El Capitán State Beach is a protected
beach
A beach is a landform alongside a body of water which consists of loose particles. The particles composing a beach are typically made from rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles, etc., or biological sources, such as mollusc shell ...
in the
state park system of
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...
. The most easterly of three state parks along the
Gaviota Coast
The Gaviota Coast in Santa Barbara County, California is a rural coastline along the Santa Barbara Channel roughly bounded by the city of Goleta on the south and the north boundary of the county on the north. This last undeveloped stretch of ...
, it is located about west of downtown
Santa Barbara, in
Santa Barbara County
Santa Barbara County, California, officially the County of Santa Barbara, is located in Southern California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 448,229. The county seat is Santa Barbara, and the largest city is Santa Maria.
Santa Barba ...
. The beach is named for
José Francisco Ortega José Francisco Ortega (1734 – February 1798) was an indigenous Californio soldier and early settler of Alta California. He joined the military at the age of twenty-one and rose to the rank of sergeant by the time he joined the Portola expedition ...
, who retired from the Spanish Army in 1795 with the rank of captain and received the
Rancho Nuestra Señora del Refugio
The Rancho Nuestra Señora del Refugio ("Ranch of Our Lady of Refuge") was a Spanish land grant to José Francisco Ortega in 1794 and is the only land grant made under Spanish and confirmed by USA in 1866 to Jose Maria Ortega.under the US Supreme ...
as a land grant.
Features
El Capitán has a day-use beach as well as a campground with 131 sites (6 of which are RV only) and 5 group sites. There are
tide pool
A tide pool or rock pool is a shallow pool of seawater that forms on the rocky intertidal shore. Many of these pools exist as separate bodies of water