Año Nuevo Island

Año Nuevo State Marine Conservation Area (SMCA) is one of two adjoining marine protected areas off the coast of San Mateo and Santa Cruz Counties, on California’s central coast. The area is approximately 55 miles south of San Francisco. The SMCA is 11.07 square miles. Except for limited taking of giant kelp, all living marine resources are protected.

Año Nuevo State Park is a state park of California, United States, encompassing Año Nuevo Island and Año Nuevo Point, which are known for their pinniped rookeries. Located in San Mateo County, the low, rocky, windswept point juts out into the Pacific Ocean about 55 miles (89 km) south of San Francisco and the Golden Gate. Año Nuevo State Natural Reserve, formerly a separate unit of the California state park system, was merged into Año Nuevo State Park in October 2008. The coastal geographic center, or coastal-midpoint of California is located at the Northern end of this park at N 37°09′58″, W 122°21'40", as the absolute geographic center of California falls at N 37°09′58″, W 119°26′58″W.The reserve contains a diversity of plant communities, including old growth forest, freshwater marsh, red alder riparian forest and knobcone pine forest. Its four perennial streams support steelhead and coho salmon, and its wetlands are habitat to the rare San Francisco garter snake and California red-legged frog. Cultural resources include the remnants of a prehistoric Native American village site and a number of structures from the 19th century Cascade Ranch. In conjunction with adjacent and nearby public lands, the unit permits the protection of important regional ecological corridors. The point remains undeveloped, much as Sebastián Vizcaíno saw it from his passing ship in 1603.

Steele Brothers Dairy Ranches is a historical site in Pescadero, California in San Joaquin County. Steele Brothers Dairy Ranches site is a California Historical Landmark No. 906 listed on February 8, 1977. The Steele Brothers: Edgar W. Steele, Isaac C. Steele, and Rensselaer E. Steele, were the pioneers of larger scale Dairy farming. Steele Brothers from Delaware, had large-scale commercial cheese and dairy plants. Steele Brothers operated 7,000-acre ranch with five dairies. The ranch ran from Gazos Creek on the north to Point Año Nuevo on the south, about 5 miles on the along the Coastal California, between the Pacific Ocean and Big Basin Redwoods. The five dairies were has far north as Point Reyes and as south as the one at Gazos Creek near Rancho Punta del Año Nuevo. The Steele Brothers operated from 1850 to 1950. A historical marker was placed in 1982 by the California State Department of Parks and Recreation working with the Año Nuevo Interpretive Association. The marker is on Cabrillo Highway at New Year's Creek Road. The Old Steele Dairy Barn is now the Marine Education Center at Año Nuevo State Park.

The Santa Cruz Mudstone is a geologic formation in California. The siliceous organic mudstones of the formation were deposited in deep water and fluvial environments. The formation overlies the Santa Margarita Sandstone and is overlain by the Purisima Formation. The Santa Cruz Mudstone was formerly considered part of the Monterey Formation. The formation preserves bivalve and echinoid fossils as well as vertebrates of Parabalaenoptera baulinensis and Otodus megalodon. The formation dates back to the Late Miocene (Tortonian to Messinian) period.

Theodore J. Hoover Natural Preserve, which includes Waddell Marsh, is located at the mouth of Waddell Creek, a coastal freshwater marsh that is one of the rarest habitats on the Central Coast of California. This marsh is one of the few relatively undisturbed bodies of fresh water left along the West coast. The land is 23 acres of wetland habitat. It is part of the Rancho del Oso Big Basin Redwoods State Park, located approximately 65 miles south of San Francisco. The elevation in the park ranges from sea level to over 2,000 feet. The area was named after William W. Waddell, who established the last of his four sawmills there in 1868. The sawmill ran down after his death in 1875. All the boilers were left in the area; they are now completely surrounded by second-growth redwoods. Other trees found in the park are conifers, and oaks. Within the park there are different vegetation types to be seen, such as chaparral, redwood forests, and riparian habitats.

Gazos Creek is a stream in San Mateo County, California, in the United States. Gazos was likely derived from the Spanish word garzas meaning "herons".

Waddell Creek is the name given to both the creek and the watershed that run through Big Basin Redwoods State Park in Santa Cruz County, California. The Waddell Creek mainstem is formed by the confluence of East and West Waddell Creeks, and empties into the Pacific Ocean at Waddell Beach, just south of Año Nuevo Point.

Rancho Del Oso Nature and History Center interprets the cultural and natural history of the area of Rancho del Oso (ranch of the bear) which became part of California's Big Basin Redwoods State Park, in the 1970s. The center is located on Highway 1 16 miles north of Santa Cruz, California. Rancho del Oso has trails that traverse the park habitats. There are soggy marshes, grassy meadows, gurgling creeks, hardwood forests and pine forests. There are ancient redwood groves and cascading waterfalls. Trails vary greatly in length from one mile to 13 miles. The area is a newer section of Big Basin. It is located on the coast of the Pacific Ocean at Waddell Beach, where the Waddell Creek watershed drains from the Santa Cruz Mountains into the sea. The site is also near the end of the hiking enthusiast's Skyline-to-the-Sea Trail. Only trails provide access to the Big Basin headquarters.

Rancho Punta del Año Nuevo was a 17,753-acre (71.84 km2) Mexican land grant in present day San Mateo County, California given in 1842 by Governor Juan B. Alvarado to Simeon Castro. At the time, the grant was in Santa Cruz County; an 1868 boundary adjustment gave the land to San Mateo County. The grant extended along the Pacific coast from Rancho Butano and Arroyo de los Frijoles on the north, past Pigeon Point, Franklin Point to Point Año Nuevo on the south.

Pigeon Point Light Station or Pigeon Point Lighthouse is a lighthouse built in 1871 to guide ships on the Pacific coast of California. It is the tallest lighthouse (tied with Point Arena Light) on the West Coast of the United States. It is still an active Coast Guard aid to navigation. Pigeon Point Light Station is located on the coastal highway (State Route 1), 5 miles (8 km) south of Pescadero, California, between Santa Cruz and San Francisco. The 115-foot (35 m), white masonry tower, resembles the typical New England structure. The lighthouse and the land around have been preserved as Pigeon Point Light Station State Historic Park, a California state park. The lighthouse is also listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and designated as a California Historical Landmark. The lighthouse is currently undergoing major renovations funded by the California state legislature in 2021. Research published 2022 by the San Mateo County Office of Sustainability found that the lighthouse was vulnerable to erosion caused by sea level rise.

Rancho Agua Puerca y las Trancas was a 4,421-acre (17.89 km2) Mexican land grant in present-day Santa Cruz County, California given in 1843 by Governor Manuel Micheltorena to Ramón Rodríguez and Francisco Alviso. "Agua Puerca" is a combination of "water" and "pork, or pig", and probably refers to the stagnant water in the lagoon formed at the outlet of the stream at Davenport Landing, the original southern boundary. "Las Trancas" means "the bars" (obstacles or difficulties) and may refer to the sand bars which naturally form at many California coastal creek outlets, forming stagnant lagoons just behind the beach. The grant extended along the Pacific coast from Waddell Creek which formed the north boundary of the grant, south past present-day Swanton to the Arroyo Puerca just north of present-day Davenport. Scott Creek flows north-to-south for almost the entire length of the grant.

Butano State Park is a state park in the U.S. state of California, showcasing the secluded redwood-filled canyon of Little Butano Creek, a tributary of Butano Creek in the Pescadero Creek watershed. Located in San Mateo County near Pescadero, the 4,728-acre (1,913 ha) park was established in 1956.