August 2026: A Final Message from the CEO
I remember when Crystal Cove started for me. It was a job interview more than a decade ago. I can’t find the exact date because my Google calendar doesn’t go back that far.
I wore my khaki linen trousers and a navy button up and a layered turquoise necklace. I arrived at check-in and told them I had a job interview – as if they didn’t know. There I was in my linen trousers and button up and layered turquoise necklace. And there you were, probably, in your Rainbows and shorts and a Crystal Cove t-shirt you bought at the Store years before that.
But imagine, for a moment, seeing Crystal Cove for the first time as a potential workplace – how badly you might want to land the job.
And I did – I desperately wanted to land that job.
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I moved into my office as Director of Development downstairs in Cottage #5 (the first one on the right in the Hollow), tucked my running shoes under my desk in case I went for a walk, and stared at a nearly empty Outlook calendar.
My days filled quickly, but the job turned out to be different than I imagined. Sandier for sure. More filled with spiders and silverfish and sea stars and hawks than I’d thought. More milkshakes and fries too.
I left Crystal Cove for a time once – to help protect elephants and jaguars and whales, and to restore the habitats they depend on in Zimbabwe and Zambia, in the Yucatán and Costa Rica, and along the Pacific coast in Baja California. And then I followed the coast where it’s led me for years now – back to California.
Back to Crystal Cove.
I don’t remember what I was wearing that time, but I remember what it felt like walking back in. Everything was where I remembered it. And you were probably still there in a t-shirt you bought at the Store years before that.
I moved into my office upstairs in Cottage #5 (the first one on the right in the Hollow), tucked my running shoes under my desk in case I went for a walk, and stared at a nearly empty Outlook calendar.
Again, my days filled, and again, the job turned out to be different than I imagined. Sandier than I remembered. Still a lot of spiders and silverfish and hawks. But now it was all more familiar. I could see more. More layers. More details. More spiders, if I’m honest.
But when you start to see the details, that’s when you really get to know Crystal Cove:
Last summer, a spider built a web near my office door. They always do. I’ve had my share of a face full of spiderwebs at 7:45 a.m. But this time she’d built her web off to the side, so it was safe. Over the next three weeks, the web expanded to several feet across. Every morning when I’d arrive, she’d be waiting in the middle. As I climbed my stairs, she’d climb hers, disappearing onto the trellis until I’d gone inside.
There is a carob tree by the maintenance shop that towers over it, leaning its branches up and over the shop door. It’s the tree where lost beach toys and Matchbox cars and plastic beaded necklaces go. They get tucked into knots and crevices, and over time, the tree has grown around them, folding them further into the knots and lifting them higher each year – at the exact same rate as a carob tree grows.
One summer, the education team spent a month doing Shake Shack brackets – each week a new milkshake matchup until at last, just the traditional date shake and mint chip were left standing. Date shake took the title, but it was more for historic reasons than anything.
Last week, the team supplemented the HR and OSHA posters in the staff restroom, adding an It’s Been X Days Since the Last Rattlesnake in the Restroom tracker.
Once there was an otter who spent most of the summer along the shore in the Historic District, and for a long time there was a cat that tucked up with cottage guests at night and begged for ahi tacos at lunch.
In the evenings, the tree frogs and bullfrogs in Los Trancos Creek are louder than the waves. And if you say you like them, there will be at least one Natural Resource aide who will quietly mutter “they’re invasive…”
Same if you think the mustard is beautiful when it’s in bloom. It is, but shh.
You can take sea glass, because technically, it’s litter. You cannot take shells. Or even the heart-shaped stones. It’s not the same.
Cottage #13 is the southernmost cottage in the Historic District. Cottage #12 is not one over. It is the southernmost cottage on the North Beach. Cottage #5 is our office. Cottage #6 is not next door. It is the fourth cottage along the boardwalk between #4 and #7. Cottages 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11 go almost in order. Cottage #36 has the only roof deck. Cottage #14 has the only king-sized bed. There is a door in Cottage #7 that marks Tristan Adamson’s height growing up.
And the Visitor Center is, inexplicably, Cottage #00.
There really are rattlesnakes on Rattlesnake Ridge; there really are no dogs on No Dogs; and BFI stands for Big F***ing Incline.
Once there was a raccoon robot suspended over Los Trancos Creek to monitor the environment. It said it liked the bullfrogs, so now it’s gone.
Tongva ti’at made of sand.
Once we made soapstone whales with a Tongva elder and then built a canoe (a ti’at) on the beach out of sand and paddled to Catalina (Pimu).
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As you have probably heard, I am leaving Crystal Cove again. I’ve accepted the role of President & CEO of Catalina Island Conservancy. Hallie Jones, who has worked alongside me for the last three years as Executive Vice President, has been selected as Crystal Cove Conservancy’s next President & CEO. She will take over on August 26. I am so excited for this next chapter – for me with Catalina Island Conservancy and for all of you, with Hallie Jones at the helm.
Leaving a place like Crystal Cove is hard. But over the past few years, I’ve come to realize that in public lands, the leaving is really the only thing that is inevitable.
It wasn’t inevitable that the Historic District would be restored. It wasn’t inevitable that thousands of students would find their way to Crystal Cove on school buses every year. It wasn’t inevitable that gnatcatcher habitat would be protected or that there would be dorms and labs and interpretive centers here. None of that was inevitable.
Only the leaving was.
In public lands, we don’t own these places. We care for them for a while – and ready them for whatever, and whoever, comes next.
The leaving isn’t the interruption of stewardship: it’s the whole point.
But leaving a place like Crystal Cove is hard. I’m in my office upstairs in Cottage #5 (the first one on the right in the Hollow), my running shoes are tucked under my desk in case I go for a walk, and I’m staring at a nearly empty Outlook calendar.
– Kate