the 1830’s “below” did not include the harbor and would have been a narrow
rocky beach at the base of the vertical cliff, a beach exposed to the south and
to the storms that came predominately from that direction. We do not look down
on such a scene today. We now overlook the harbor and thousands of pleasure
craft safe behind rock breakwaters.
This artificial calming of the waters has also changed the cliff face. Erosion
material at the cliff base does not wash away with the storms but builds up upon
the artificial fill softening the effect of the vertical. The cliffs now appear
more benign than they would have in Dana’s day. We descended to the harbor
through Heritage Park and then back tracked to the Orange County Marine
Institute and the “Pilgrim”, a replica of the ship that brought Dana to the
California coast.
We then turned and continued our quest for Mexico, first regaining our campsite
at Doheny, now pulsing with the amplified bass of a reggae and world music
festival. For the next several miles, it was beach walking for us across
Capistrano Beach Park and Poche Beach.
Our starting time for the day was delayed until l pm so that we could
navigate the next section of the walk. A trailer park here has dumped riprap
onto the beach making it difficult to pass dry shod except at low tide.
At the end of the trailer park near the Amtrak Station Stephanie Dorey, Mayor of
San Clemente, greeted us along with twenty or so city officials, environmental
activists and friends. Together we walked past the city pier along the beach and
on the ad hoc trail paralleling the railroad tracks. Plans are currently
underway to upgrade this trail route, making it safer as well as more useful and
aesthetically pleasing. We stopped our southerly progress long enough for a nice
reception at the mayor’s house, which overlooks the beach area then continued on
to our destination at San Clemente State Park. (See the full journal on
the website, www.californiacoastaltrail.info)
Get involved! Volunteer to work on
Coastwalk's Coastal Trail Project. Work with a local CCT Volunteer Committee in
your area on projects ranging from mapping the trail, trail maintenance, local
CCT advocacy, leading day hikes, community outreach, and many others. You can
help make the California Coastal Trail a reality! For more information, contact
Trail Steward, jrosales@coastwalk.org, (707) 829-6689
