Point Dume This Fall: Heathercliff Road Gains, Westward Beach Road Closed

On Heathercliff Road a breakfast line now forms at Point Dume Plaza. Across the street, a surfboard artist runs a gallery with a sculpture garden next to the post office. Down at Westward Beach, the pay gate has been removed. Crews are working late into the night to stack a rock wall along an eroded shoreline, and the Point Dume State Beach parking lot behind them is closed.

Both changes happened in the same few months. As of early October 2026, the part of Point Dume that is easy to reach is up on Heathercliff Road, and it has more to offer than it did in spring. The beach road below is still closed to cars, and nobody has published a reopening date. Trancas lost a longtime dining room in September. For anyone who lives between Zuma and Trancas, the weekend routine looks different than it did a year ago.

Heathercliff Road added a cafe and two galleries

The anchor is The Royal Egg Cafe, which opened June 15 in Point Dume Plaza at 29169 Heathercliff Road. It is the second location of a Westlake Village cafe owned by Jaron and Bree Gugliuzza. The Malibu Times reported that some customers of the original were glad to no longer have to drive over the Santa Monica Mountains for it. The kitchen cooks from scratch with organic ingredients and no seed oils. The menu runs from a wild boar sausage plate called The Malibu Ranch Hand to a keto quiche with an almond flour crust, plus a kids' ricotta huckleberry pancake.

Across the street, Bobbi Bennett opened Stoked Malibu Gallery at 29170 Heathercliff Road, Suite 6, next to the post office. It shares a building with Malgosia Design and has its own sculpture garden. The walls carry work by Bennett, Will Pierce and Kristina Grace, along with photographs by the late Guy Webster, who was Bennett's mentor. In late July the gallery was open by appointment only, with regular walk-in hours planned. Bennett told the Malibu Times that much of her work now is art consulting for clients rebuilding homes after the Palisades Fire.

Cliff and Christie Graham's ART Gallery opened in Point Dume in July. Bennett has partnered with the Grahams, and her surfboards are part of that arrangement. The Grahams have been part of the Malibu community for nearly 20 years. Christie Graham described the space as a home for contemporary artists.

One business moved the other way. Malibu Eye Center, Dr. Gregory O'Conner's optometry practice, left Point Dume Plaza for the Ocean View building at 24955 Pacific Coast Highway, Suite A-103. Patients who used to go to the plaza now drive east for eye appointments.

Trancas gained a studio and lost a dining room

North of the point, the lineup has changed in both directions.

New: The Sandwich Shop, 30150 Morningview Drive. Malibu native Sara Jerabek opened it in the house her grandparents first lived in, across from Malibu Middle and High schools, in time for the school year. With permission from the owners of Pt. Pizza, she brought back the Torpedo, a sandwich many people who grew up here will remember from there. Many sandwiches come on Bubread. As of the Malibu Times report on Sept. 7, the shop was open Wednesday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., with online ordering.

New: GLO Yoga Studios, Trancas Country Market. Co-founder Tarik Celebi announced infrared heat classes, Yoga Sculpt, HIIT, sculpt pilates and meditation. In July the studio was targeting a late-July opening. GLO's Malibu page now lists the Trancas studio as open and takes bookings, but it does not give an opening date.

Closed: Kristy's. Kristy Apana set Sept. 9 as the last day for her restaurant in Trancas Country Market. Kristy's opened in early 2011 as Kristy's Wood Oven & Wine Bar on the Malibu Country Inn property, overlooking Zuma Beach. In early 2017 it moved into the former Le Village Cafe space at Trancas. Over 15 years it stayed open on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's. It served free pajama pancakes to kids on Christmas morning and hosted an annual Chinese New Year gathering with a dragon dance. The Malibu Times profile did not name a replacement tenant.

Another September closing came from Newton Canyon. Saturday, Sept. 26 was the final day of the Rosenthal Malibu Estate's Vineyard Experience. That ended public tastings at the property where the winery had hosted guests since the Palisades Fire destroyed its wine bar and patio on Pacific Coast Highway. George Rosenthal planted the first vines there in 1987. The estate has 28 acres of vineyard at about 1,450 feet. The Malibu Times noted that the winery has not said what will happen to its vines, its wine production or its wine club, and its online shop still lists wines.

That leaves Heathercliff Road with a new breakfast spot and two galleries. Over the same summer, Trancas lost the dining room that had hosted its holidays, and west Malibu lost its vineyard tasting.

Down at the water, the road is closed past the pay gate

On the night of July 31, high tides and surf caused more erosion along Westward Beach. On Aug. 1 the city announced that Westward Beach Road beyond the pay gate and the Point Dume Beach parking lot were closed until further notice. Los Angeles County Public Works and the Department of Beaches and Harbors are handling the emergency repair. In early August, the Malibu Times reported that funding, a contractor, emergency permits and access across private property were still being arranged, and there was no reopening estimate.

The Malibu Times gave an update on Oct. 1. Crews have been building a rock revetment wall parallel to the shore to protect the infrastructure. The pay gate has been removed, and the state beach lot is still closed. The erosion has exposed pilings, concrete and steel in the sand and water. It has also left steep sand cliffs that could collapse and little to no sandy area to walk on.

Here is where each access point stood as of early October:

The county's Point Dume Beach page was last updated Aug. 6. It describes a full public closure from 5 a.m. to 3 p.m. while work is active, which is stricter than the general advisory. On a weekday morning, walking or biking down the road may not be allowed while crews are working.

Getting to the sand this month

The road may be closed, but Point Dume State Beach is still open. Here are the ways in as of early October:

• Top of Point Dume. State Parks lists limited free two-hour parking at the top of the point and asks visitors not to park in residential areas.
• Point Dume Nature Preserve. State Parks describes the preserve trail from the Westward Beach Road cul-de-sac and some disabled parking along Cliffside Drive next to the bluff-top park. Parking at the top is very limited.
• On foot along the road. People walking or biking may use the access road when contractors are not working.
• From the Big Dume turnaround. In August the Malibu Times reported that some visitors were hiking in from there and others were walking along the sand. The Oct. 1 report described much less beach left to walk on.
• Zuma instead. The county says Zuma's main beach, lots, restrooms and amenities are open.

This week adds a timing issue. A City of Malibu alert forecasts powerful breaking waves, rip currents, coastal flooding, erosion and debris in the water from today, Oct. 7, through Friday, Oct. 9. It advises staying off rocks and jetties. Those are the conditions that caused the July damage, and they are hitting a shoreline that has not been repaired yet.

The rock wall is a short-term repair

The revetment is meant to protect the road and the infrastructure under it. It is not a plan to bring the sand back. That is a separate and much slower effort. A county Beaches and Harbors draft feasibility study proposes adding 500,000 cubic yards of sand at Zuma Beach and building or enhancing dunes at Zuma Creek and Point Dume. It estimates the cost at $49,008,525, not counting future sand replenishment. The draft lists preliminary engineering, environmental review and permitting as the next phases, which puts it at an early planning stage. In August, Malibu.FM reported that the county was looking for sand sources. A broader idea of trucking sand from catch basins in the San Gabriel Mountains was still being talked about, at a reported cost in the hundreds of millions.

The two projects run on different schedules. The road could reopen when the revetment and repairs are finished. A wide beach at Westward depends on a project that is still in its draft stage, with costs measured in tens of millions of dollars. Until then, the parts of Point Dume you can count on reaching this fall are a breakfast table at Point Dume Plaza, a gallery next to the post office, and limited two-hour parking at the top of the point.

Joshua Spiegel follows the Westward Beach Road repair and changes along Heathercliff Road the way residents do, one county update at a time. If you have questions about how changes to beach access around Point Dume could affect a home you own or are considering, Joshua Spiegel is glad to talk it through. Let's Connect.