Archeology students explore southcoast dig

The Santa Cruz Sentinel follows a Cabrillo College archeology class digging for artifacts at an excavation site off Whitehouse Canyon Road, north of Año Nuevo State Reserve [map].

What they found was pretty prosaic: stone flakes, broken obsidian spearheads and shell fragments. But they are believed to be artifacts of the local Quiroste tribe from 250 years ago:

The Spanish described a valley with one large house in the middle of the village, spacious enough to fit the entire tribe of 200. The remnants of this house, known as the "round house" or "casa grande" by the Spanish, is the "Holy Grail" for the archaeologists searching the area, Hylkema said.