Lands End & Sutro Baths

When I heard the name Lands End for the first time, I had no idea what is was, but I knew it sounded pretty cool and I wanted to go see it. I’m a big fan of national parks and historic sites, so this was the perfect trip to plan for my last weekend in San Francisco.

Henry and I took a Lyft down to the southwestern edge of San Francisco, which took a surprising 45 minutes due to the traffic and distance. When we arrived to the trail head, we began walking down the path towards Lands End Beach.

Many people were out jogging or walking their dogs on this trail, so I loved getting to see 15 or 20 cute puppers along the way! The route was fairly simple and went about 2 miles. We took a turn and went down ~284 stairs (yes, I attempted to count) to get to sea level.​

When we emerged out of the roughage and when we looked at what was in front of us, we were so surprised! All along the beach there were dozens of rock tower formations that people had stacked. All of them were masterpieces. For some, giant boulders had been strategically placed on top of one another to create a heavy, solid structure.

For others, itty bitty rocks had been stacked, creating minuscule, narrow towers. The best part is that looking at one tower is nice, but seeing them all together is what really makes you take a step back and say, Wow, this is incredible.​

​After spending some time down on the beach, Henry and I trekked back up the stairs, getting a great glute workout along the way.​

When we were almost back to the trail head, we took a new set of wooden stairs down to the main attraction – Sutro Baths.

The Sutro Baths opened in 1896 as a place where people could travel outside the city to relax at in indoor swimming pool located right on the ocean. Unfortunately, a fire burned down the entire structure, and all that remains is the large plot of land where it once stood.

An an Anthropology major, I was absolutely blown away by the remnants of what used to be the indoor swimming facility. Henry and I tried figuring out what some of the structures used to be – hot tubs, locker rooms, a deep diving pool, the shallows?

I love looking for tiny details and was astonished when I found remnants of what used to be ladders that men and women used to get in and out of the pools. There were also several posts in the ground where diving blocks used to stand.​

We climbed back to the top of the hill and looked at the site with an aerial view. I would have loved to use Augmented Reality and see a hologram of what the entire building used to look like, but at that moment, my imagination did just fine.

#SanFrancisco #nature #hiking #beach