A crackle of static fills the airwaves. "This is Captain Vancouver. If you would care to read my diary, you will find I traveled by horse, not by mule, and the purpose of my journey to your "Pinnacles" was in part exploratory, but equally a brief diversion from the endless task of mapping the west coast of the continent, assessing the nature and extent of Spanish settlements, and negotiating certain matters with the Spaniards. Our ships, Discovery and Chatham, were in need of caulking and sail repair in November, 1792. We anchored at the Port of Monterey for this work and, after visiting the Mission of San Carlos, I joined a party traveling to the valley through which the Monterey River flows. I was there gratified, as my diary records, by the sight of the most extraordinary mountain I had ever beheld:

On one side it presented the appearance of a sumptuous edifice fallen into decay; the columns which looked as if they had been raised with much labor and industry, were of great magnitude, seemed to be of an elegant form, and to be composed of the same cream-colored stone, of which I have before made mention. Between these magnificent columns were deep excavations, resembling different passages into the interior parts of the supposed building, whose roof being the summit of the mountain appeared to be wholly supported by these columns rising perpendicularly with the most minute mathematical exactness. The whole had a most beautiful appearance of human ingenuity and labor; but since it is not possible, from the rude and very humble race of beings that are found to be the native inhabitants of this country, to suppose they could have been capable of raising such a structure, its being the production of nature, cannot be questioned...."

My arms are glistening with sweat in the ninety-degree air. Directly overhead, one blistered hand is turning a rubber-handled drill. The other is swinging a hammer into the mushroomed end of the holder. Fine dust puffs from around the drill tip. My chalky hand pinches an egg-shaped knob. I move one foot from its hold, shake it, and make the return. Suddenly my eye is pulled beyond the knobs to the sweeping gulf below. I feel an upwelling wave and reeling sensation at the prospect of toppling over backwards. Overhead, the black indentation we are climbing curves up and outward. From a distance, this shallow, water-worn groove, darkened by eons of slow seepage from the grassy terraces above, gives the appearance of a deep excavation between columns—perhaps this cliff, now called the Balconies, is the "sumptuous edifice" described by Vancouver. Below, the indentation sticks straight down like a black tongue. A few of the twelve protection bolts below sparkle against the black. Several of these bolts had to be started without looking at the drill overhead for fear that any backward leaning might instigate a somersaulting cascade down the knobby tongue.