mission serves as a parish church, school, and basilica. Its distinction as a basilica is the highest honorary rank for a church and implies great historical and artistic importance. Pope John XXIII honored Carmel Mission’s church with the rank of basilica in 1961 in recognition of Serra’s work in the establishment of Christianity on the western coast of the United States, as well as the unique architectural features of the structure such as the Moorish dome and the parabolic ceiling. Since that designation, Carmel Mission Basilica was honored with a visit by Pope John Paul II, who visited the church to lay a wreath at the foot of the grave of Father Serra, who is buried beneath the floor of the sanctuary (near the altar).
Carmel Mission is open to the public Monday–Saturday 9:30 a.m.–5 p.m. and Sunday 10:30 a.m.–5 p.m. The admission fee to visit the mission grounds, basilica, and museums is $6.50 for adults, $4 for seniors (age 65 and up), and $2 for children age 7 and up (children under 6 are admitted free). These funds are used to support the continued maintenance and restoration of Carmel Mission. To get there, turn west from Highway 1 onto Rio Road and drive 0.7 mile to the corner of Lausen Drive. For more information, call (831) 624-1271 or visit carmelmission.org.
Ranching & Homesteading
AS MEXICO REDISTRIBUTED the vast mission holdings as land grants, homesteaders claimed several outlying areas of Big Sur. Monterey soon developed into an important Pacific trading port, and the United States began to set its sights on California. Tensions arose between land-owning Californios, as they called themselves, and American pioneers immigrating through the treacherous passes of the Sierra Nevada. Conflict erupted at the outset of the Mexican War in 1846. In 1848, Mexico ceded California to the United States. The following year, gold was discovered in the foothills of the Sierra, and statehood was declared in 1850.
Pioneers and prospectors headed to California in droves. By this time, many outlying areas, including the Carmel, Nacimiento, and San Antonio River Valleys, were already privately owned. Two land grants spanned Big Sur: the 8984-acre Rancho El Sur, owned by Juan Bautista Alvarado, covering most of Point Sur, and the 8876-acre Rancho San Jose y Sur Chiquito, from the Carmel River to Palo Colorado Canyon.
Would-be homesteaders found the remaining steep, rocky terrain ill suited for farming, difficult to cross, and isolated from the world. Nonetheless, by the late 1800s a small community of determined pioneers had settled in Big Sur. These strong-willed folks survived by hunting, fishing, foraging, raising livestock, planting orchards, and tending gardens amid the lush canyons and steep ridges. Today, much of the land is named for these early pioneer families, including the Pfeiffers, Posts, Plasketts, Prewitts, and Partingtons.
The sheer coastal topography has kept the Big Sur coastline rugged and largely uninhabited even to the present day.
Highway 1 Construction & Recent Settlement
UNTIL 1938, early settlers could only dream of a safe, fast route down the coast from Monterey to Big Sur. Even a simple supply trip to Monterey required a three-day trek up steep ridges and across creeks and deep canyons. In 1919, after lobbying pressure from a local politician, the federal government began construction of a road along the central California coast. The construction project pitted settlers who wanted to preserve their privacy against those who sought to profit from California’s growing tourist trade.
Built by convicts and local labor, Highway 1 would become one of America’s most popular roadways, revealing a gorgeous natural landscape. Artists and writers, social activists, scientists, philosophers, and other visionaries flocked to the area for inspiration, forming small artists’ colonies and Bohemian sanctuaries. In the 1940s and ’50s, playwright Henry Miller lived and worked in Big Sur. Other famous people who spent time here include Robert Louis Stevenson, Ansel Adams, Jack Kerouac, Mary Austin, Jack London, Sinclair Lewis, John Steinbeck, Robinson Jeffers, Lillian Ross, and Edward Weston.
Today, millions of annual visitors drive the Big Sur coast in appreciation of its unparalleled natural beauty. While the road literally paved the way for so many of us to access this wild, remote coast, it has also spurred government agencies, conservation groups, and local activists to preserve its exquisite beauty.
Big Sur Lore
WITHIN THE JAGGED cliffs and narrow valleys live generations of mysteries: tales of buried treasures, haunted beings, and supernatural speculation. The awe-inducing beauty and eerie isolation experienced by many who venture to Big Sur, whether to call it home or a place of refuge, gave birth to many interesting and irksome stories. In my countless days in the backcountry, I have yet to experience any evidence that these tales shed light on life within the Santa Lucia Mountains, yet they still remain an alluring part of Big Sur’s cultural heritage, and I do not intend to endorse or debunk them.
The Dark Watchers
The sighting of the Dark Watchers originates from the Chumash Indians. They first spoke of these dark humanlike beings inhabiting the forests and high country of Big Sur in legends and their cave paintings. More recently, legendary author John Steinbeck described them in his story, “Flight”:
“Pepe looked up to the top of the next dry withered ridge. He saw a dark form against the sky, a man’s figure standing on top of a rock, and he glanced away quickly not to appear curious. When a moment later he looked up again, the figure was gone.”
In 1937, the poet Robinson Jeffers mentioned them in his poem “Such Counsels You Gave to Me” as “forms that look human … but certainly are not human.” If Jeffers or Steinbeck ever actually saw one of the Dark Watchers is unknown, but the local legend has been around since long before they wrote about it. Longtime Big Sur resident Rosalind Sharpe Wall claims to have seen the Dark Watchers near Bixby Bridge. If you happen to come across a Dark Watcher, the prevailing wisdom warns against looking at them.
The Ventana
The Ventana Wilderness is named for a unique notch called “The Window” on a granite ridge between Ventana Double Cone and Peak. According to local legend, this notch was once a natural stone arch that created a natural “window,” which is supposedly what inspired the Spanish explorers gazing up toward the peaks to call it Ventana. The Ventana, or “The Slot” as local rock climbers call it, is the 200-foot-deep gap in the ridge. Geologists have yet to find rubble of a collapsed arch to support the legend, but nonetheless there are many arches and small complete “windows” in rock formations in the Santa Lucias. You can view the notch by looking west from Ventana Double Cone or along Coast Ridge Road with views north and looking northeast from Post Ranch Inn.
Supernatural Stories of Point Lobos
During the mission period, the Ohlone Indian neophytes at Carmel Mission would go out on foggy evenings to “cheer up” their lonely and forlorn fog spirits. The mission fathers strictly forbade any such pagan activity, and one night they followed them out into the fog and performed an exorcism. The fog spirits flew off angry and offended, departing with howls and causing sadness among the Indians. Some believe poetic justice prevailed, when the priest who performed the exorcism went mad, jumped off a cliff into the sea at Point Lobos, and was drowned.
A Goddess and a Hidden Gold Mine on Pico Blanco
With the discovery of gold and silver in Big Sur in the late 19th century, miners began searching for the precious metals along the flanks and valleys of the Santa Lucias. Today, the Pico Blanco area is littered with the rusting remnants of mining operations.
More than tales of fortunes found, historians have uncovered a curious tale that was circulated in response to the miners’ arrival. According to local legend, an American
