Climbing down is forbidden, to protect the environment, and there is no path to the shore, though a descent down an overgrown slope just north of the falls looks relatively easy. The cove is exceptionally pretty, containing brilliant turquoise blue water, clean whitish sand, jagged rocks and rough, white-topped waves. Two trails start from the official carpark, the main one following the creek seawards, passing under the road in a concrete tunnel then leading south along the top of the cliffs to a view of McWay Falls and its pristine sandy beach, both about 200 feet below. A $8 day use fee is charged, but like other Big Sur parks, parking is free (and fine for oversized vehicles) alongside Highway 1, the nearest suitable layby here being 0.2 miles further south. The center of the state park is at McWay Creek, where a short side track leads to a small parking area in woods beside the stream - a place that often fills up by mid morning and has no room for large vehicles at any time. So impressed was Helen with Julia's life and achievements that she donated all her land to the state of California on condition that it would be named after the pioneer woman. Julia died in 1928, having in her later years become close friends with one of the main landowners in the region, Helen Hooper Brown (wife of congressman Lathrop Brown). She still was a rancher but also operated a guest house a little way further north along the coast, a site now occupied by the Esalen Institute, and became well known to tourists and the other local residents. Julia married quite late in life (1915) to John Burns, and afterwards settled near present-day Burns Creek, a few miles south of McWay Creek. Julia Pfeiffer was born in 1868 and moved to the Big Sur coast with her parents one year later, when the family built a cattle ranch and farmed vegetables. Like Andrew Molera, 15 miles north, the park commemorates an early twentieth century pioneer of this remote region. But the 3,762 acre park also contains several more miles of high, rocky coastline, the grassy bluffs either side of Highway 1, an undersea area popular for scuba diving, and a section of the inland hills rising almost to 3,000 feet, mostly covered by mixed woodland of chaparral, oak and redwood. The highlight of Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park is undoubtedly beautiful McWay Falls, one of only two coastal waterfalls in California, where McWay Creek falls 80 feet over a granite cliff onto a sandy beach, or at high tide directly into the Pacific Ocean.
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