 Fascinating and romantic legendary lighthouses
Added: 02/01/2006 |
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Lighthouses mark long, rugged coastlines, beautiful but often fogbound, frequently deadly. Hid from human sight, most places where they are located are remarkably beautiful. Whether it's for their usefulness, beauty, or romance - or the combination of the three - most of us would admit to the enchantment with lighthouses.
Lighthouses carry much of the romance and history. These fabled structures have been making beautiful and dangerous wilderness coasts where their construction required extraordinary ingenuity, courage, and strength. The nature of people's love for them takes its root in the legendary history of these treasured coastal beacons. Most legendary lighthouses are situated at challenging for navigators remote locations that are lost in millions square miles of ocean.At one time some locations had numerous lighthouses to mark the long and dangerous shorelines. Today, only a few remain in reasonably good shape and most are in private hands. The legendary lighthouses of the Gulf of Mexico are spread over the Gulf coast that stretches for a thousand miles along five states - Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. Two of its legendary lighthouses are worth noting - Biloxi Lighthouse which stands in the middle of four lanes of traffic in Biloxi, Mississippi and privately owned Aransas Pass Light Station in Texas. With only 7,000 miles of land, the remote Hawaiian chain of islands has always been tough to navigate. It's been highlighted with the legendary lighthouses such as Kilauea Point Lighthouse, located on the Kilauea Point Wildlife Refuge on Kauai Island; Makapuu Point Lighthouse the biggest and most powerful of the lighthouses in Hawaii; and the Diamond Head Lighthouse, located near the foot of the extinct Diamond Head volcano. New England's area of Cape Cod and Islands has some of the most picturesque lighthouses in the world. Gay Head Light of Massachusetts sits 160 feet above the sea on the brightly colored clay bluffs in Martha's Vineyard to mark the entrance to the dangerous Vineyard Sound. The original wooden lighthouse built in 1799 was replaced by the current brick and brownstone tower in 1856. In 1998, Gay Head was changed to the original Native American name, Aquinnah. The lighthouse is the largest on the island and guards treacherous shoals offshore, the Devil's Bridge. Chatham Light, Massachusetts is situated in the town of Chatham on the elbow of Cape Cod. In 1808 the first of three sets of twin lights was installed at Chatham Beach. In 1841 the original lights were replaced by a set of brick towers. In year 1881, the erosion toppled them over the cliff. Again a pair of lights was installed at Chatham--this time designed of brick-lined iron. In 1923 the north light at Chatham was relocated up the beach and is known today as Nauset Light. Chatham Light remains in this configuration today. Off the keeper's house you can still see the remains of the last Chatham twin. The legendary lighthouses of Alaska were built to mark the way for ocean-going vessels, pleasure boaters and a fleet of commercial fishermen. Even though the seas around Alaska are some of the most treacherous on the planet, there are only a handful of lighthouses built along Alaska's 33,000 miles of coastline. None of the lighthouse are accessible by road - all are reachable only by boat, plane or helicopters. Most of the lighthouses are open for visitors. You can create your own lighthouse getaway and brighten up your day with a tour of one of these lighthouses.
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