Central Coasting: Discovering Asilomar

Nestled among trees and close to the shore, the Asilomar Conference Grounds offers a lot to visitors and locals alike.

Walking through Asilomar’s Hearst Social Hall makes you feel like you’ve gone back in time to 1913, when the Young Women’s Christian Association first established the camp.

Over the years, renowned architect Julia Morgan would design 13 buildings, making it the largest collection of her buildings in one place.

In 1956, it became a California State Park and came to be what it is today.

“We’re actually a very interesting park,” said State Park Ranger Lisa Bradford. “Yes, we are primarily a conference grounds, but during the day we are open to the public. We’re very accessible because we have no entrance fees and no parking fees.”

The conference grounds attract all kinds of groups that want to switch up the usual big city conference for a more tranquil and serene setting.

“We’ll get high tech groups from Silicon Valley and the San Francisco area specifically because we don’t have TVs or telephones in our rooms, and they like that concept of unplug and connect,” said Timothy McGill, Asilomar’s Director of Sales and Marketing.

Asilomar officials want to dispel the misconception that it’s only a conference grounds. It’s open for anyone to enjoy, whether you’re taking a break from your conference or a local resident who just wants to get outdoors, there’s a lot to do at Asilomar.

“We have kayaking. We have bike rentals here. We have relationships with organizations that will do team building events for the beach area as well,” said McGill.

“We have lots of wonderful hikes and trails — boardwalk trails that run through the dunes. We have a lovely one mile long coast trail that runs along our rocky shores marine habitat. We have sandy beach and we also have forest habitat here,” said Bradford.

They want people to know about this hidden gem and to call it their own.

“It’s here and we really want the community to think of Asilomar as their state park,” said Bradford.

During the summer, Asilomar provides free park tours. Follow this link for a list of time and dates: http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=24967.

Watch Jason Atcho’s story tonight at 5:00 as KION goes Central Coasting.