West Hylebos Wetlands: Little-Known Park In Midst Of Federal Way's Urban Bustle

Tucked away in Federal Way, a few blocks from bustling Pacific Highway South, is one of the best-kept secrets in the state park system.

West Hylebos Wetlands State Park is a unique 70-acre headwater swamp with a wild diversity of wetland life and a circuitous, one-mile boardwalk nature trail.

To enter the swamp is to step into a hushed, forested cathedral where the outside world is left behind. The primeval environment, unchanged for millennia, includes towering trees, overhanging drapes of moss, peat bogs, shelf fungi and spreads of lichen, and a vast array of ferns.

Birdsong is constant along the trail. The only intrusion is noise from planes on their way to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and background traffic - the park is only blocks from a commercial strip - which, after you spend some time under the leafy canopy, is easy to imagine as a roaring waterfall or rushing rapids.

At the trailhead is a "living fossil" grove of rare coast redwood, giant sequoia, dawn redwood and gingko, common in the lush, semitropical forests of North America 30 million years ago.

Elsewhere, giant spruces, red cedars and Douglas firs tower over thickets of deciduous shrubs, alder and hemlock. The park contains swamp birch and Sitka spruce - the latter including 300-foot-tall examples at least 10 feet in circumference - which are rare in the Puget Sound area. Interpretive signs at a grove of giant spruce indicate the trees germinated about 1660. Similar spruces were logged for plane wings and bodies in World War I by the U.S. Army's Spruce Division.

All sense of time and direction is lost on the boardwalk, which twists and turns like a veritable yellow-brick road and makes the park seem much larger than it is. The nature trail features interpretive signs every few feet describing the variety of plants, including red huckleberry, wood fern, coast red elderberry, red osier, salmonberry, black twinberry, straggly gooseberry, wild roses, swamp violet, swamp laurel, cascara and Pacific dogwood.

The swamp's many streams empty into West Hylebos Creek, which drains many square miles of Federal Way and flows into Tacoma's saltwater Hylebos Waterway six miles to the south.

Deep in the swamp are two sinkholes, about 24 feet deep, that look like large, innocuous puddles. Their origin is unknown; they may be deep springs or all that remains of a shallow lake that once covered the area. While the boardwalk through the swamp is generally level and perfectly maintained, the dirt and gravel trail leading to the boardwalk is rutted and sloped. Wheelchair access, thus, is restricted but well worth the effort. The entire trail and boardwalk are suitable for children.

A primitive dirt trail to the grove of giant spruce leads through extensive muddy stretches before returning to the boardwalk, so wear hiking boots; sneakers are fine for the boardwalk itself. Wear warm clothing - especially near sundown - since most of the trail leads through shade.

Access to the small earthern parking area, large enough for about a dozen vehicles, is down Fourth Avenue South., which looks like a driveway and dead-ends at the home of Ilene and Francis Marckx, who donated much of the property for the park and still tend it as a labor of love. Maps of the park are available at the trailhead. Got a great idea for a local getaway? Give us a call at 946-3970 or write to us at South County Life, 31620 23rd Ave. S., Suite 312, Federal Way, WA 98003. --------------------------------------------------------------- -- If you go: West Hylebos State Park in Federal Way. From I-5, take exit 142B to South 348th Street. Driving west on 348th, cross Pacific Highway South and after one half-mile turn left onto Fourth Avenue South just before the electrical substation.