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Life - Travel

Sunday, Feb. 22, 2009

Angel Island: A key facility is open again

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If you want to explore Angel Island in near-solitude, come now while the days are chilly and gray.

The storied island -- the largest in San Francisco Bay, and a state park since the 1950s -- was where Coast Miwok Indians hunted and fished for 2,000 years. It saw military occupation from the Civil War to the Cold War.

One million immigrants first set foot on U.S. soil here, and for 30 years, complying with exclusion laws, our government did what it could to keep the Chinese out.

When San Francisco banned pistol duels, gentlemen did the deed on Angel Island. When government officials attempted to deport labor leader Harry Bridges, they tried him on Angel Island. And when an electric light burns in abandoned quarters at Fort McDowell, some say Angel Island has a ghost.

About 200,000 people visit Angel Island State Park each year, most during the April-to-October peak season. They come to experience the wild beauty and appreciate the views of San Francisco, tony Marin County communities and the bridges of the bay.

The island is accessible by watercraft, yours or a ferry. The Angel Island-Tiburon ferry makes weekend-only runs in February, although it may be possible to catch a ride with a scheduled group during the week. Limited daily service resumes in March, with full service April through October. Ferries also serve Angel Island from San Francisco and Alameda-Oakland.

Explore the 1.15-square-mile island on foot or bicycle. Bring your bike on the ferry for $1. The island's bike rentals and guided tours are on hiatus until April.

"I like history, and this place has so much history that it's incredible," says Angel Island State Park superintendent Dave Matthews, who describes the island as four small parks -- Ayala Cove, Camp Reynolds, Fort McDowell and the U.S. Immigration Station.

Ayala Cove

"If you think back to Paul Revere and the battles of Lexington and Concord in 1775, at that same time, Juan Ayala sailed into the Golden Gate and moored his ship here," says Matthews. "One of his crew members was the first to map San Francisco Bay."

Ayala named the island Isla de los Angeles, or Island of the Angels. Today, the park's visitor center, cafe, ferry and other services are headquartered at Ayala Cove.

In 1891, the Marine Hospital Service constructed 40 buildings for a quarantine station at Ayala Cove, to contain contagious diseases carried by ships' passengers arriving in San Francisco. One of four surviving buildings, the 1935 officers quarters, now houses the Angel Island State Park visitor center.

"Certainly, until 1947 to '48, when the quarantine station closed, diseases were contained here," Matthews says. "It was of tremendous importance to the health and safety of not only California but the entire United States."

Camp Reynolds

Fears that Confederate ships might invade San Francisco Bay or that the Southern-sympathizing British might send in warships to stir up trouble led to establishment of this Civil War encampment in 1863. It bears the name of Union Gen. John F. Reynolds, killed at Gettysburg.

A bakery was often the first building erected on an Army post because bread was part of the soldiers' pay, says Matthews. Camp Reynolds' restored bake shop, the island's oldest building, is where schoolchildren can experience a day in the life of a soldier and bake cinnamon rolls in the brick oven.

The Officers Row housing has survived, but the enlisted men's quarters across the parade ground is gone. The structure at water's edge is the quartermaster's building. The 1876 post chapel was a schoolhouse for the camp's children.