On Good Friday, Christ hung on the cross from noon until his death at 3 p.m. Growing up, I spent those three hours, called the Tre Ore, in church with incense, gold, candles and Gregorian chant filling my senses and soul. Middle age, I spent those hours shopping for Easter dinner at Costco, buying ham, asparagus and fruit salad. Mid-Costco a dozen years ago, I suddenly missed the intense ritual of those holy three hours. I was shopping; Christ hung on the cross.
However, being totally Northwest, I replaced church with a shoreline walk from KVI Beach to the north-end ferry dock. I do this walk on Good Friday, noon to three, almost eight miles, when tides are minus. My new Tre Ore leaves me spiritually enlightened and sensually immersed in seaweed and thimbleberry scents, eagle and kingfisher chatter and a zoo full of God’s creatures.
The beach after KVI is mostly exposed cliff. Its make-up of sand and gravel, some stratified, some not, was deposited by glaciers advancing some 15,000 years ago.
Next is Klahanie’s wide sand beach. Textured with ponds and sand bars, its flats provide a dining plate for marine birds. Detour to inspect what the seagulls are eating: sea stars and spider crabs. A solitary sandpiper bobs solo in the exposed cobble.
Leaving the developed shore behind, choose the hard sand next to the receding tide. If the outgoing water still covers the hard sand, walk in the shallows. Make time by getting your feet wet. Minus tide provides shortcuts across the exposed coves.
King County owns part of this beach and the ravine running up to Ridge Road as part of the Heyer Point Natural Area. This and other Island shoreline acquisitions preserve un-armored shoreline, that is, high-bank waterfront without bulkheads. Unfettered cliff erosion allows sediment to be picked up by waves, carried south in a current called a drift cell. This sediment is deposited south at Heyer Point, replenishing the sand creating KVI Beach.
Where the beach narrows, you are forced to walk over the upper-beach cobbles and crawl through the downed alder. This slow passage brings you close to the shoreside’s natural wonders. The oversized, dangling florets of big-leaf maple are topped with tender, unfurling leaves. Clam shells whiten the dark upper beach, suggesting that river otters feasted here. Across Puget Sound, airplanes settle toward Sea-Tac Airport using a long approach from the north.
The next stretch is fast going across a cove. Eelgrass, not a seaweed but a vascular plant, thrives here rooted in the sandy substrate. At the lower-tide level grows the hearty, native Zostera marina. At the mid-tide zone grows the non-native, whimpy Zostera japonica that seems to build sand terraces replacing exposed sand flats. Finger through the eelgrass blades for sea creatures, such as bright green, shrimp-like isopods. Ahead, like a beached ship waiting for the returning tide to re-float it, a big flat-topped rock sits mid beach. This glacial erratic was transported from Canada in the glacier’s belly and deposited here some 15,000 years ago. Climb this rock for a rest.
Up the beach top, amid the cobbles are bricks. Their numbers increase as you near the next point, Hitchings Landing (formerly called Vashon Landing and now owned by the Vashon Park District). On the beach area, near what is called the castle, is the site of a former brickyard. Discern what may be the kiln, a big chunk mid-beach covered with barnacles. In the late-1880s, this back-beach area held a kiln and rows of split wood, lines of brick-making and drying tables, dozens of workers and a house and vegetable garden. The clay came from neighboring cliffs.
Next you round Beals Point with its communities of Dilworth and Glen Acres. You are more than halfway; the time should be 1:30 p.m. The rest is not easy; the tide is coming in. You are pushed up to walk the upper beach’s cobbles and, later in the season, the algae is slippery, especially the long ribbons of sugar wrack, seersucker and triple rib. But way ahead, the lone tree that marks Dolphin Point marks this hike’s last stretch.
Years ago, I was given to share Island pioneer Mary Dilworth’s diary and letters. She wrote these in the 1880s after she and her family moved to Beals Point. I think of her each Good Friday. She wrote:
“Although this is Sunday, Mary (daughter) is parading up and down the beach singing as loud as she can yell, ‘alkani saca Klatawah nannidge’ which is Chinook for a familiar old chime ‘Where oh where is good old Daniel,’ and as there is no one within a mile to hear her, I am letting her yell.”
And I think of her again as I cross the uninhabited beach after Glen Acres. Mid-stretch, the beach is now owned by the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe. Forgive me in advance for repeating the derogatory term “siwash” in the her 1884 letter quoted below.
“The water is in front of us, and the impenetrable forest behind us. Scattered all along the beach, at intervals of ¼ to a ½ mile are Indians — Siwash. Five, at one time, and at another time, eight boat loads of these ‘noble red’ settled themselves right beside us, but (husband, Mosquito Fleet captain, clergyman) Dick drove them away.” The Dilworth family did agree to “pay monies” to the “squaws” for pails of blackberries and gave them permission to stay for a week.
Today, Native Americans have returned to this beach, hopefully to a more respectful Island community. The Muckleshoot Tribe of Indians purchased one-half mile of beach and 95 acres of property that descends in a series of terraces and perched wetlands from Vashon Highway to the beach. The Muckleshoots use the property for shellfish production and a fishing site.
Immediately before Winghaven Park, the next time check (or tide check) occurs. The incoming tide quickly covers this rocky, small point. At Winghaven’s ornate bulkhead, make the decision whether there is enough low tide to round Dolphin Point. If not, bail out here, go up to Cunliff Road and then downhill on the highway to the ferry dock.
If the tide is not licking the point, proceed past the two walk-in communities that hug Dolphin Point. The first is where local author Betty MacDonald wrote about Island life in “Onions in the Stew” and the second is Bunker Trail. Exit at the ferry dock and enjoy a beer at the Mexican restaurant.
I have done this hike solo and with large groups. No one has carried a cross yet, and in spite of the nuns’ warning against the evils of pantheism, I find religion in nature, especially God’s local creation. And Easter joy (ham and all) is Sunday next.
— Ann Spiers is a poet and naturalist on Vashon.
The distance is about eight miles from KVI Beach to the north-end ferry dock. The walk takes three to four hours. Going south to north allows public exit at Winghaven if the tide cuts passage off.
Start on an outgoing minus tide. Bring water, a sun hat, rain gear and foot gear suitable for wet cobbles, barnacles and slick surfaces.
