Backpacking and hiking are popular sports on Catalina. Photo courtesy of Visit Catalina Island.
The entrance to the Wrigley Memorial and Botanic Garden.
80-foot-high tower dominates the memorial, with the concrete structures emblazoned with marble and glazed tiles from the island’s yesteryear tile factory dating back to 1927, but only in operation for 10 years. Original tiles also line Avalon walls and storefronts, especially along the waterfront area. Back at the harbor, central Green Pleasure Pier is where tour operators sell tickets for fishing adventures and other aquatic activities including glass bottom boats and submarine rides to see marine life in the island’s exceptionally clear waters. In fact, it was a glass bottom boat ride that inspired the artist John Gabriel Beckman, who created the murals for Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Los Angeles, to paint the island’s popular mermaid mural on the outside of the Casino’s theater in 1929—a caricature often seen on local souvenirs and t-shirts. “He came up with this amazing mermaid that was sort of the keeper of the underwater,” says Fornasiere. “It enhances that art deco, early California mythical kind of magic that this island is.” To get to the island, Catalina Express has a fleet of eight slick and fast vessels, the larger ones two-hulled catamaran watercraft. The ferry service offers up to 30 departures a day from three Los Angeles area mainland ports, at San Pedro, Long Beach and Dana Point. I took the hour-long ferry from the Long Beach waterfront which conveniently has an RV camp, the Golden Shore RV Resort, in walking distance to the port for RVers who are wanting to visit the island for a day or stay overnight or longer.
The Catalina Tiles can be seen on many of the older structures.
Through the years, the herd grew and has been managed by the Catalina Island Conservancy, created in 1972 by Philip Wrigley, son of William Wrigley Jr. “He donated 88 percent of the island to become the Conservancy for good reason,” explains Fornasiere. “The family really wanted the island to remain in some way how they enjoyed it.” Thanks to the Conservancy, Catalina Island is a hiker’s paradise with more than 165 miles of trails weaving throughout the hilly landscape, many with splendid island and ocean views. The multi-day, 38.5 mile Trans-Catalina Trail is for serious hikers and links five campgrounds as it ascends hills and stretches from Avalon to Two Harbors and beyond. A popular diving, camping, and beachside village, Two Harbors sits along an isthmus on the island’s west side and is reached by hiking or by water, with boat tours from Avalon or by ferry from the mainland. A hike more to my liking and stamina is the 30- or 40-minute walk up Avalon Canyon to the Wrigley Memorial & Botanical Gardens, also reached by the Catalina Trolley or a taxi. Cactus and other desert plants native to the island line the walkways of the Botanical Gardens, started in 1935 by William Wrigley Jr.’s wife Ada. An
THE MAGIC ISLE
COAST TO COAST MAGAZINE SUMMER 2023 | 17
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