Alki Beach Park551

The scene here is more SoCal glitter than Northwest gloom. The roughly 2.5-mile-long waterfront in West Seattle teems with life on sunny days: volleyball players and sunbathers, rollerbladers, kids on bikes, kite-flyers, and cars with booming stereos. Seattle's habitual public reserve isn't evident here. Funky beachhouses sandwiched between encroaching new condos at the north end of the beach attest to Alki's previous life as a getaway for urbanites. To the south, Alki Beach Park offers picnic tables with grills (but little privacy), an art studio, and restrooms. A wide sidewalk runs the length of the beach, extended by a trail that runs north, and a bike path runs along Alki Avenue Southwest. The view is spectacular: a wide-lens view of Puget Sound, ferries, all of downtown Seattle, and the Olympic Mountains.