10 Other Times Star Trek Used The Vasquez Rocks

4. Maps And Legends/The End Is The Beginning – Star Trek: Picard

I don’t know which seemed more unlikely, at one point: that we’d ever revisit the later-life adventures of Jean-Luc Picard... or that Toronto-based Star Trek TV would ever find a way to once again shoot scenes at its most famous location. 

Much less brazenly identify the whole thing AS Vasquez Rocks! But that’s exactly what we got onscreen in text, with the LA-based Picard series production and the introduction of troubled Starfleet retired commander Raffi Mussiker, amid her isolation from both Starfleet and former mentor J.P., now ghosting her for years. 

Crews spent a number of days at the park in early May 2019 filming work that we would see in finished form nine months later. The story of Raffi’s drug addiction and her life in a trailer struck many fans as a sad turn for Starfleet, seemingly dumping on its veterans, and many echoed the character’s bitterness at being shunned by her onetime senior from his historic and posh wine estate. That always struck me as a short-sighted point, seeing as Raffi apparently had the best wi-fi on the planet, and how could Starfleet force veterans into therapy and treatment if they refused? 

But to our point here - how was she living in the Vasquez Rocks? On one level, it was a cute wink, but, for me, it opened a can of worms more troubling than Raffi’s status: The question of whether, in our utopian 24th-century Earth, Vasquez Rocks was no longer a public park, no matter who owned and operated it?

If not, then did Starfleet randomly make it a practice and have the access to place its troubled veterans in small housing units in parklands? Is that part of the park off-limits to regular citizen use? Does it defeat the goal of sharing an amazing natural landmark with the public if its most famous attraction is occupied by private housing, a troubled veteran or otherwise? And if it’s no longer a park, then why? And who does “own” it — if land ownership in 300 years has any resemblance to our grubby system today?

Of course, many fans saw that scene and that text graphic, and just smiled and said, “Cool!” 

NOW, I promised you TEN OTHER times Star Trek used Vasquez Rocks! The truth is— only seven of those other visits were in the flesh, so to speak. You may think you saw those famous tilted ledges onscreen thrice more—and you did! But not as a result of live on-scene shooting. Such as...