Hike 9C: Meadowbrook

Dear Diary,

It was getting dark on January 20 as I approached Meadowbrook.  Now, if you were to look at the map I was hiking to check, say, today, it would show two symbols at that park - one for the playfield's restrooms, and one for the buildings a fair way east of those.  But in January the playfield's restrooms were closed, and since there were no "sanican"s near them, the map admitted they were closed.  Observe:

And on the other side?

Here's what I thought the best face of the restroom building, which was, as you can see, dear Diary, in January heavily covered with graffiti.

At least it was good graffiti on this side.

Now, as I said, this was January 20, and there were big doings in the other Washington.  But I'd kind of forgotten about them until I got to the Community Center, which the map then said offered restrooms and showers - and to which I'd been pointed for showers by an employee in June.  My attempt at a postcard shot:

The unexpected closed doors:

The unexpected extra-closed doors:

The dedication sign nearby, rendered deeply ironic by the previous picture:

How times change.

I actually needed a restroom by this point, so it was with deep disappointment that I turned away.  But as I was leaving I noticed a light in the direction of the building.

Well, it was pretty much full dark by then.  Above the picture sort of in the middle of the photo, though, I could see words then that I can't see in the photo, and those words included "Meadowbrook" and "Pool".

Now, obviously it makes sense for a pool to have showers, but this was the first sign I'd encountered that the pool was actually the building to go to.  Moreover, I was worried about a reception similar to the one I'd gotten at the Ballard library:  I only wanted a toilet and sink; the map claimed I could get those, but was it telling the truth?

It was.  Despite the signs' emphasis:

and the fact that I smelled pretty terrible (I was then only a week from the motel, but had been wearing the same clothes much, much longer), nobody considered it at all unreasonable for me to want only a restroom.  And what a restroom:

I'd just about forgotten that indoor public restrooms can be pretty nice.  Seems to me a pool, where people might have to wait in line to shower, is an unexpected place to find such a thing as a public restroom deserving the label "nice" - why encourage people to be slow?  But maybe the showers have some flaw that discourages lollygagging.

Anyway, the people staffing the place also had snacks on hand, and I left the building much happier than I'd found it.

Good night, dear Diary.  I'm actually not sure whether, that night, I went "home" to southeastern North Seattle, or just back to Green Lake and Woodland Parks, but anyway, the next stages in my investigation of those parks' restrooms' hours are the subject of the next page in the January story.

Hike 3B: Green Lake Park

Dear Diary,

Green Lake Park is just north of Woodland Park, and in these hikes I visited it all the same days (and, sigh, nights).  It seems I've told you rather less about it, though.  June 8 in "A Shower at Green Lake", of course, but then only October 8 in "South of North Once More", part I.  I'm sorry, but this page isn't going to do much better by this park which pretty well deserves its considerable popularity.

For example, when I visited it right after Woodland Park January 9, I took twice as long to shoot about as many photos.  That's partly because I stopped to eat - but there hadn't been anywhere in Woodland Park I wanted to sit and eat after I found those dugouts locked.

So let's assume for now that I owe Green Lake Park better treatment, and get on with checking the map put forward this winter by the Homeless Strategy and Investment Division of the Department of Human Services, or "HSD map", also with reference to last winter's list of park restrooms intended to stay open.

In this park both say all restrooms should be open, and both pass with flying colours, but since the map, a GIS thingie like the street ends map, tries to be much more informative, as befits the greatly changed reality for homeless people, it gets more details wrong.

We start at the parks' shared border, so at the south end of Green Lake's trail, with the restrooms of the Green Lake Small Craft Center.  The preferred name used for these rooms by Seattle's Department of Parks and Recreation is "Shellhouse", a name we'll encounter in different contexts in your last series, dear Diary.  These restrooms, like those in the Laurelhurst Community Center, have a mixture of indoor and outdoor - well, professional and park - that I attribute, here, to the presence of professionals in the Small Craft Center and among its usual clients.

The open doors:

The building:

Next, in the counter-clockwise direction still expected of travellers on Green Lake's loop trail, are the "65th St" rooms near the exit to, um, N 64th St; I've previously identified them as southeastern.  I discovered on these visits that the men's sink often gives warm water; since I don't remember that from last year, I guess it to be the result of accidental proximity between the pipe and the heat.  Which means the women's sink may not have this feature.  Open doors:

Building:

This brings us to the Green Lake Community Center on the northeast, at the end of Ravenna Boulevard.  Where things have ... changed.

Details from those shots:

Most of the things the map is wrong about in this park have to do with hours, as in Woodland Park reserved to an upcoming page, but here there's another issue.  The map correctly states the undead state of these restrooms, replaced:

but unwilling to leave the stage.  The last time I checked, only cold water was available; I'll save the real horror story for its proper place in a different upcoming page.  The map's only wrong about showers, which at least on the men's side really have ended.  They're replaced by a "mobile shower unit", which, given my fastidiousness toward "sanican"s, dear Diary, you might expect me to hate.  But Green Lake's high-school-gym-style communal showers with paper towels already set the bar so low that these actual port-a-showers have no trouble vaulting over it.  Not only do they offer privacy, but also real towels.  I should've photographed those, but you'll have to settle for their signage:

And - oh, yes, the building.  This is its front anyway, facing the parking lot like any modern building, but with those showers, civic duty, and trees all thrown in, this is by miles this building's best side:

Well, zombies plus high technology make a hard act to follow, but I did continue on.  Next are the "wading pool" restrooms, at the park's northern edge.  They actually are near that edge, farthest of the restrooms from the circum-lake trail, and I managed to miss them one night.  But anyway, the open doors:

The building:

And finally.  Dear Diary, I have some crow to eat.  The restrooms attached to the Bathhouse Theater ("Bath House", northwest) are officially open summers only, for the actual theatre season.  Since that didn't happen last summer, I was sure those rooms hadn't opened (not that I got there to check), and I was sure they didn't open winters either, using that as a basis for questioning last year's list in general.  Well, ...

I was wrong.  (Those are posed shots; the doors are normally closed this winter.)

The restrooms are like those at Laurelhurst and the Small Craft Center, a mix of professional and park, and no doubt because they're meant primarily for paying audiences.  Speaking of which, the building

looks better by night, with the marquee all lit up even in winter, even in this year, but that defeated my phone's camera except maybe in this oblique shot from January 17:

All for now, dear Diary.

Hike 2B: Magnuson Park, main page

Dear Diary,

I'm sorry to have to inflict this complexity on you.  Magnuson Park has so many "sanican"s in so many places that I ended up taking nearly forty photos there.  I have no interest in trying to convince Blogspot to let me put that many photos in a single page, nor in asking anyone to read the result.

So this page narrates my visit as a whole, but tries not to talk about "sanican"s too much, and includes no photos of, or primarily about, them.  I'll then ask you, dear Diary, to tolerate two more pages primarily about "sanican"s, with photos of nothing but.  I devoutly hope many more people read this page than those two.

OK, all that said.  I really wanted to limit the amount of gravel I took my cart across, especially since, with my glasses broken, I wouldn't be much of a searcher anyway.  So I consulted my previous chronicle in your pages of my futile search for a hand-washing station and 

What's that?  Oh, yes, you're quite right, dear Diary.  Magnuson Park, the largest park in North Seattle and the nearest large park to where I live, has concerned several pages in you before this one.  You started there, April 22, with "Magnuson Park Has a Warm Water Sink!".  Then in "Magnuson Park:  Things We've Lost, Part I" on April 24 I went looking for the seven restroom pairs shown on an old map, concluding that three old restroom buildings were entirely lost.  On April 29 the "Two Magnuson Park Questions Tentatively Answered" were 'No, there aren't more than four water fountains' and 'No, there aren't any hand-washing stations'.  That page used a more recent map as a guide to the park's many "sanican"s.  Since I had neither time nor eyesight to explore anew, the locations reported in that page are the ones I revisited two days ago.

May 6 in "Go North, Aging Man!", Magnuson Park got most of the photos.  More came in "Home Dry Home" June 4 and in part II of "Water Fountains - An Interim Report" October 3.  Finally on November 23 "Standing Room Only", part III.

That doesn't mean I'm ever prepared for this park, in particular for the long distances its size entails.  The most preparation I did this time was, for puposes of gravel avoidance, to break my itinerary into a 74th St side, to be visited via the park's impressive front door, and a 65th St side, to be visited via that street and the lake shore drive to which it leads.

74th St Side

Dear Diary, it'd been a few days since I checked, but anyway today the Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation is no longer offering an outdated map of park restrooms on its front page.  So it's time I stopped using that as a punching bag.  My purpose henceforth on these hikes is to check the map now offered by the homelessness division of Seattle's Department of Human Services, especially as compared with last year's list of park restrooms expected to stay open.

Magnuson Park has four buildings still in place with doors that open to the outside and lead to restrooms.  One is easiest reached from the 74th St entrance, two from the lake shore drive, and one is in between, but less confusing to find from the lake side.  The four water fountains are each near a restroom building.  So this side's itinerary included one restroom and one water fountain, neither of which is on last year's list nor this year's HSD map.

What is on the HSD map for this part of the park is three "sanican" markers.  One says, near as I can figure out the format, that there should be three regular "sanican"s and one ADA one at the playground.  I found the ADA one and four regular ones.

The marker for the dogs' off-leash area says there should be one ADA "sanican", one regular one, and one hand-washing station there.  I didn't want to believe it when I found only the ADA one, so I spent an hour walking the perimeter.  There's a regular "sanican" outside the perimeter, at an entrance to the off-leash beach, but I found no hand-washing station.

The third marker shown near this entrance says there are two ADA and six regular "sanican"s at "various" locations around the park.  I found three ADA and seven regular ones I'd consider thus.

OK, let's backtrack.  I walked into Magnuson Park via 74th; what's the first thing I did?  Look for "sanican"s?  Of course not!  The first thing I did was look for the Community Center.

See, I found the newer map, the one I'd used as a guide in the page I intended to piggy-back from, and found a very unwelcome surprise there:

In "Home Dry Home", I blithely asserted that the Magnuson Community Center was the Brig.  I've thought for months now that I got that from the centre's web page, but no; even today that page says nothing about it.  (And the Internet Archive has copies from last June, similarly mum.)  I think I must have placed way too much faith in last year's equivalent to this:

Assuming there was an equivalent last June.  At any rate, on Wednesday at the real Community Center's front door - postcard shot:

Open door shot, I kid you not:

I was informed by a woman who came to the door while I was reading the signs that the centre was just about done moving to the Brig for a temporary home during construction, and she was sure someone there could answer all my questions.

Was I in a time warp last June?

Well, I didn't act on her advice immediately.  I did then go "sanican" hunting, including the playground and the fruitless hike around the dog off-leash area.  There I discovered two shelters.  One I hadn't the patience to photograph, it was so thronged, but it's essentially a fancy bus shelter, so probably not the greatest protection from rain.  That's in the special area for shy dogs.  The other, though, is perhaps the most substantial shelter in the park:

However, as I worked my way counter-clockwise through the 74th St stops, the Brig was next.  One thing I never remember is that it isn't actually possible to circle the Brig on pavement.  But its front door is on the west:

while not only the restroom doors, which can't be opened from the outside:

but also the only door I found open, are on the east side.  Beyond that door was a children's program being run by a young man from the YMCA who knew nothing about the Community Center moving there.

If anyone finds the Magnuson Community Center, please let me know.

Meanwhile I headed northwest for more "sanican" hunting.  The only place listed in May where I found no "sanican" in January was up there, at the area for launching boats by hand.  However, I remember that being tricky to find, and don't remember the trick, so I'm not at all sure it's really gone.  While I was there, I anyway took a view north across Lake Washington:

65th St Side

On this side the HSD map has four markers, at two restroom sites and two former restroom sites.  Confusingly, one of the former restroom sites is the only one in North Seattle where the map emphasises a closed restroom building.  A comparison between the map's handling of University Playground and its treatment of the "Tower" site at Magnuson Park shows the oddness.

Anyway, I think this is the so-called tower's best side, but also shows the decidedly closed door:

The water I found running last April is running again, which gives me hope that it's just rain drainage, and not the ghostly work of fire-destroyed plumbing inside.  The HSD marker says there are three regular "sanican"s there; I found two, one each ADA and regular.

Continuing north I reached the Cross Park Trail, and turned to find the central restrooms, which the map calls "Sport".  I've repeatedly complained about the gravel surrounding these.  I'm now pretty convinced that the entire trail is actually paved, but someone just thought it would be more artistic or something to lay down a hundred yards or so of gravel on top of the pavement.  They should please, pretty please, remove that.  Thank you.

The best side of the central restroom building:

Yes, it's built into the hill.

HSD represented, shortly before I started writing this page, these restrooms as open, the first restrooms closed last year that I should have found open this year.  The closed doors:

Yes, they were both locked, at 4:30 P.M.

HSD also said there should be two regular "sanican"s here.  I can't prove a negative, but I didn't see them:

The beach restrooms are a happier story.  The building's best side:

The open doors:

The showers and water fountain were turned off, as expected, even though they're all attached to a building that's not only heated, but equipped with a hot water heater.  The men's room dryer is still, or maybe again, not working.  I saw no ducks.

The HSD map says there should be one each ADA and regular "sanican"s here, and that's exactly what I found.

The old map is still attached to this building.  Here's my warrant for the idea that the assisted boat launch area used to have a real restroom:

The HSD map now says it has one ADA and three regular "sanican"s; I found one and two.

Here's an unpleasant but explanatory surprise:

Notice the wide gap between the Brig and the restroom symbol.  We have another missing building, if this map is to be believed.  But it helps explain why the water fountain and restrooms in this area are so far apart, if there used to be restrooms much closer to the fountain.

Or maybe we still have only three missing buildings.  Somewhere in the depths of Promontory Point is a building that, on the "Tentatively Answered" hike, I really tried to convince myself was a repurposed restroom building.  I must have failed to do so, since I neither photographed it nor mentioned it in the page.  Still, maybe...

Anyway, I parked my cart in the shelter of the building's middle and headed north to photograph the "sanican" at the entrance to the dogs' off-leash beach.  Along the way was a stretch of maybe a hundred yards of a worse pavement than gravel, but it did produce gorgeous reflections of the sunset.  Unfortunately my phone's camera thinks there can never be too little red, but here anyway is an echo of it:

Since the ground east of the drive had been rather squishy on the way north, I was relieved to take the higher ground to the west to get around the washed out area on my way south.  It isn't actually higher ground, though; it's taller grasses over a swamp.  Rather later, and with my shoes and trousers rather the worse for wear, I clambered back to my stuff.  

I should, I suppose, clarify that this is not a complaint, a demand that anyone do anything.  One has to expect water sometimes if one walks between a swamp and a lake.  But on the way south, I noticed another view, decidedly less bucolic, and yearned for its bright lights:

I still had one more "sanican" to track down, but then joyfully shook the dust of Magnuson Park from off my feet.  The mud stains on my trouser legs, however, remain.

Dear Diary, the rain seems to have paused, so I'm going to go to Ravenna Park.  When I return, two boring pages of "sanican"s, then my visit yesterday to Cal Anderson Park.