Madison Park Beach No. 1 in the summer

The Seattle Parks and Recreation department reports that our beach is the “most heavily attended” beach in the City, at least during the summer. It sure looked that way yesterday, with multitudes of sun worshipers, swimmers, and waders thronging the beach area. Even so, it’s a bit of a surprise to me that we surpass both Golden Gardens and Alki in popularity. Perhaps easy access is the reason.

Ice cream is still available at the beach, by the way, for those willing to await the periodic arrival of the musically-challenged ice cream truck:

The tent may be gone, but private enterprise goes on. The Parks department confirmed to me in an email this week that it was “community concerns” which led the Parks’ contract manager to suggest that the vendor fold up his tent earlier than planned.

Meanwhile, across the street in the play area of the Park, the newly engraved pavers (installed earlier this week) were on display for all to see.

It seemed to be a picture-perfect day:

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As an aside, blog reader Alice Lanczos reports that the political website The Huffington Post is having a contest for Best U.S. City Beaches, and Madison Park Beach is currently running in 8th place (up from 9th place earlier in the week). She wonders, however, about this comment by the person who nominated the Beach: “Be sure to stick around for an incredible sunset, known to locals as the Protestant Sunset.” Perhaps I’m just not a local, but that’s news to me. A Non-Denominational Sunrise would be a more likely phenomenon at Madison Park Beach, don’t you think?