Every night at ten o'clock sharp, hundreds of eager gnomes crawl from Coronado's cracks and crevices to quickly roll up the sidewalks, closing the island down for the night. At least, they might as well: to the casual observer, nightfall turns the usually lively Orange Avenue into a convincing ghost town.

But not all is as quiet as it may seem. While most of us sweetly slumber, Coronado's night shift busily keeps the island on life support. The next morning's sun will rise on clean sidewalks, healthy patients, freshly baked bread, undisturbed hotel guests, unhungry revelers, unburgled businesses, unburned homes, and uncrashed planes, all due to the overnight vigilance of a dedicated few.

On this assignment, I spent many a sleepless night checking in on who's been burning that midnight oil. And I can attest, with the night shift on the job, Coronado is in good hands.

Night & Day Cafe
The days when you could pop into the Night & Day Cafe for a drunken three a.m. brawl, complete with dancing girls on the bartop, are gone - or are they? Long a daytime family favorite, the Cafe by night used to be legendary for rowdy crowds and barhoppers attracted by the chance to sober up before heading home.

Times have changed and the Cafe has been polishing its image - they've even begun offering specialty espresso drinks - but this is still the hopping place to be at closing time. Two a.m. brings a sailor-heavy rush of regulars, characters who rib each other in high spirits and seem as at-home here as the staff. Diners often line up out the door, waiting for one of the 11 seats at the counter to open up; by the time they've sat, their orders are usually just coming off the grill, and the food is good. Almost universally and without prompting, diners catch the cook's attention to lavish praise on omelets, hash browns and everything else. After a good meal and some quiet conversation in the fresh air, the crowds pack up and head home happy. With such a hip joint, why wouldn't you dance on the bar?

Coronado Fire Department
Around nine p.m., after a garlic-intense and very healthy dinner, the guys at the Coronado Fire Department finish up a few chores. One by one, they head for their bunks upstairs and close their eyes to wait for the almost inevitable table call which will send them running for the pole. Most overnight calls are for medical reasons, with a few false alarms thrown in now and then for good measure. The reason doesn't matter to the fire crew, who doze in readiness to scramble at any moment: from the time a caller dials 911 to a knock on the door is usually less than three minutes. "It's rare we sleep all the way through a night," says Captain Mark Fagan, "and it's getting rarer and rarer." A night's sleep in the fire station isn't a real sleep at all; often firefighters, having "slept" through the night at the station, will still require another eight hours at home. Does that bother them? "No. We prefer the calls," says Fagan. "That's what we trained for. That's why we're here: to save lives."

Loews Coronado Bay Resort
If you're ever the night manager of a hotel in Coronado, bring a very good book and a very deep coffee cup. Brandon McMahon, night manager at Loews Coronado Bay Resort, wouldn't come right out and say his job can get boring-but I will. Why else, at two in the morning-when hotel managers and security guards in other cities are shepherding rowdy drunks from lobbies, and calling housekeeping for various unsavory cleanups-would our Brandon be calmly working on a resort newsletter, his only concern that he'll get a late- night request for an early wakeup call? Maybe, just maybe, because we're a nice little island-but that still leaves the poor night manager trying to create new ways to stay awake.

NASNI Control Tower
"We're kind of disconnected from the rest of the base, so they kind of forget we're out here," chuckles Air Traffic Controller First Class Michael Druhl, the commanding officer at North Island's air traffic control tower. He's not complaining.

It's about ten o'clock on a Saturday night, and the last of three firework displays has just ended. There's rarely any scheduled runway action this late at night, leaving controllers waiting for a rare impromptu military refueling, or carrier jets on late-night offshore exercises who've missed their flight-deck touchdown.

Does night watch get boring? It doesn't have to. "We notice things in the sky more than most people," says Druhl. Even though the view of the fireworks was amazing, the world below is its own constant show. Deemed by some the best view in San Diego County, the tower's vantage floats serenely in a sea of twinkling lights: below, the unfolding story of a city which starts off to sleep and wakes again before it ever quite dozes. The quick-changing weather can trump the city lights anytime, though, says Druhl. "The fog rolls in over Point Loma like fingers and comes to sit like cotton under the catwalk. There's nothing like it."

Coronado PD
After three sleepless days staying out all night for this story, I asked Coronado Police Officer David Craig if I could spend the night in the drunk tank, but he evidently thought I was joking. Instead, he took me on a ride-along and showed me just how lively the island by night really is.

Eight hours in the patrol car later, I had seen reckless driving, reckless bicycling, reckless walking, reckless fishing, and reckless garage door closing. Through it all, Officer Craig approached his subjects with a sense of humor and compassion - not to mention lots of bright lights and quick backup from his fellow officers. Far from being the ticket-dispensing machines I had secretly hoped to document, Coronado's Finest spent the night patrolling with seemingly one guiding principle and goal: safety. When not watching late-night motorists for signs of intoxication (or just plain sleepiness), our police were in the dark streets and alleys, watching, listening, caring. I still wouldn't do 40 up Orange, but I'll sleep more cozy knowing these guys are out there.