hundred of them—but one stands out head and shoulders above all others in terms of facilities, quality of dockside services, fine restaurants, and stellar attractions, all literally within a few minutes’ walk from your moorage. Tacoma’s Thea Foss Waterway is an absolute must-see destination for sailors.


T This waterway has it all: four


fascinating world class museums, fine art galleries, excellent restaurants, and boutique shops, all within a few hundred yards of your moorage— and your choice of three high quality marinas with friendly staff. Thea Foss Waterway is accessed


through Commencement Bay—its entrance is located on the west side at the foot of Tacoma’s downtown office buildings on the southwest, and the industrial complex of paper mills and storage tanks on the northeast. Look for the light marking the northeast side of the entry to the waterway, and stay to the north and east of it. The waterway is 29 feet deep as far as the 11th


Street


Bridge, and from 22 to 19 feet deep past that as far as the I-509 Bridge. Three marinas on the west side


of the waterway provide you with a great choice of slips. The closest to the waterway entrance, Foss Waterway Seaport, (Ph.253-272-2750) has 1,200 feet of side-tie moorage at affordable rates (under 26 feet, $15/night; 26 to 41 feet, $25/night; over 42 feet, $0.60c/foot), and a 4-hour stay for free. www.fosswaterwayseaport.org The maritime museum (opened


in 1996) is located in the behemoth 300-foot-long Balfour Dock Building, adjacent to the Seaport’s docks and floats.


The museum, formerly a grain


storage warehouse dating from 1900, is well worth visiting, and displays a number of interesting maritime ships and oddities including beautiful antique wooden boats, model ships, a gillnet fishing boat, a high tech vessel that students from University of Puget Sound rowed across the Atlantic Ocean, a hydroplane racing boat, an active heritage wooden boatbuilding workshop, and an early 19th


century native American cedar canoe. The


he Puget Sound boasts some of the finest waterfronts in the country—and there are several


tall-masted grain ships took six weeks to load grain and lumber, which they transported all over the world from here.


Foss Harbor Marina, a few hundred


meters past Foss Waterway Seaport, also on the west side, has no less friendly service and excellent amenities including a fueling slip, pump-out stations, storage lockers, recycling stations, dock carts, a picnic area, a packed marina store, laundry facilities, electrical service, phone and cable service, and bathrooms and showers. Marina manager Susan Forsythe tells me they have 408 slips for boats ranging from 26 to 96 feet, including 70 live aboard tenants, and 40 vacant slips available. www.fossharbormarina.com (Ph. 253-272-4404) Another few minutes down Foss


Waterway is Dock Street Marina (Ph. 253-272-4352). Marina Dock Age magazine recently awarded Dock Street Marina their “Marina of the Year” accolade for docks with fewer than 250 slips. Spend a few minutes talking to manager Craig Perry, and you’ll soon know why—customer service here is excellent and friendly. Services at Dock Street Marina


include cable TV, dock carts, electrical service, waste disposal, laundry rooms, recycling bins, showers, slip side pumpouts, storage lockers, and water lines at each slip. Perry tells me they already have 41 yacht clubs booked for the year. Dock Street Marina has 25 guest slips, and can hold up to 40 guest boats (boats under 60 feet $1.00/foot per day; over 60 feet, $1.50/foot per day). This marina also has promotions with local restaurants where they give you coupons and arrange transport to El Gaucho Restaurant, among others. But the best part about Dock Street


Marina is its location—just a few steps past the gate house towers the massive 90 foot, off-center cone, announcing the world famous Museum of Glass www.museumofglass.org – Tacoma’s pride and joy. The colorful and imaginative glass art in this 79,000 square foot museum is superb. Don’t forget to watch the museum’s glassblowers in action molding the molten glass in the Hot Shop amphitheater, inside the base of the cone; you can ask questions while they’re doing their thing. Check out the Kids’ Design Glass exhibition,


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48° NORTH, DECEMBER 2010 PAGE 39


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