Seward Park (Seattle) (Seattle, Washington)

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5902 Lake Washington Boulevard South
Seattle, WA 98118
www.seattle.gov/Parks/environment/seward.htm

A beautiful city park with the only stand of old-growth forest in Seattle proper.

Geology note: mostly bedrock

There is a trail that follows the water around the park, a swimming beach in the bay, and two tennis courts

Seward Park is a 300 acre (120 ha) park in Seattle, Washington that occupies all of Bailey Peninsula, a forested peninsula off south Seattle that juts into Lake Washington.

One approaches the park from the North by Lake Washington Boulevard S, from the South by Seward Park Avenue S., or from the West by S Orcas Street. The main parking lot and a tennis court are located in the southwest corner. The most commonly used trail is a car-free loop around the park. It is flat and 2.4 miles long ( 3.8 km). Others lead all over the interior, including a few car-accessible roads that lead to amenities including an amphitheater and picnic area. Seward Park features numerous small beaches, the largest one on its southwest side, as well as a playground and an arts center.

The 300 acres (121 ha) of Seward Park have about a 120 acre (48.6 ha) surviving remnant of old growth forest, providing a glimpse of what some of the lake shore looked like before the city of Seattle. With trees older than 250 years and many less than 200, the Seward Park forest is relatively young (the forests of Seattle before the city was fully mature, were up through 1,000–2,000 years old).