Tour the tower
After you hiked all that way, you want to tour the tower.
Tours are provided on a first come, first serve basis from mid-March to
mid-October. Additionally open for tours on the weekends
prior to Christmas. This exterior shot shows the tower, its
attached building and adjancent building. That adjancent
building was where the kerosene for the light was stored. The
building attached to the tower is where the light keepers entered, and
where our tour entered. This small sturcture which at one time
had windows that overlooked the coast also had a fireplace, which
provided the heat to keep the interior of the lighthouse dry and a nice
comfortable place for workers to take a rest.
From that building we enter the tower
itself. The tower
stairs, in fact the entire metal structure of the interior is put
together with bolts. There are three levels in addition to
the ground floor. One of the levels is where the workers changed
their clothing for work. The uppermost part of the tower
that contains the actual lens is closed to the public due to the nature
of the rotating lens.
Kerosene for the light was hauled up in 5 gallon containers.
Since there was no electricity when the lighthouse was built, it
required a mechanism to turn the First Order Fresnel Lens. That
was accomplished by a 200 pound weight down the center of the
building. Much like the weights on a grandfather clock, this
weight was brought up to the top and provided the power to turn
the lens for about 4 hours. After which someone had to climb to
the top and wind the weight back up.
In the picture to the left you see a small weight on a
cable. This is to give you and idea of how the 200 pound weight
was arranged. Notice that on the floor below there is an
indentation where the weight rested once it completed its travel from
the top of the tower.