Clean Cruising

Cruises visiting Santa Catalina & all Santa Catalina cruises for 2013 - 2014

Mediterranean-flavoured Catalina Island is a world removed from the bustle of LA but has been a popular getaway since chewing-gum magnate William Wrigley Jr purchased the place in 1919. It is part of the Channel Islands, a chain of semi submerged mountains off the coast of Southern California with a unique ecosystem. Most of the island’s interior of sun-baked hillsides, valleys and canyons is owned by the Santa Catalina Island Conservancy, which ensures that it will never become overly developed. A bus tour of the area is most popular. However, the main attraction would have to be the reefs and shipwrecks of the area that are home to schools of flying fish and the bright orange Garibaldi which teem the local waters. This results in great scuba diving and snorkelling being very popular. There are also glass bottom boats, and for the adventurous parasailing.

The Catalina Island Museum, located in the historic Catalina Casino building, is also an attraction as it is the keeper of the island's cultural heritage with collections numbering over 100,000 items covering over 7,000 years of Native American history. Add to this over 10,000 photographs and images, a large collection of Catalina-made pottery and tile, ship models, and much more and one realises that it is a must-see. Also well worth visiting is the unique gift store. All appreciate visiting this island for its beauty and its pre-1919 intriguing history of once being a hangout for sea-otter poachers, then for smugglers, and finally for Union soldiers.

These days almost 85 percent of the population, numbering about 4,000, live in the island's only incorporated city, Avalon, while the second centre of population is the unincorporated village of Two Harbours, in the north.