One afternoon along the cliffs that overlook the northern tip of the peninsula— which, as outdoorsman-author Phil Arnot has suggested, feels for all the world as if you are on the bow of a huge sailing vessel—I realized that Point Reyes has been kept so virginal for a reason. Ever since the white man ran the Miwok off to lay claim to the peninsula, some developer or another had had it in mind to subdivide it and turn it into another Gold Coast. But nature or man has always foiled such schemes: If it wasn’t the 1906 earthquake, it was the Great Depression or World War II that put serious development back where it belonged—in limbo. Finally, in 1962, the Kennedy administration saw the light and declared Point Reyes what it had already more or less proclaimed itself: a national treasure, a living reminder of where the American West began and ended, a gentle admonition that the nature we’ve never conquered is just as important as the wilderness we’ve tamed.
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Diary of a Foodie
From Vermont to Vietnam, take a global culinary tour with season three of our award-winning public television show, Gourmet's Diary of a Foodie.
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Watch chef Chris Cosentino use a blowtorch, a razor, and a carving knife to butcher a whole pig’s head, which he uses to make porchetta di testa.
