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Beginning June 3, 2024, Kopachuck State Park will close for major construction of roads and buildings, primarily in its upper day-use area. The project is expected to reach completion in mid-summer of 2025.

Considered one of the most diverse fossil forests in North America, Ginkgo Petrified Forest State Park is famous for its rare specimens of petrified Ginkgo tree discovered there in 1932.
A quick paddle or boat ride will get you to Hope Island State Park between La Conner and Whidbey Island on Skagit Bay. Most of the island is a nature preserve that supports a delicate and diverse ecosystem.

Fort Worden Historical State Park preserves an example of a US Army defense project from the beginning of the 20th century. Its strategic location on a high bluff at the entrance to Puget Sound also features sweeping vistas of the islands, waterways and mountain ranges that have attracted people here for millennia.

Jackson House State Park Heritage Site is a 1.4-acre day-use park at Jackson Prairie. The park is the setting of a homestead cabin built by John R. Jackson, one of the first Euro-Americans to settle north of the Columbia River and a significant figure in early Washington territorial history.

OLYMPIA – Nov. 23, 2022 – The Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission is set to begin construction on the Keystone Boat Launch at Fort Casey State Park.

Set on a rocky cliff at the west end of San Juan Island, Lime Kiln Point is considered one of the best whale-watching spots on earth. Catch a glimpse from a viewpoint or the lighthouse.

Bay View State Park is perched above the waves of Padilla Bay at the western edge of the Skagit Valley. The scenic spot lies within the traditional territories of Coast Salish Indigenous people whose present-day descendants include members of the Samish Indian Nation, Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, Upper Skagit Indian Tribe, Suquamish Tribe and Lummi Nation. For thousands of years the rich estuary and its extensive eelgrass beds have provided habitat for a diverse community of life that forms the basis of their cultures.

The 31-mile Klickitat State Park Trail hugs the meanders of the Klickitat River and its tributary, Swale Creek, revealing stories of massive volcanic flows, bubbling mineral springs, timeless Indigenous subsistence traditions, ephemeral attempts at wresting profits from the land, and a delightful environment of oak and pine woodlands and grasslands. The trail stretches from a windswept plateau 1,600 feet above sea level to the river’s confluence with the mighty Columbia River barely 100 feet above sea level.

Patos Island Marine State Park provides a favorite campsite for paddlers and moorage for sailors, located on the northernmost edge of the San Juan Archipelago, noted for its historic lighthouse and wild, remote shores.

A Rocky Island

The San Juan Islands are distinct from most of Puget Sound in that they feature shorelines with exposures of hard bedrock, rather than the bluffs of clay, sand and gravel left by Ice Age glaciers that are predominant on most of Washington’s Salish Sea, the state’s inland saltwater passages.

Fort Casey Historical State Park preserves an example of a US Army defense project from the beginning of the 20th century. Its strategic location on a high bluff at the entrance to Puget Sound also features an historic lighthouse and sweeping vistas of the islands, waterways and mountain ranges that have attracted people here for millennia.

Overnight mooring space may be limited during construction 

OLYMPIA – May 20, 2024 – Washington State Parks is set to begin contracted mooring buoy repair work in several state parks. Work in the San Juan Islands begins June 10 and work on the eastern Olympic Peninsula and Hood Canal will start July 8.  

Parks will also complete routine inspections and maintenance of 81 of its public mooring buoys. The maintenance project will service state-owned public mooring buoys to ensure they are in top condition for boaters this summer. 

Learn about snakes in Washington State Parks.

Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission is beginning a process to update the long-term boundary for Pearrygin Lake State Park to include properties on the north shore of the lake.  This change would result in all of Pearrygin Lake’s shoreline being within the long-term park boundary, allowing for future connection of a loop trail around the lake.

OLYMPIA – June 22, 2023 – The Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission (Parks) asks everyone who is planning a Fourth of July celebration at a park or on the beach to be safe and protect their friends, neighbors, public lands and wildlife.

The story of Mount Pilchuck State Park goes deep. The distinctive blocks of light-colored quartz monzonite (a rock like granite but with a smaller proportion of quartz crystals) that a hiker must scramble over to reach the historic fire lookout were once molten magma slowly cooling thousands of feet below the earth’s surface. The mechanisms of plate tectonic subduction elevated the rocks to 5,324 feet above sea level to put Mount Pilchuck’s prominent alpine summit barely 18 miles from salt water at the Snohomish River estuary.

Roll out for a medium to advanced-level biking adventure Jan. 1 at Fort Ebey State Park.
Roll out for a medium to advanced-level biking adventure Jan. 1 at Fort Ebey State Park.

OLYMPIA – Following a public process, the Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission voted on Thursday to keep the cabins at Cama Beach Historical State Park permanently closed where they currently sit.  

“…they topped the last hill and saw the abundance nature had spread before them.

OLYMPIA – December 1, 2022 – The Washington State Parks and Recreation Commission will hold a planning meeting in-person on Tuesday, Dec. 6 and Wednesday, Dec. 7 in Camano Island.

Agenda items include year-end review, division highlights and 2023 Commission priorities.

The public may attend the meeting, but no public comment will be taken. Attendance is limited to in-person only. No virtual access will be available.

The 130-mile Columbia Plateau State Park Trail weaves together a diverse parade of landscapes filled with stories of land and people along the route of the abandoned Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway. The trail stretches through a swath of today’s eastern Washington, from ponderosa pine forests near Spokane across the volcanic “scablands” and into the deep canyon of the Snake River.

James Island Marine State Park preserves an entire island on the western side of Rosario Strait. Its two forested hills rise more than 200 feet above a low isthmus. Rock outcrops on its rugged shore reveal that the bedrock of the island was formed deep on the ocean floor and uplifted above the water’s surface by the forces of plate tectonics.  

Join City of Issaquah Urban Forest Supervisor and Friends of Lake Sammamish State Park board member Dan Hintz to learn about the native species used in restoration efforts at Lake Sammamish State Park.

There’s something magical about simple, hearty foods when you’re surrounded by nature – every bite just hits different. Level up your camp chef game with the perfect grilled cheese. 

This isn’t just your average grilled cheese – it's melty, herbalicious, tangy and just a little bougie (in the best way). And the best part? You can make it right on your camp stove with minimal gear. 

What you’ll need 

Ingredients:  

  • 2 slices of sourdough bread