On Saturday I was exploring the Museum District in Tacoma and we stopped to take a group photo near Union Station. A delightful security guard stopped to offer to take a photo with all of us in it. And then he told us about the often overlooked Liberty Bell in Tacoma. It is located down a staircase next to Union Station and tucked around the corner. It is available for ringing and makes a lovely tone.
Tacoma Weekly did a great article on how the bell got there.
In 1990, artist Paul Cislo painted three murals on walls in downtown Sumner to commemorate Sumner’s Centennial which occurred in 1991. This Cislo mural on Main Street is titled Ryan Sawmill in 1888, (Sumner, WA) and illustrates a sawmill and loggers on Elhi Hill. George Ryan, who owned the mill, was an important person in Sumner’s history.
The Sumner Mural Restoration Project is raising funds to restore all three murals. This summer Trackside Pizza will move into the building.
I stopped here after a Holiday BBQ. While snapping my photos my dear husband wandered into an antique store and purchased two chairs, so this was an expensive stop for me!
Smithsonian Institution’s Archives of American Gardens has the Pecchenino Garden in Gig Harbor registered as a Horticultural Services Division Garden and today it was open to the public for a small donation which was contributed to a charity. The two acre garden surrounds a private house and is amazing. The garden features a stupendous view of Henderson Bay and Cutts Island, a waterfall, a vegetable garden and, of course, flowers.
Thea Park hosted dragon boat races today and dear husband and I managed to see the very end of it. Not the racing part, but there was still a group receiving awards and a booth or two. I wandered on to the dock to see the new still dragon boats, their dragon heads being safely stowed.
Washington State’s only velodrome (a cycle-racing track, typically with steeply banked curves) is the Velodrome at Marymoore Park in Redmond, WA. Dear husband and I checked it out today. There were only a couple of folks causally biking the loop on this lovely day. Velodrome racing was a popular sport in the U.S from the early 1800s to the 1930s and has been a part of the Olympic Games since 1896. There are about 26 functioning velodromes across the country. Interesting fact, the bicycles that race the track can go speeds of upward of 50 mph and have no brakes.
While at Marymoore, we also checked out the spectacular rock climbing wall and the turn of the century Windmill in the Willowmoor farmstead area.
