West Seattle, Washington
17 Monday
Even with the acceleration in teardown-to-townhome construction, West Seattle still has thousands of homes dating back to the ’50s, and earlier. We found out some of our house’s history not long after moving in — I was out doing some garden cleanup one day, when a man walked up, asked me a few questions about the house, then revealed his father was the original owner/builder. He told us his dad had to go off to serve in World War II not long after the house was done; after the war, he said, his dad moved into the homebuilding business bigtime, and the family eventually moved to California. (Whenever I find myself bemoaning our house’s relatively tiny size, I think of its original residents, who were double our number and apparently got along just fine!)
After this encounter, we did more research on the house by going to some government building (memory fails me) and looking up its original building permits. (You should still be able to do this nowadays; check these places for starters.)
I mention all this as an excuse to link to a few interesting house-history sites we’ve encountered recently while doing online research. One is this site set up by real-estate agents for a Fauntlee Hills home that sold earlier this year (though the site is still active, please note the listing is not); they went to great lengths to create a site with the house’s history and even old marketing materials for the area (if you’re not familiar with Fauntlee Hills, it’s the group of brick houses just east of Fauntleroy Church and the old school-turned-community center, uphill from the ferry dock). Another is the site a local developer created a few years back for a 1923 Craftsman home he rescued from impending teardown, then moved a short distance and renovated. And the third is a site for a home whose history is still in progress, a rather dramatic renovation project we’ve seen along the south end of Cali Ave. Very nice of these folks to share the houses’ history with the rest of the world!
The experts insist the heat wave is finally ending. Still — if it’s still sweltery tomorrow night — here’s a different way to try to keep cool by pretending to feel wintry: Cruise past Canine Casa in Fauntleroy (just south of Endolyne Joe’s) and check out the red-and-green holidayish lights. Bonus: Tuesday happens to be exactly five months till Christmas.
–The latest edition of the Alki News Beacon just went up a few days ago.
–On the other end of the peninsula, the Fauntleroy Community Association’s spring newsletter is now posted.
–Found an excellent tale of community crime-fighting at the “Fairmount Springs” site.
–The West Seattle Junction site has been bannered “New Site Coming Soon” for months. I know redesigns are tough, but I’ve seen entire skyscrapers go up faster than this.
–Just one week till Colman Pool opens for the summer. If you have never been to this Sound-front city pool, you are missing something spectacular. Excellent swimming bargain, too, since its public swims run up to three hours, three times the maximum swim time for the same price at Southwest Pool and most other indoor facilities.
–Want to re-experience the joy of discovering West Seattle? Check out this blog entry from a new arrival.
We didn’t realize till tonight that the Lincoln Park pipeline project has torn up Cove Park just north of the Fauntleroy ferry dock. The little park has been a favorite stop of ours during spring and summer walks — a nice place to sit on one of the driftwood logs for ferry-watching and Olympics-admiring. Tonight, once the weather cleared, we went down to Cove Park for the first time in months — and were absolutely shocked — the driveway down to the park from Fauntleroy is stripped of its artsy inlaid glass border; the driftwood logs are mostly gone; the beach is a staging area for the pipe work, complete with humongous backhoe; and a joint on the above-ground temporary pipe is venting sewer gas right at the entrance to the beach (no wonder the first house north of the parklet is vacant and posted “for rent”). We understand this project was necessary but that doesn’t make the loss of the little park any less heartbreaking. With that and the loss of the southernmost Lincoln Park parking lot (also a staging area for equipment, gravel, etc.), we don’t think we’re going to be spending much time on this end of the WS waterfront until the work is done in a few months. We find it hard to believe this won’t affect Colman Pool access, at least for the first few weeks, but the city brochure doesn’t reflect any impacts …
We’ve gone past the Cat’s Eye Cafe’ a few times recently to see if it showed any signs of reopening, three months after the crash that closed it. No signs of anything … till we went by last night; the cafe’s marquee along Fauntleroy Way has a hand-lettered sign stuck on its south side, NATIVE PLANT SALE. Hard to tell in the dark but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s associated with the cafe — the patch of ground between its parking lot and the sidewalk used to bloom profusely in spring and summer with wonderful plants including lupines. Is this “everything must go,” or just a desperate attempt to raise a few more $? We’ll keep an eye out …
Also a note, our updates here for the next few weeks won’t be quite as frequent as they’ve been. Big project at work is about to eat every waking hour and restrict personal Web access. But it’s got a definite end date, so we’ll ramp back up afterward.
Sounds like things are getting a little scary on this side of the peninsula.
First the Fairmount Springs team runs yet another post about a car prowl.
Now the Fauntleroy folks are calling a “community security meeting” after a siege by smash-and-grabbers so brazen, they’re even hitting the church parking lot. Now that’s just evil.
Dropped by Endolyne Joe’s (just uphill from the Fauntleroy ferry dock) for the first time in months. They’ve been doing a Quebec theme (certain food specials including, on the lunch menu, the classic fries-n-curds-n-gravy creation known as “poutine”) for a while, but the waitperson gravely informed us that it’s changing next week … along with the cute icicly (haven’t they heard about global warming?) decor. Next up: Santa Fe Tex-Mex. Jalapenos, here we come!
–Wish the Fauntleroy Creek salmon “bon voyage.” According to Fauntleroy.net, volunteers start checking on them tomorrow.
–The daily newspapers both have the Holy Rosary pastor story today (the P-I does a better job than the Times). Remember, you read it here first.
Realized this morning that I haven’t taken a ferry ride in months, even though the dock is minutes away from our neighborhood (and most parts of WS). The state ferries are a big reason why we wound up here — on my first trip to Seattle as a tourist, a guidebook entry enticed me to Anacortes, where I walked onto a San Juans-bound boat and fell in love with its utilitarian splendor during a basic 3-hour round-trip run. Other ferry rides followed before my vacation ended. And this sail down Memory (Shipping) Lane reminds me, the ferries are even the reason I discovered WS on my second Seattle trip; I saw all those oddly placed “Vashon Ferry (arrow)” signs along Alaskan Way and was determined to figure out where that mysterious run really docked … managed to make my way onto the bridge, veered over to Alki while trying to find Fauntleroy, game over, I was crazy in love, and ready to move.
So excuse me while I go look up the schedule and see about a recreational ride on the F-V-S ferry sometime before the weekend is out … just to rekindle the romance.
On a blue SUV headed down Fauntleroy toward the ferry dock, this yellow bumper sticker with red lettering:
SAVE SOMETHING
So many ways to interpret that. I almost busted a brain gasket thinking through a dozen or so of them during the rest of the drive home.
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