Scenic Beach State Park, Washington - July 14th to 17th, 2024

Scenic Beach State Park lives up to its name. There are lovely views of the Olympic Peninsula from the beach. It is a rocky beach, not a sandy beach, but it is still a great place to hang out.

Sunday was a short driving day from Kanaskat-Palmer State Park to Scenic Beach State Park, both in the state of Washington.

On the way, we crossed over the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. This was the site of the infamous Galloping Gerty Bridge which collapsed in 1940, in the same year it was completed. Thankfully, the replacement bridge has successfully stood for much longer. The first replacement, which now only carries the westbound traffic, was completed in 1950. A second bridge, which now carries the eastbound traffic, was constructed in 2007.

We stopped in Port Orchard for gas and groceries. Then we found Long Lake County Park just down the road from the grocery store. It was a lovely place for a picnic lunch. A lot of people were enjoying their Sunday on the beach and in the water there.

Check-in at Scenic Beach State Park didn’t start until 2:30 pm. We still had about half an hour to kill, so we drove over to Bremerton to find some ice cream. Bremerton is home to the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard. A relative of ours was stationed there many years ago. The Puget Sound Navy Museum is located near the Bremerton Ferry Terminal.

We strolled the downtown area and the boardwalk alongside the marina. The USS Turner Joy is docked there. It is now a museum battleship and open to the public for self-guided tours.

We found our ice cream, Scoops and Bites, near the ferry terminal. We had our usual, Keith with his vanilla shake and Ann with her waffle cone of mint chip and chocolate. Even though they were our usual pick of flavors, the ice cream was delicious.

Our hour long stroll allowed us to head straight from there to the campground. The sites in the campground are nicely spaced in the woods. The deep sites are large, yet provide a lot of privacy from the neighboring sites with thick plants in between the sites. A trail through the dense vegetation leads to the bathhouse.

After dinner, we walked down to the beach. It is a rocky beach, on the edge of the Hood Canal, with views of the Olympic Peninsula. The water there is pretty calm and there were plenty of paddle boarders enjoying the water. People were also swimming in the water and sitting on the beach, despite the large rocks.

Ann was hoping to walk up and down the beach, but fallen trees along the beach made it hard to go very far. The amount of beach owned by the state park is not very long, but we didn’t go to the boundaries to see if the public is allowed to walk further. Most of the land surrounding the park is privately owned.

The park was previously a scenic resort owned by Joe Emel, Sr. The Emel House, built in 1911, still stands on the property along with a rustic little cabin, called Grandpa Joe’s Cabin.

Monday was a slightly cooler day, barely reaching into the 70’s by late afternoon, so Ann didn’t feel like getting her paddle board out. We had forgotten to fill our fresh water tank when we arrived at camp the day before. The dump station and fresh water fill were at the end of the campground loops, on the way out of the campground. Our fresh tank was pretty low, so we packed up and drove over to the fill station.

Since we were already moving, we decided to drive down to the Day Use Area and have a picnic near the beach. Before eating our lunch, we went down to the beach. Ann walked up and down the rocky beach. It was a little tricky getting around all of the fallen trees, but she managed. Heading southwest on the beach, she quickly came to the park boundary, with “no trespassing” signs posted. So she turned around and headed the other direction. She believes she passed the park boundary on the other side, but there were no posted signs this time. Once she reached an area with a couple of kayaks stored against the bank and wood steps leading up the bank, she decided it was time to turn around.

The picnic area is lovely, with plenty of shade. We found a table with a view out over the water. While we were sitting there eating, Ann noticed something out in the water in the distance. She zoomed in with her camera to spot several dolphins. Keith didn’t have his glasses on and couldn’t see them because they were so far away.

After we returned to camp, Ann explored the hiking trail through the woods. Keith’s shoulder was still bothering him, so he stayed behind at Red Tail (our Winnebago EKKO). The trail isn’t very long, less than a mile in length. It goes from the far end of the campground down to the group campground near the beach. The group campground was reserved, so signs directed you down the road to the Day Use Area from the Group Campground. The trail starts out rather close to the road, with the traffic noise spoiling the ambiance of the trail. But it was a nice little trail through dense vegetation, including the wild rhododendrons the park is known for.

Tuesday we visited the Bloedel Reserve on Bainbridge Island. We’ll cover that in our next blog post.

Wednesday, we drove down to the picnic area again for lunch. Then Ann got her paddle board (paid link) out in the afternoon. The water was a little rough, so Ann did not trying standing up this time. She mostly stood on her knees to paddle, occasionally sitting down to give her thigh muscles a break.

Ann started out against the current, just to make sure she could handle it OK, then headed the other direction to the point. She stayed close to shore, just in case something happened. She’s never tried getting back up on the board in deep water and this did not seem like the place to try.

Due to the rough water, Ann couldn’t see very well into the water. When she could see, there wasn’t much to see. She didn’t see any fish, other than a small, dead one floating on top of the water. She thought she spotted a seal or sea lion poke its head out of the water a few times in the distance.

Ann made it all the way to the point, then paddled back, against the current. She was on the water for about an hour. It was a good workout, paddling against the flow, with the small waves crashing over the front of the board.

After hanging out in the picnic area while Ann’s board dried. We headed back to camp. However, it was dinner time. The very small town of Seabeck was just a mile or two down the road from the state park. We remembered there was a pizza stand in town, one of the two buildings in town. Since we were already packed up and driving anyway, we decided to check out the pizza. However, when we got there, they said they were working on a large order, their oven was full, and it would be about an hour and a half to make us a pizza. We didn’t want to wait that long, so we declined and went back to camp. We had leftovers we could reheat in the microwave, so we didn’t need to cook.

Scenic Beach State Park was another great state park to relax in. It was a great combination of woods and a rocky beach with views.

Check out our related video: Scenic Beach State Park, Washington

(Ann)