ORIENT POINT LIGHTHOUSE
Long Island, New York
As you can see from the map, Long Island stretches out eastward from Brooklyn and ends in a fork. Montauk Point is the southern tip and Orient Point is the northern one. I also went out to this one on the Sunday with the bad weather. It was pouring down rain and I had driven out to the end of the dirt road through giant puddles, maybe they were small lakes, and big potholes, not yet forming small lakes. Then I had to park the car sideways and roll down the window real quick, take the picture and roll the window back up. Of course I could've waited till the next day when the weather was a bit better, as you can see below.
You take Highway 25 out to the end and park at the Cross Sound Ferry terminal. You can walk out along the beach and see the lighthouse from shore. This lighthouse is your basic cast iron 'spark plug' type structure, however, it is affectionately called the Coffee Pot by the locals. The Lighthouse Board decided in 1896 that the Oyster Pond Reef located just off the point in what is known as Plum Gut needed marking and so they approved the construction of Orient Point. Didn't actually light up until 1899 and was briefly equipped with a 5th order lens, until 1900 when they replaced it with a 4th order one. The tower itself stands 45 feet high and is a caisson type foundation. The island you see is actually hundreds of tons of rock dumped all around it to protect it from gale driven waves. It flashes a white light every 5 seconds and with the modern optic installed in 1954 when the Coast Guard automated the light, it can be seen 17 miles out at sea. They were gonna tear it down in 1970 but public outcry once again saved the day. One small detail, after the repairs and facelift were completed, the little tower leaned 5 degrees to the side.
The drive out here is also beautiful. I came from Montauk on Sunday so I caught the ferry over to Shelter Island and from there to Greenport on the north fork of Long Island. I came the opposite direction on Monday.
OF THE MOUNTAINS
John B Caddell
Copyright 2001