Point San Luis Lighthouse

The Point San Luis Lighthouse Keepers are a non-profit organization formed in 1995 to restore and preserve the Point San Luis Lighthouse and to open it to the public twice weekly for docent led tours. The Lighthouse is a Nationally registered historic site that was originally constructed in 1890.

Located out in Avila Beach, on property that is closed to the public due to its proximity to Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant.

The Lighthouse is currently operational, with a blinking light every night. We have two trolley tours per week, plus three hiking tours. The Point San Luis Lighthouse was the beacon over San Luis Bay during the steamship era and into the more modern oil tanker era, allowing for a huge influx of people, goods, and general commerce to enter the region and help San Luis Obispo become the county seat. 

We currently have many restoration projects in the works, landscaping, painting, fixing wooden floors. We have a need for someone with a love of theater to assist in writing scripts and movement for a live-history program we are starting. We have field trips for fourth grade students that we need volunteers for. There is a newly constructed archive room that needs to have archival paperwork sorted and filed, and we need assistance with documenting artifacts and cleaning them. We are also looking into new forms of social media to enhance our presence digitally. The docent program to lead tours is a fun way to volunteer, with some docents dressing in period attire. We also have work crews during the week for experienced craftsman who want to assist with larger projects. We also would like to do some plantings and cleanup work of the back boardwalk to make the walkway nicer.

People who would be good volunteers should be interested in fields such as: history, restoration work, theater art/interpretation; assisting with field trips; cleaning artifacts; inventorying archival paperwork; assisting with social media accounts; an interest in working with the general public, etc.