Ashore in the Two Harbors area halfway between Isthmus Cove and Catalina Harbor (the two harbors for which it is named) is the Isthmus Yacht Club. Their building is a barracks constructed by an Army contingent during the Civil War. Still there.
http://www.visitcatalinaisland.com/twoHarbors/poin_civilWarBarracks.php
In Catalina Harbor at a spit called Ballast Point, so named because it was created by sailing ships offloading ballast stones to careen their hulls for bottom work, you can see the ironwood frame heads sticking out of the mud/sand of the historically significant shipwreck,
Ning Po. You must be there at dead low tide to see them, identified by the seaweed clumps attached to them and aligned in the curvature of the hull.
http://www.visitcatalinaisland.com/twoHarbors/poin_ningPo.php
Not mentioned in the provided link, the
Ning Po was the first ship to have watertight compartments, inspired by the structure of bamboo. The picture in the link is NOT the Ning Po. Two pics of the actual ship attached below.
Cherry Cove on the West face of Isthmus Cove is leased to the Boy Scouts who have established quite a facility there. Many, many years ago there was a group of scouts who hiked up Cherry Canyon from Cherry Cove and chose a likely place to establish an overnight camp. Out came the folding shovels to clear an area for their tent and CLUNK, what did we hit? It was a buried chest of gold leaf wrapped opium placed there in another time.
Yep, a magical place and filled with history, much of it still untouched.
