Kopachuck State Park – state parks quest #31

On a gray, chilly summer day, Mr. Adventure and I hiked down a short trail to the beach at Kopachuck State Park. Ferns carpeted the forest floor, big cedars and firs towered overhead, and vine maples filled the space between.

Passing through a secluded picnic area, one of several along the beachfront path, we stepped onto the beach. I inhaled briny air and looked down at the mosaic of shellfish and seaweed at my feet. 

Homelands

Though I’d never been to Kopachuck before, it felt familiar. The southern reaches of Puget Sound include seven waterways that are the ancestral and traditional home of the Squaxin peoples. They are known today as Carr, Case, Hammersley, Todd, Eld, Budd, and Henderson inlets. In addition to Kopachuck, there are a number of state parks on these inlets, including Tolmie, Joemma Beach, Penrose Point, Hope Island, McMicken Island, and Jarrell Cove. In each one, evergreen forests grow right to the water’s edge. The southern Puget Sound landscape is a characteristic these parks share. I live here. Of course it feels familiar.

Beach dwellers 

At low tide, the park’s near-mile of beach is exposed, and we wandered aimlessly. Among the oyster shells and coarse sand, I noticed grayish areas that, on closer inspection, turned out to be sand-dollar colonies. Eccentric sand dollars are native to Puget Sound, and dozens of the small, flat sea urchins crowded together, like purple-black quarters just spilled from a roll. I’d never seen sand dollars this bruised color, and I later learned that live animals are purple, blue, or green, while dead ones are the bleached ivory color I’m accustomed to seeing. 

The tide was far enough out that it exposed purple and green sea anemones on a few small boulders, but most of the beach was flat, covered in shells and festooned with sea lettuce and other plants. It’s big enough to provide plenty of space to roam, and several other people were also walking around, wading in the shallows or bending to get a better look at the tidal zone denizens. The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife plants clams, oysters, and mussels for seasonally open recreational shellfishing. 

Cutts Island 

On a clear day, you can see the Olympic Mountains from the beach, but on this day the peaks were obscured by low clouds. A small, tree-topped island about a half-mile offshore stood out against the gray skies and hazy distant shore. Tiny Cutts Island is a state park property, reachable by boat and occasionally on foot at a very low tide. The nearest boat launch is three miles south of by road, but it’s possible to hand-trailer a kayak down the service road from Kopachuck’s parking lot. A boat-in campsite on the island is available for those arriving by human-powered watercraft.

Forest loops

We walked partway up the service road to a loop trail, one of four we explored in the park. None of the trails are more than a half-mile long, but stringing them all together makes for a pleasant walk in the woods.

Most people seem to come to Kopachuck for the beach, so the forest trails are quiet. The “C” loop is the park’s former campground, permanently closed because of tree root disease. The trees there are impressively tall but the campground has a slightly post-apocalyptic atmosphere, with moss taking over the road.

An interpretive loop trail on the south side of the park entrance road has signs explaining the native trees and plants, and ends in a picnic area with two bat boxes that look, at first glance, like skinny townhouses on stilts.

And that was it. We’d explored the 300-acre park end to end, forest to beach to forest. Yet its familiar feel got me thinking about the state parks in the South Sound region, and the rarity of saltwater access. I wondered whether Kopachuck, six miles from Gig Harbor, got a lot of use. The answer is yes, and the explanation illustrates why state parks on Puget Sound are a vital piece of Washington’s outdoor recreation infrastructure.

Population and visitation

Gig Harbor is reachable from Tacoma via the soaring Tacoma Narrows Bridge. The bridge is the only road connection that crosses Puget Sound between the mainland and the Kitsap Peninsula, and it gets a lot of traffic. In fact, this major commuter route was expanded to twin suspension spans in 2007 to accommodate the growing peninsula’s growing population. The western end of the bridge lands on the southwesternmost part of the Kitsap Peninsula, on a smaller peninsula called the Gig Harbor Peninsula. The first major town is Gig Harbor.

Between 2010 and 2019, Gig Harbor’s population grew by 50 percent, in response to rising housing costs in Seattle and Tacoma and thanks to the expanded bridge, which ostensibly made commuting easier. During roughly the same time period, visitation to Kopachuck State Park, the only state park (but not the only park) on the Gig Harbor Peninsula, increased 52 percent. I don’t think that’s a coincidence.

There are several places to access saltwater in downtown Gig Harbor, but the rest of the small peninsula doesn’t have many public beaches. On Carr Inlet to the west, there are four public boat launches and two boat-access-only beaches. And thankfully, there is Kopachuck State Park. With its long saltwater beach, Kopachuck is significant. In Chinook Jargon, the regional trade patois of the early exploration and settlement period, kopa means towards and chuck means water. Towards water. Perfect.

Fast facts about Kopachuck State Park

• 280-acre day-use park, open year-round
• 5600’ saltwater shoreline on Carr Inlet
• Discover Pass required, $10 daily or, for a very reasonable $30, purchase an annual pass
• Beachcombing, scuba diving, swimming, fishing, shellfishing (license required)
• More than 50 picnic tables, grills, covered picnic shelters, fire circles
• Hiking
• One Cascadia Marine Trail campsite for those arriving by nonmotorized boat
• Boating, paddling, two moorage buoys offshore from the park, boat launch 3 miles away
• Harbor WildWatch, local environmental education nonprofit, occasionally offers interpretive beach and forest walks
• Park brochure
• Park map

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