Hike 11B: Near Northeast, part II

Dear Diary,

After all the surprises of the previous page, this one is smooth sailing.  I visited three parks with four restroom buildings and one community center, but no "sanican"s, took thirteen pictures, and got no stories to tell you.  All the restrooms were open or closed as the map I was checking said they should be.

Ravenna Park

Ravenna Park, as one of the bigger parks in North Seattle, has two pairs of restrooms.  They're usually referred to as "upper" and "lower", and although Ravenna Park was probably the most familiar to me of the North Seattle parks when I started to write you, I was quite wrong to think the whole park could be understood as "upper" or "lower"; but that will have to wait.  So take the older of these pages of yourself with a grain of salt, dear Diary:  "Hypotheses", last April 23; "Our Main Characters", last April 25; "I Level Up, Wielding 'Sanicans'", April 26, "FOUND:  Park Drinking Water NEAR UW!!", April 26; "The Curious Incident of the Light in the Night-Time", May 2; "Go North, Aging Man!" and "Foolish Mortal", May 6; "Ravennawards", May 12; "Two Hours and Two Hours", June 3; "Home Dry Home", June 4; "Amazing Water Fountain News", July 30; "My Book of Hours", part II, August 30; "A Problem", November 12; and "Standing Room Only", part II, November 23.

The "upper" restroom building's best face:

Since this is the one that actually is closed in winter, I assume it's also the one in the list I quoted a few pages back that's supposed to be closed in winter.  It still isn't shown as open on the map as of today.  The closed doors January 22:

The "lower" restroom building's best face:

This one has heat, and was open (with exceptions, as witness the rather embarrassing page "Mysteries" of February 1) this past winter:

Laurelhurst Community Center

A try for a postcard shot:

 The closed doors to the inside:

Because of those closed doors, dear Diary, I haven't told you much about Laurelhurst Community Center, but rather more about Laurelhurst Playfield, which is where the community center is:  "Our Main Characters", last April 25; "Laurelhurst Playfield", May 2; "Go North, Aging Man!", May 6; "Home Dry Home", June 4; "This and That", June 20; "Amazing Water Fountain News", July 30; "My Book of Hours", part I, August 7, and part III, August 30, and then, yet again, oops.

The open outside-facing doors:

Burke-Gilman Playground Park

This is a much less important park in North Seattle than Ravenna Park, except to its neighbours, to drivers along Sand Point who rely on its restrooms when they're open, and to me because it was closer to where I slept than any restrooms except Laurelhurst's, which are on top of a very steep hill, and because I really liked its water fountain's water.  So I've talked about it to you, dear Diary, quite a bit:  "Magnuson Park Has a Warm-Water Sink!" last April 22; "Hypotheses", last April 23; "Our Main Characters", last April 25; "I Level Up, Wielding 'Sanicans'", April 26; "FOUND:  Park Drinking Water NEAR UW!!", April 27; "We're All in This Together", April 28; "The Curious Incident of the Light in the Night-Time", May 2; "Metropolitan Market or, Reliability", May 4; "Home Dry Home", June 4; "This Is Getting Old", July 2; "Momentous News", July 17; "My Book of Hours", part I, August 7, and oops.  The "Momentous News" was that the park's water fountain had been shut off.  I figured it was because I'd made it known that the thing was running.  I started getting water from University Village, which had also re-opened its restrooms by then, oh, and someone vandalised the bench I preferred to sit on, so BGPP stopped being all that important to me pretty quickly.

Anyway, though, the restroom building's best face is unfortunately the one they keep putting fairly unimpressive murals onto to advertise some sort of social media campaign for park improvements.  (I think.)  Here:

The closed doors:

And that leaves one park to go, Matthews Beach.  But I have a whole lot to tell you in that park's page, dear Diary, so don't know whether I can still get it written tonight.  If not, good night, and you'll see it tomorrow.