An Interesting Feature in California. A SINGING BEACH.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 222, 1 October 1887, Page 2

An Interesting Feature in California.

A SINGING BEACH.

Ma\ t y people "have heard -of the singing beach fit Manchester, Macs., where the sand, when driven over or stirred, gne« out a peculiar and not unmusical sound, but few, very few people know that near Poscadei^o a bead) exists, much laiger, giving out sounds in no uncertain manner. The beach near Mancbet-tei is said to be one-fifth of a mile in extent, bub here the "writer a*>d a small party of friends lately investigated the matter, and frnind the sounds very clear, though varying in loudness, for a distance of one and a halt miles along the coast line. The sound is loudest and most distinct where the sand is dry on top and damp beneath. A light vehicle driven over it gnes a clear, musical sound, a footstep nob quite so loud and even the hands or a stick stirring or lifting the sand causes It to " sing '" quite plainly. What causes this sound I do not attempt to explain. The coast at that particular place is well worth a visit, independent of the "singing sound." The blufls are wildly grand ; the sand dunes arc strange and desolate, mixed with enough of life, though, to make the drive a lovely one on a clear day, and for two or three mile-5 the driving along the- ocean sand is excellent at low tide. Perhaps the strangest thing about this sand is that persons who have li\ed in Pescadero for many years seem to know nothing of it. It is out of the way of the celebrated Pebble Beach road, and the inhabitants and the pleasure-seekers seem to think that is enough of a good thing foi one place, leaving this really wondeiful and beautiful beach to the few fisher-* and hunters who go there occasionally for the excellent surf-fishing and sea-fowl shooting, and never think that the lofty cliils, with their faces carved as if in Egyptian hieroglyphics and pierced with eaves forming as fine a scenic efiect as the Palisades of the Hudson, a thing woith noticing