Spanish sailors aboard the supply ship San Carlos named this stretch of shoreline Punta de Caballo in 1775, after the wild horses they saw galloping along it, and the name stuck through English translation into Cavallo Point. The U.S. Army acquired the site in 1866 to help fortify the northern approach to San Francisco Bay, and the 24 Colonial Revival buildings that now house the resort went up between 1901 and 1915 as officers’ quarters for Fort Baker.
The post remained active through both World Wars and into the Cold War, finally transferring to the National Park Service in 2002 after the last soldiers left. Developer Mike Freed, out walking his dog near the old parade ground in 1998, saw the potential in the abandoned buildings and spent a decade working with the Park Service to convert them into a lodge, which opened in 2008 alongside new sustainably built rooms overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge.