View Park - Point Defiance Park - Reviews

-We spent the late afternoon/early evening hours at this park on a Thursday in August
-It had excellent picnic grounds, and we had our picnic dinner there
-A short drive away from the picnic area is access to Puget Sound, including more picnic areas, a nice walkway, etc., providing a great view of the Sound near sunset, including the southern part of the Seattle metropolitan area across the Sound
-We also drove through the relatively small zoo in the park, and came upon an unfortunate peacock, which was loose. The youngsters among us tried to get the peacock back to its home and out of harms way, without success. Unfortunately, there was no one at the zoo at this time and no references to phone numbers we would call for help. So, to this day, we wonder at the fate of the loose peacock
-Our only negative occurred in getting to this park—a massive pm rush hour traffic jam on westbound WA 16, immediately after our exit off I-5

Point Defiance Park ratings (on scale of 1 to 5, with 5 the best)

-Upkeep = 3 (this would have been higher if not for the peacock incident)
-Beauty = 4 (typical urban park, would have been rated only a 3 except for the Puget Sound walking area and view, which was excellent)
-Peaceful = 4 (given that this park was in a large urban area—Tacoma—and that the weather on this Thursday evening was excellent, there were relatively few people in the park; more were at the Puget Sound access area)