Lakeview Park

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HOURS

4 a.m. - 11:30 p.m.

ABOUT THE PARK

Slow down, or you'll miss this combined outlook-boulevard-picnic park at Hillside Drive, just where Lake Washington Boulevard E. begins its switchbacking descent to Lake Washington. The lookout is planted with peonies backed by a stone wall, and has a good view of the lake and the Cascades. Just to the right of the lookout, a trail leads down to meet the next boulevard loop beneath a magnificent coastal redwood tree.

The park proper, a grassy bowl enclosed by woods and brush, is bounded by Dorffel Drive, which curves off and up to the right at a three-way intersection, just before the boulevard heads downward. This is a fine, quiet place for a family picnic beneath a cedar or maple tree. The park continues on down with the boulevard to McGilvra Boulevard.

(Excerpt from Enjoying Seattle's Parks by Brandt Morgan)

HISTORY

Olmsted Bros., landscape architects of Brookline, Mass., proposed a major parkway along the shores of the Lake Washington, which once was Chief Leschi of the Nisqually Tribe favorite campsites. The first viewpoint in the park was developed in 1910 with an excellent view of Lake Washington and the Cascade Mountains (160’ above the lake). A second viewpoint was developed in 1947 with a bench facing the view.

(Edited from the files of Don Sherwood, 1916-1981, Park Historian.)