Contact Information
Address:
1 Bear Valley Road
Point Reyes Station, CA 94956
United StatesMailing Address:
P.O. Box 159
Olema, CA 94950
United StatesPhone:
415-464-5260
Cordell Bank National Marine Sanctuary
One of 14 federally designated underwater areas protected by NOAA's Office of National Marine Sanctuaries, Cordell Bank National Marine Sanctuary is an extremely productive marine area off the west coast of United States in northern California, just north of the Gulf of the Farallones. With its southern-most boundary located about 52 miles west-northwest of San Francisco, the sanctuary is entirely offshore, with the eastern boundary about seven miles west of shore at Bodega Head. In total, the sanctuary protects an area of about 1,286 square miles.
Significant features of the sanctuary are Cordell Bank and Bodega Canyon. Cordell Bank is an undersea granite and rocky reef about four-and-a-half miles by nine-and-a-half miles, located 23 miles west of the Point Reyes Lighthouse. It sits at the edge of the continental shelf, and rises abruptly from the soft sediments of the shelf to within 115 feet of the ocean surface. Bodega Canyon is a prominent seafloor feature that cuts across the continental slope and into the shelf north of Cordell Bank. The canyon is about 10 miles north of Cordell Bank, and is about 12.4 miles long and over 5,200 feet deep.