Beach · Point Reyes National Seashore
Kayak-in camp beach with vault toilets, so no wag bag needed
Overview
Map
Plan your stop
The highest, rockiest slopes around here are a summer buffet for grizzly bears.
Point Reyes Tour Guide
Parkwolf is a GPS audio tour guide for Point Reyes National Seashore. As you drive, it chimes in with what’s ahead: hidden gems, upcoming stops, history, geology, and wildlife, right through your car’s speakers.
Recorded for this area
The Beach Nursery You Might Miss“Kehoe Beach is one of the places where western snowy plovers nest. The birds are about sparrow-sized, and their pale eggs lie in shallow hollows among sand and shells.”
Plays on the road 0.9 mi from Tomales Beach in the Parkwolf Point Reyes Tour Guide.
More stories near here in the app
“Fantastic app with many points of information… It’s great to just turn on while you’re driving and it gives you an audio tour of the national Park. We love it!!!!”
Guide
Tomales Beach is a long sandy beach on the wild west shore of Tomales Bay, inside the national seashore and reachable only by boat. It's one of about a dozen beaches where you can camp overnight with a boat-in permit, and one of just two, with Marshall Beach, that has vault toilets. That's the reason to pick it: camp here and you don't have to carry a portable toilet. Groups of 15 to 25 book it as their own site; smaller parties can land here too when there's room.
You paddle over from the east side, pull the kayaks up the sand and pitch above the high-tide line, because a big tide swallows most of this shore. Scrub and steep slopes back the beach and there's no trail in or out, so it feels cut off. Low tide uncovers mudflats and eelgrass, and on a dark summer or autumn night the water can glow with bioluminescence when you stir it. There are a couple of picnic tables and nothing else: no water, no trash pickup.
Reserve a boat-in permit in advance. Miller Boat Launch on Highway 1 is the closest put-in with overnight parking, about an hour's paddle away. Go in the morning, because afternoon wind can turn the crossing into a slog. Bring all your water, bear-proof storage for food and toiletries, and firewood from outside the park if you want a beach fire, which needs a free permit. No dogs, no glass.
Wildlife
2,552 sightingsNorthern Elephant SealMost seen around 11 AMSighting map
127 sightingsGrey WhaleMost seen around noonSighting map
109 sightingsHumpback WhaleMost seen around 10 AMSighting map
29 sightingsSteller Sea LionMost seen around noonSighting map
203 sightingsCalifornia Sea LionMost seen around noonSighting map
352 sightingsHarbor SealMost seen around 7 AMSighting mapSighting maps show where each species has been reported across Point Reyes. Wildlife moves, so no sighting is guaranteed.
Keep exploring
ModerateMarshall Beach Trail2.4 mi · 1.5 hr · 1.3 mi awayA ranch road drops through pasture to a small Tomales Bay cove.
EasyKehoe Beach Trail1.2 mi · 1 hr · 1.7 mi awayA short dune crossing leads to a wild, surf-washed beach.
ChallengingTomales Point Trail9.5 mi · 4.5 hr · 2 mi awayWalk a wild elk ridge to the Pacific end of the peninsula.
ModerateMcClures Beach Trail0.8 mi · 45 min · 2.2 mi awayA sandy ravine descent to a cove of surf and sea stacks.
EasyAbbotts Lagoon Trail2.8 mi · 1.3 hr · 3.5 mi awayThree lagoons, a footbridge, and a sandy finish at Great Beach.
Beach · 0.9 mi awayMarshall Beach400-foot Tomales Bay strand most visitors reach by small watercraft
Beach · 1.9 mi awayKehoe BeachShort dune walk to a wide, wind-scoured surf beach
Sight · 2.1 mi awayPierce Point RanchWeathered 1858 dairy ranch you can wander, high above Tomales Bay
Beach · 2.5 mi awayMcClures BeachSteep sandy path drops to a wild cove between rocky headlands
Sight · 4 mi awayAbbotts LagoonFlat walk past coastal lagoons and dunes to a wild ocean beachParkwolf’s Point Reyes ranking
The audio tour guide for the drive, plus offline maps, trails, and wildlife heatmaps for when the signal drops.
