There are miles of public paved bike and pedestrian "trails" along the Duwamish River, Elliot Bay, Harbor Island and under the West Seattle Bridges. All of this about a mile from our house as the crow flies.
You might wonder, when our peninsula is known for pretty parks and beaches, why anyone would choose to walk in such a noisy and frankly, ugly area?
If you can catch it at a quieter time, like early Sunday morning on a holiday weekend, it does have a certain industrial fascination. I ike seeing the giant container ships and barges on Harbor Island up close. An interesting peek at another world entirely, that we just whiz by (or over) hundreds of times a year.
This was a lower bridge pocket park over the Duwamish, once popular for fishing and now highly discouraged because of the heavy metal and other pollution. The river is one of the remaining Super Fund sites, and the clean-up efforts have been going on for years.
Some relics from the past. I still remember the previous lower bridge because it opened painfully slowly like a hinge, causing many a traffic jam. That one was damaged by a ship and replaced in 1991 with a pivoting structure that seems to jam frequently. Who cares? Now that the upper bridge is repaired, the lower is mostly used by commercial traffic.
Sunday was one of the lowest tides of the year, making for interesting and fragrant views.
To top off our industrial tour, we drove a couple miles down West Marginal Way and took a walk at the (just try and pronounce it) site of an original Duwamish tribe village.
Of course, native American traces long gone, but the city and tribe created a nice park with shade, grass and picnic tables and trails along the river. They have somehow managed to keep it clean and mostly free from homeless encampments.
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