The 75 Best Swimming Holes in Washington

Juanita Beach Park has been a place to swim since the 1920s, first as a private resort and now as a 22-acre Kirkland city park on Lake Washington's northeast shore. The swimming happens in a shallow, sandy-bottomed cove enclosed by a concrete U-shaped pier, which keeps boat traffic and open-lake chop out of the swim area entirely. A naturally long shallow shelf, exposed when the 1916 ship canal lowered the lake almost nine feet, extends the gentle water several hundred feet from shore.

That protected, shallow layout makes this one of the most kid-friendly swimming holes on the lake, and lifeguards staff the beach daily from around noon to 6pm in summer, roughly July 1 through Labor Day. Beyond the sand there are wetland trails, ball fields, courts, and a preserved 1905 landmark house if anyone in your group wants a break from the water.

Lake Sammamish State Park gives you two sandy, buoy-marked swim beaches, Sunset Beach and Tibbetts Beach, at the south end of Lake Sammamish near Issaquah. If you are after a lake to swim in on the Eastside, this 512-acre day-use park with nearly 7,000 feet of waterfront is the obvious answer, and summer water temperatures reach a comfortable 70 to 75 degrees.

Even on hot days, take the park's own advice seriously: cold water can trigger a dangerous gasp reflex, so ease in and put life jackets on the kids. Between swims there is plenty of lawn, beach, and even seven full-size soccer fields to spread out on.

Lake Wilderness Park gives Maple Valley one of the few staffed public places to swim in the area: an official sandy swim beach on Lake Wilderness, roped off from the boat area and watched by lifeguards through the summer season. The 2026 lifeguard schedule runs daily from June 23 through August 23, noon to 7pm, which is a longer guarded window than most local beaches manage.

The 117-acre park around this swimming hole is genuinely nice, with forested walking trails, a big grassy lawn, an adjoining arboretum, and rentals for canoes, kayaks, paddleboards, and pedal boats. One quirk worth knowing: the city has posted a public notice about leeches in the lake, so some swimmers prefer water shoes.

Idylwood Park is the only free public swimming access on Lake Sammamish, which explains why this Redmond swimming hole draws roughly 42,000 visitors every summer. The designated sandy beach sits on the lake's northwestern shore with a bathhouse right behind it, plus open lawns, a fishing pier, and paved and unpaved paths linking the beach to picnic and play areas.

It suits families and casual lake swimmers rather than open-water distance types. There are no lifeguards, and the city points visitors to King County's seasonal water quality monitoring, which tests weekly from mid-May through mid-September, so a quick status check before you load the car is smart.

Walla Walla Point Park is Wenatchee's in-town answer to a river swim: a designated swim beach on the Columbia River inside a 50-plus-acre riverfront park run by Chelan County PUD. The beach fronts the Rock Island Pool, the slow, impounded stretch of river behind Rock Island Dam, so this is calm-water swimming next to lawns and sports fields, not a whitewater plunge.

It works as a swimming hole you can fold into a normal day, since the park sits right on the Apple Capital Loop Trail with picnic areas, courts, and paved paths all around. There's no formal trailhead, just a few minutes' walk from the lot to the water. No lifeguard presence is documented, so treat it like any open-water river beach and watch the kids.

You do not have to leave downtown Leavenworth to get in the Wenatchee River. Waterfront Park sits just a few blocks from the shops, with a string of small sandy and gravel inlets along its 3,000-plus feet of river frontage where people wade, swim, and launch tubes all summer. It is an in-town swimming hole, not a backcountry one, and that convenience is exactly the appeal.

The water runs cold and can move fast, especially during spring runoff, and this same stretch feeds a Class III+ whitewater run downstream toward Cashmere. Stick to the calm beach inlets and save the main channel for the rafters. The lot fills up on summer weekends and holidays, so go early.

Matthews Beach Park is widely described as one of Seattle's largest freshwater bathing beaches, a 22-acre lakefront park on the west shore of Lake Washington. The swimming hole here is a sandy beach with lifeguards in summer and an offshore diving platform anchored for the season, so it leans casual and family-friendly rather than remote and rugged.

The Burke-Gilman Trail runs along the park's western edge, which means plenty of people roll up by bike, cool off, and keep going. Between the lawns, the playground next to the beach, and the shallow sandy entry, it is an easy place to spend a full summer day.

Lake Chelan State Park puts you on the quieter southwest shore of one of Washington's most famous lakes, a long, glacially carved trench in the eastern Cascades foothills promoted as 50 miles of crystal clear, glacier-fed water. The park's swimming hole is a designated swim area cordoned off along a gravel beach with a log berm, so you get calm lake water without sharing it with boats.

The water is clear enough that the park also permits scuba diving and snorkeling, which tells you something about what you'll see when you open your eyes underwater. Families and casual swimmers are the main crowd, with paddleboarding and kayaking layered in. The park runs 6:30am to dusk year-round, so early-morning swims are on the table.

Thornton A. Sullivan Park wraps the southern shore of Silver Lake in Everett, and its sand beach is the kind of easygoing swimming hole that suburban summers are built on. Visitors describe pleasantly warm water with a gradual, sandy-bottomed entry, shallow enough that it works well for children and casual swimmers rather than anyone chasing a long open-water swim.

It gets busy on warm weekends and holidays, so a local guide recommends arriving before about 11am on peak days. The 2-mile paved path around the lake, the playground, and the picnic shelters make it easy to turn a swim into a full day out.

Doris Cooper Houghton Beach Park packs a lot of swimming into 3.8 acres of Kirkland waterfront, about a mile south of downtown. It is one of the city's official guarded beaches on Lake Washington, with a sandy, gently sloping entry, a shallow zone set aside for small children, and a deeper roped-off area with a swim dock where dock diving is allowed. That two-zone setup makes it a genuine family swimming hole that still gives confident swimmers something to do.

City lifeguards are on duty roughly July through Labor Day, with loaner life jackets available at the lifeguard stand, and the views run across the lake toward the Seattle skyline. It is a developed urban park with lawns, a playground, and public art, so plan on a beach day rather than a wilderness outing.

Steamboat Rock State Park wraps around an 800-foot basalt butte at the north end of Banks Lake, in Washington's Grand Coulee country. The park's swimming hole is about as official as they come, with a buoy line, a sandy beach, and an asphalt walkway leading down to the water, which makes this big desert reservoir an easy lake to swim in.

Regional roundups rank Banks Lake among Washington's best swimming lakes and describe the water as clear and pristine. Keep in mind this is a large multi-use reservoir shared with motorboats and waterskiers, so the buoyed swim area is where you want to be.

Allan Yorke Park is Bonney Lake's 45-acre city park at the south end of Lake Tapps, and it is the closest thing the town has to a hometown swimming hole. There is a marked swimming area right off the shoreline, a boat launch, and open grassy park land that hosts community events like the Tunes @ Tapps concert series.

One thing to take seriously here: Lake Tapps runs cold underneath. Police have noted subsurface temperatures around 50 to 56 degrees even when the surface feels warm, and that cold can sap a swimmer's strength fast on longer swims toward the buoy line, where the water reaches about 12 feet deep. Stay close to shore, watch your kids, and this is an easy drive-up place to swim without leaving town.

Lake Sylvia State Park packs a rainforest-ringed swimming hole into 233 acres just north of Montesano. The lake is a small reservoir formed behind a dam dating to the early 1900s, and the day-use area holds an official swim beach along with picnic shelters, an ADA playground, and a campground close by.

One thing worth knowing before you go: the old dam has had documented structural trouble, with emergency-level ratings in 2024 and 2025 that led to a lowered lake level and a temporary park closure. The park was back open and hosting events by May 2026, but check current State Parks alerts before making the drive.

Newcastle Beach Park is Bellevue's largest beach park, and it shows in the setup: a sandy Lake Washington swim beach with seasonal lifeguards, a 300-foot dock, a non-motorized watercraft launch, grassy picnic lawns, a children's play area, and a nature trail. If you want the easiest possible place to swim on this side of the lake, this is a strong candidate.

The swim area is bounded by float lines, with a separate deep-water zone reserved for swimmers who pass a skills test, so the main shallow area stays supervised and family-oriented. One recurring caveat: the county monitors water quality here, and the city has closed the swim area before over high bacteria counts, so a quick check before a hot weekend visit is worth it.

Martha Lake Park makes Martha Lake an easy lake to swim in, or more precisely, to wade in. This 6-acre Snohomish County park on the lake's south shore, built on the site of the old Martha Lake Resort, has a sandy beach and a designated wading zone with an ADA-accessible swim ramp, one of the more accessible entries you will find at a local swimming hole.

It is set up for families and casual lake wading rather than deep-water swimming, with wetland boardwalks, picnic shelters, and a playground wrapped around the shoreline. There is no lifeguard at any time, so adults need to keep eyes on kids in the water.

Seward Park covers all 300 acres of Bailey Peninsula on Lake Washington, and its swimming hole hides in Andrews' Bay on the southwest shore: a sandy beach in a sheltered inlet, backed by a broad lawn made for sunbathing and picnics. The freshwater swimming is the draw here, but the setting seals it, since the rest of the peninsula holds one of the last old-growth forests inside Seattle city limits.

A 2.4-mile car-free paved loop circles the whole peninsula, so it is easy to pair a swim with a walk or ride. The Olmsted-designed grounds and upland hiking trails make this feel like a getaway without leaving the city.

Waverly Beach Park is the most sheltered of Kirkland's three guarded swimming beaches, a tidy urban swimming hole where the swim area sits inside a U-shaped public pier on Lake Washington. The water inside is calm and shallow, entered from a small pebbly-sand beach or down concrete steps, and one recent visitor described it as clean and transparent, though with some algae in the shallowest zone near shore.

The park sits down a forested hillside in the Market neighborhood, set back from Lake Washington Boulevard, which gives it a more secluded feel than Kirkland's busier waterfront parks. On clear days the views run across the lake to the Seattle skyline and Mount Rainier.

Horseshoe Lake Park gives Woodland an in-town swimming hole on an 83 acre former oxbow of the Lewis River, diked off from the river back in 1940. The whole lake is designated no wake, so the water stays calm and flat, and it warms up nicely through the summer, which is when locals describe it as a popular swimming spot.

The city officially sanctions swimming at a designated swim area and even tests the water there for E. coli and algae indicators, with more frequent testing in the warm months. There is no lifeguard, though, and late-summer algae is a known possibility, so it is worth checking recent test results before you jump in.

Madison Park Beach has been one of Seattle's favorite places to swim since the late 1800s, and it still delivers: a sandy and grassy public beach on Lake Washington with a roped swim area, a swim raft, and both low and high diving boards. Lifeguards are on duty during the summer months, which makes this urban swimming hole an easy pick for families and casual swimmers.

The 8.3-acre park splits into two halves, with the swimming beach and public dock on the east side and a playground, playfield, and tennis courts on the west. It is all a short walk from Madison Park's small commercial strip, so you can make a full afternoon of it.

Don Morse Memorial Park is Chelan's big lakefront park, 20 acres at the west edge of downtown with 2,000 feet of beach on Lake Chelan set aside for sunbathing, swimming, and water sports. The lake itself is the third-deepest in the country, and the local utility describes its clear waters as a defining community resource, so this is genuinely nice water to swim in.

The swim area is marked off, and city rules require motorboats to stay at least 25 yards away from it, which matters on a lake this busy with watercraft. It's a developed, family-oriented beach rather than a secluded swimming hole, with playgrounds, courts, a skatepark, and marina access all in the same park. The one catch is parking, which is paid and adds up on a full day.

Medina Beach Park is a compact 1.4-acre pocket of grass and sand on Lake Washington's eastern shore, with a 50-foot beach, views across the water toward the Seattle skyline and Mount Rainier, and a gradual sandy-bottom walk-in entry that suits most skill levels. One visitor account describes the water as surprisingly clear, which is not what most people expect from an in-town lake swim.

It is an official place to swim, with a designated swim float and lifeguards on duty in July and August, though the beach goes unsupervised the rest of the year. The dock doubles as a kayak and paddleboard launch, so give the boat traffic a little room once you drift beyond the shallows.

Enatai Beach Park sits at the south end of Bellevue's Lake Washington shoreline, partly tucked beneath the I-90 floating bridge near the mouth of Mercer Slough. It is one of the city's designated public swimming beaches, and this swimming hole comes with structure: a roped-off swim area bounded by float lines and log booms, a wooden swim dock, and city lifeguards during the summer season.

The near-shore zone is shallow and calm, well suited to young kids, while a deep-water section requires passing a lifeguard-verified swim test. The sandy beach turns to pebbles at the waterline, so water shoes are a good call, and King County tests the water weekly from mid-May through late September for bacteria and algal blooms.

Madrona Park slopes down a wooded hillside to a sandy beach on Lake Washington, where the swimming hole is a designated swim area with summer lifeguards and diving platforms anchored offshore. Visitors describe the water as calm and refreshingly cool, and on clear days you get views across the lake toward Mount Rainier and the Eastside.

The swim beach itself runs small, so it fills with families on warm evenings, and paddleboarders work the open water just beyond. With a shallow, grassy-sandy entry and lifeguards on duty from late May through late August, it is an easy pick for a casual city swim.

Hood Park puts a proper roped-off swimming beach on the Snake River right where it meets the Columbia, in the shaded Army Corps campground at Burbank. The water here is slack reservoir rather than fast current, since this stretch is backed up as part of Lake Wallula behind McNary Dam, which makes it a calm, family-suited river to swim in.

The beach sits next to the day-use area with a playground alongside, and mature trees throw welcome shade over an otherwise arid corner of the Tri-Cities. Stay inside the ropes: one camper noted algae building up outside the marked swim zone. The season runs mid-May through early September, matching the campground's operating window.

Pearrygin Lake is spring-fed, ringed by open grassy lawns, and sits in the Methow Valley's shrub-steppe country just a few miles from Winthrop. The state park almost completely surrounds the lake, and its swimming hole is a designated area marked off by a buoy line, with picnic tables on the grass and mountain views in every direction. A local ranger put it simply: 'It's so gorgeous here, you can see in every direction.'

The lawn runs right down to the water's edge, so there's no steep or rocky scramble to get in, and with no river current to worry about it's an easy swim for kids, though no lifeguards are mentioned in any official materials. The park calls itself a water enthusiast's dream from spring through fall, then flips to cross-country skiing and snowshoeing in winter.

Charbonneau Park sits on Lake Sacajawea, the Snake River reservoir behind Ice Harbor Dam, about 8 miles east of Burbank in the rolling desert hills of southeastern Washington. The swimming here is genuinely set up for families: an official swim beach sheltered from the open reservoir, marked with buoy lines, backed by sand, and stocked with a life jacket loaner board.

The calm, protected water suits young kids, and smaller sand beaches near the boat launch get used for wading too. The park has been recognized as one of America's Top 100 Family Campgrounds, and reviewers describe it as clean, quiet, and family-oriented, with grassy shaded day-use areas that feel like an oasis against the surrounding canyon country. If you want an easy lake to swim in with a campground attached, this is a strong pick.

Speelyi Beach is a Forest Service day-use area with a wide sandy beach on the southeastern shore of Cle Elum Lake, a reservoir in the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest about 8 miles northwest of Cle Elum. Visitors come to swim and kayak straight off the sand, with conifer forest wrapping the shoreline.

As swimming holes go, this one is refreshingly simple: drive in off Road 903 next to Wish Poosh Campground, walk onto the beach, and get in. It is unsupervised reservoir swimming with no lifeguard documented, and water levels can shift with reservoir drawdown, so keep kids close.

Alta Lake is a bit of a geological oddity: a 2-mile glacially formed lake with no primary inflow or outflow, tucked in a valley beneath stone cliffs that rise about a thousand feet overhead. That closed system means calm, generally clear water, and the state park's swimming hole takes full advantage of it, a large sandy beach in the day-use area that slopes gently into a roped-off swim zone.

The ropes keep swimmers separated from the boat dock and launch, which makes this an easy lake to swim in with kids, though no lifeguard presence is confirmed either way. Day-use parking is capped at a fixed number of stalls with no roadside overflow allowed, so on hot summer weekends, showing up early is the move. The park runs April through October.

The name says it all. Sandy Swimming Hole is Washougal's traditional summer swim spot, a city park on a bend of the Washougal River where a gravel and pebble beach slopes gently into clear water beneath tall shade trees. It is the warmest, most family friendly stretch of the river, with water hitting roughly 70F in August.

The water stays shallow and calm close to shore, then gradually deepens to chest and overhead depth farther out, so waders and kids get their zone and swimmers get theirs. It gets busy, the park can exceed capacity on hot days, so arrive early if you want a spot on the beach.

Sacajawea Historical State Park sits on a flat, open point where the Snake River meets the Columbia, right in Pasco, with a sandy beach where swimming is officially on the menu alongside kayaking and paddleboarding. The water here is the slack Lake Wallula pool backed up behind McNary Dam rather than free-flowing river, and the beach is framed by lawns, picnic shelters, and a Lewis and Clark museum.

As an established place to swim in the Tri-Cities, it is easy: park the car, cross the lawn, and you are on the sand. Just note there are no lifeguards or roped-off shallow zones, and the swim area sits right at the confluence of two major rivers, so keep small kids close. The park closes entirely from November through March, making this a spring-through-fall spot.

Clyde Beach Park is a small 2.23-acre Bellevue beach park on Lake Washington, built around a historic boathouse in a quiet residential pocket near Clyde Hill and Medina. As swimming holes go, this one is about as low-friction as it gets: a designated swim beach with city lifeguards in summer and a shallow, roped-off area meant for children and casual swimmers.

The rules keep things orderly. Swimmers stay inside the marked float lines and log booms, and anyone who wants the deeper water beyond the ropes has to pass a swim test first. Diving from the dock is prohibited, as is swimming near the boat launch, which leaves the supervised swim zone pleasantly predictable.

Davies Beach has been a local swimming hole for over a century, going back to a private lake resort that operated here from about 1908 to 1950 before the site became a county park and then a city one. It sits on the southwest shore of Lake Stevens at the foot of Chapel Hill, and on hot June and July days it draws crowds on the order of a hundred people, families and teens swimming, wading, and jumping into the marked swim area.

Take the depth seriously here. The marked swim area reaches roughly 10 feet deep with a reported drop-off, there is no lifeguard, and two minors drowned here in June 2022 while not wearing life jackets. The city now stocks a free life-jacket loaner locker on site, and using it is the smart move for anyone who is not a strong swimmer.

About 2 miles west of Leavenworth on Highway 2, this short trail through Tumwater Canyon follows the bed of an early 1900s wooden pipeline that once powered trains through the Cascade Tunnel. Along the way it passes sandy beaches on the Wenatchee River where visitors describe clear, turquoise water, and the first pull-outs are only a few minutes from the parking area.

Treat this one as a wading and cooling-off spot rather than a true swimming hole for laps. The name Tumwater comes from a Chinook word meaning strong, rough water, and the Washington Trails Association warns the main current here can sweep even strong swimmers downstream. Stay in the calm eddies at the beach margins, or head for the seasonal side creek about half a mile in, which is described as the safer place to cool off.

Mardon Resort is a privately run fishing and camping resort on Potholes Reservoir, a roughly 28,000-acre irrigation reservoir in the hot, dry Columbia Basin southwest of Moses Lake. Swimming happens right off the resort's sandy beach, and reviewers describe simply walking from a beachfront campsite straight into the water to cool off, which is exactly the appeal in a central Washington summer.

This is casual, resort-style lake swimming rather than a wild swimming hole, with a marina, boat launch, cabins, and RV sites all part of the package. The beach has a shallow entry and there is a playground on-site, but no lifeguard is mentioned anywhere, and the marina keeps motorboat traffic close, so keep an eye on kids near the launch and dock.

Daroga State Park is built on former orchard land that was flooded when Rocky Reach Dam created Lake Entiat, and the result is a green, irrigated oasis in the dry scabland hills north of Orondo. The swimming hole here is a calm, sheltered lagoon that Washington State Parks describes as ideal for beginner swimmers, backed by a grassy slope running down to a narrow curved sand beach on the river.

Because the water is a dammed, slow-moving stretch of the Columbia rather than free-flowing river, it's an easy place to swim with kids, and camper reviews mention plenty for them to do on busy weekends. The park runs May through September and closes for the winter, with 1.5 miles of shoreline to spread out along.

Crow Butte Park sits on a 275-acre peninsula jutting into Lake Umatilla, the Columbia River reservoir behind John Day Dam, and it feels like a desert oasis. The designated swimming beach is sandy, and the water near shore runs warm and shallow, which makes it an easy sell for families in the summer heat. Basalt canyon walls and 360-degree high-desert views surround the whole thing.

This is a proper developed swimming hole with a marina, campground, and six miles of Columbia shoreline to explore. There is no lifeguard on duty, so keep an eye on your group, and know that western rattlesnakes turn up in the rocky terrain, especially along the trail to the butte summit. The park runs April 1 through October 15, with the warmest swimming in midsummer.

Clear Lake Military Resort is a 34-acre lakeside recreation area on Clear Lake near Cheney, run by Fairchild Air Force Base's 92nd Force Support Squadron, and access is restricted to DoD ID card holders and their families. If you qualify, you get a designated place to swim on a calm, warm-water lake, plus playgrounds, a fishing pier, and cabins and yurts set among the trees.

Guest reviews collected by aggregators call it a great area for kids to play or swim, and the calm, stocked lake backs that up. No lifeguard staffing is documented, so supervise as you would at any unguarded lake beach.

Pritchard Island Beach is the neighborhood swimming hole for Seattle's Rainier Beach area, a 19-acre city park on the west shore of Lake Washington. Seattle Parks calls it a fine, quiet beach, and it earns the description: no boat ramp traffic like the neighboring Beer Sheva beach, just a lifeguarded swim area marked by a floating raft, big cottonwoods along the shore, and views across to Seward Park and Mercer Island.

The park sits on what used to be an actual island until 1917, when the Lake Washington Ship Canal project lowered the lake about 9 feet and turned it into a peninsula. Swimming and youth swim lessons are both free during the lifeguard season, which for 2026 runs June 27 through August 23.

Lake Wenatchee is glacier and snowmelt fed, so the water stays cool all summer, which is exactly what you want on a hot eastern Cascades afternoon. The Swimming Beach Day Use area on the state park's south shore is the designated place to swim in it: a developed sandy beach where the water's edge stays gentle and shallow, an easy entry for families with kids.

It's also one of the more accessible swimming holes in the region. The park loans out a free beach wheelchair from May 1 through October 31, and Mobi-mats give wheelchair users a path right to the shoreline at two ADA picnic spots. The whole scene sits on a 5-mile alpine lake ringed by national forest, with camping, boating, and trails filling out the rest of the 492-acre park.

Manson Bay Park holds a distinction that matters a lot if you're swimming with kids: it's the only lifeguarded beach on all of Lake Chelan. The swimming hole is a roped-off, seasonally lifeguard-monitored swim zone right in downtown Manson, with a lifejacket loaner station on top of that, which makes it the safest bet for families anywhere on the lake.

The 6-acre park sits next to the Manson Bay Marina with views across the water to mountains and orchards, and you can walk to restaurants and shops afterward. Summer is the time to come, when Lake Chelan's surface water is at its warmest and the lifeguard program and marina services are running.

Fishhook Park is an Army Corps campground on Lake Sacajawea, the Snake River reservoir behind Ice Harbor Dam, about 18 miles east of Burbank in Washington's shrub-steppe country. Swimming is an official activity at a designated day-use beach, and mature trees shade the waterfront sites, a rarity along this sun-baked stretch of the lower Snake.

Be honest with yourself about what this is: open, wind-exposed reservoir water shared with boat traffic, not a sheltered swimming hole. The Corps stocks a life jacket loaner board at the beach, and a 2018 drowning near the park, a swimmer who entered rough water without a life jacket, shows how fast wind and waves can turn serious here. The park runs seasonally May through September, and after a 2024 to 2025 closure it was reported to be reopening for 2026.

Scooteney Reservoir gives the high desert scabland northwest of Connell something rare: a lake to swim in. Visitors describe the campground and shoreline as a green waterfront oasis in an otherwise dry, hot landscape shaped by the Ice Age floods, and the open swim area gets used for casual swimming and tubing alongside boating and fishing.

The water is calm, open reservoir, fine for families and casual swimmers, but there is no lifeguard and the swim area shares the reservoir with water-skiers and motorboats off the launch. One thing regulars flag: an annual algae bloom can shut swimming down for about a month in some years, so clarity is seasonal here.

McCormick Park is one of the easiest family swimming holes on this stretch of the Snoqualmie River. The park sits at the bottom of the hill from downtown Duvall, behind the old train depot, and the river here runs with a slow, lazy summer current that locals like for inner-tubing. Entry is off a soft sandy beach with a gentle slope, no rocks or boulders to stumble over, which is why family-travel writers keep singling it out as one of the most kid-friendly swim spots near Seattle.

The water runs clearish and blue-green during the June through September season, warm enough for comfortable swimming and tubing. One heads-up: there is very little shade anywhere in the park, so bring sun protection, and know there are no lifeguards on duty.

Chelan Falls Park has one big advantage over swimming in Lake Chelan itself: warmer water. The park sits where the Chelan River empties into the Columbia, and locals say the river's warmer outflow makes the roped-off swim area noticeably more comfortable than a dip in the cold, glacially fed lake up the hill. It's also completely free, a rarity around Chelan.

The swimming hole is a designated area cordoned from the rest of the waterway by a floating safety line, about 4 miles from downtown Chelan and reliably quieter than the busy lakefront parks in town. There's no lifeguard, but loaner life jackets are kept near the boat launch. One serious caveat: the PUD warns that dam and powerhouse operations nearby can cause sudden, unpredictable currents, so stay inside the ropes.

Sunny Beach Point is the designated swim spot on Alder Lake, a Nisqually River reservoir managed by Tacoma Power near Eatonville. It's more developed swim beach than backwoods swimming hole: a free 9-acre day-use area with a grassy shoreline for towels and blankets, forested hills all around, and Mount Rainier in the distance.

The lake itself is described as calm and glassy, a good flatwater lake to swim in, but it's a working reservoir, so levels fluctuate and the water can run seriously cold. Tacoma Power warns that 50 to 60F water can cause rapid loss of muscle control, so ease in and keep swims short early in the season.

Clear Lake Beach is Skagit County's developed swim beach on Clear Lake, about 3 miles from Burlington and an easy drive from Mount Vernon. It is a proper county park rather than a wilderness swimming hole, with a designated swim area plus a shelter, playground, and volleyball court on the grounds.

The swim area is not lifeguarded, so you are on your own in the water. The county tests the lake periodically and has closed swimming in past summers when bacteria levels ran high, so it is worth checking current advisories before you load up the car.

East Beach is a grassy National Park Service day-use area on the east end of Lake Crescent in Olympic National Park, and it ranks among the most popular places to swim on the lake. The draw is the water itself: Lake Crescent's low-nitrogen chemistry keeps algae from growing, so the lake is famously clear with a blue-green cast, and visitors consistently mention that clarity as what makes swimming here feel special.

Respect the lake, though. It stays cold year-round and plunges to roughly 600 feet deep, with the bottom dropping away not far from shore. There are no lifeguards, so guides recommend life jackets for kids and weaker swimmers, and summer is when it's most inviting.

Willow Point Park is one of the quieter public places to swim on Lake Chelan, a day-use park in Manson with an official designated swimming area on a lake the local chamber promotes as 50 miles of crystal clear, glacier-fed water. The park sits on a hillside above the shore, so you get lake and mountain views from shaded grass before you head down for a swim.

It's set up as a family swimming hole, with a playground, picnic tables, and restrooms rounding out the beach, but the parks district is explicit that no lifeguards are on duty, so keep close watch on younger swimmers. Getting from the car to the water takes all of a minute or two.

Chism Beach Park is one of six official Bellevue park beaches with seasonal lifeguard coverage, a designated Lake Washington swimming spot and beach in a residential neighborhood near Moorland and Norwood Village. The grounds mix a dock, lawn and picnic areas, a playground, and the historic Burrows Cabin, so it works as a whole afternoon, not just a dip.

The swimming itself is squarely family territory: a lifeguarded lake swim area bounded by float lines and log booms, with a swim test required before anyone heads past the floats into deeper water. Worth knowing before you load the car, the city occasionally closes the swim area for high bacteria counts or lifeguard shortages, and water quality is tracked through King County's swimming beach program.

Colman Park is the quieter way to swim in Lake Washington. This 24-acre historic park in Seattle's Mount Baker neighborhood, listed on the National Register of Historic Places for its Olmsted Brothers-influenced design, descends from a wooded hilltop to a grassy, willow-shaded shoreline just south of the I-90 bridge. The swimming hole here is informal lake access rather than a developed swim facility, and reviewers describe it as calmer and less crowded than the popular beaches nearby.

People have been swimming off this shoreline since at least the mid-20th century, and the setup is simple: grass, big drooping willows, picnic tables, and views out to the Cascades, Mount Rainier, and Seward Park. It sits right next to the city's designated Mount Baker Bathing Beach if you want a more managed option.

Coho Campground puts you on the west shore of Wynoochee Lake, a dam-formed reservoir in the Olympic Mountain foothills ringed by evergreen forest with mountain views to the north. The Forest Service officially lists swimming among the activities here, so the reservoir doubles as a sanctioned swimming hole alongside the boating and fishing it is better known for.

The catch is that this is managed reservoir water, and conditions swing with the water level. A visitor in September 2025 found the lake 37 feet below its normal high-water mark, exposing rocks, mud, and submerged logs along the shoreline, so check current levels before planning a swim trip.

Sunset Beach Park is a quarter-acre pocket park on the shore of Lake Stevens, and it is about as compact as a public swimming hole gets: a narrow strip of beach, a fishing and swim dock, a few picnic tables, and an open view across the lake. The city designates it as an official swim area with a roped swim line marking the boundaries.

Swimming happens right off the shoreline and dock in calm, non-flowing lake water, the kind of casual family swimming that fills up on hot summer days. Visitors describe it as small and quiet, though the tiny footprint means it can feel tight when the weather is good.

Clarke Beach Park is the quieter of Mercer Island's public swim spots, a 9-acre waterfront park on the island's southeast shore with an enclosed, officially designated swimming area on Lake Washington. Instead of a sandy beach, you enter the water from grass lawns via steps, with swimming and fishing piers alongside, and locals describe it as calmer and less developed than the island's other beaches, which is exactly its appeal.

The land was once the Girl Scouts' Camp Tarywood before the city bought it around 1969 and opened the park in 1971. There are no lifeguards at this swimming hole, and the city is blunt about Lake Washington's cold subsurface water being a hypothermia risk, so stay in the designated area, swim with a buddy, and think twice before bringing very small kids who need a gradual sandy entry.

Magnuson Park's swim beach sits on Lake Washington in northeast Seattle, on the grounds of a former naval air station that became parkland in 1975. It is a lifeguarded city beach rather than a backcountry swimming hole, with a fixed swim platform offshore and views across the lake that reportedly reach the North Cascades, and Mt. Rainier on clear days.

The water is warmest in July and August, and reports say early weekday mornings bring the lightest crowds. Lifeguards are on duty daily from late June through late August, which is when the beach is at its family-friendly best.

Ike Kinswa State Park gives you a sandy beach and designated swim area on the north shore of Mayfield Lake, a reservoir on the Cowlitz River system in Lewis County. The water is calm and easygoing, which makes it a comfortable lake to swim in for families and casual swimmers.

The day-use area gets very busy in summer, so plan around the crowds. No lifeguards appear anywhere on the park's amenities list, and swimmers share the lake with boaters and water skiers, so keep an eye on kids.

North Lakeshore Swim Beach is the neighborhood swimming hole for the city of Lake Stevens, a half-acre stretch of sandy shoreline about 0.3 miles from downtown with views across the water toward the Cascades. It is small and easygoing, roughly 400 feet of beach with a swim dock, and the shallow water off the sand is what makes it work so well for families with young kids.

The water here is generally clear for a lowland lake, though the city notes it can turn green during periodic algae blooms in warmer months. There are no lifeguards and no concessions, so pack what you need and keep an eye on the little ones.

Meydenbauer Bay Park drops a proper swim beach into downtown Bellevue, on a sheltered inlet of Lake Washington within walking distance of Main Street and Bellevue Square. The swimming hole here is fully official: a roped-off swim area with a sandy beach and an anchored swim platform, watched by lifeguards daily from noon to 7pm between late June and Labor Day.

The shallow, enclosed bay suits families and casual swimmers more than fitness swimmers, and the 10-acre park around it gives you plenty to do between dips, from the landmark 400-foot curved pier to a viewing terrace and a historic whaling building. The beach house under the pier is a genuine perk, with restrooms, showers, a changing area, and two family restrooms that one firsthand account describes as nicer than typical park facilities.

Angle Lake Beach packs a lot into a compact 10-acre park in SeaTac, minutes from the airport. The swimming hole is a designated sandy beach with a roped-off swim area on the 102-acre lake, and sources describe the water as calm and clear, which suits families and casual swimmers just fine. Seasonal lifeguards work noon to 8pm starting mid-June, and there is a spray park next door for the little ones.

The lake is tested weekly for bacteria from mid-May through late September, and the beach does close when E. coli levels spike, as happened in July 2025, with resident geese identified as the usual culprit. Check for posted closure signs before wading in.

Windust Park is the quiet, remote option on Lake Sacajawea, an Army Corps site tucked into the Snake River canyon southeast of Pasco with 24 free first-come campsites under mature shade trees. The small designated beach near the tent area serves as the local swimming hole, casual reservoir swimming on a stretch of water that draws people specifically trying to get away from town.

Loaner life jackets are provided at the beach, which is a nice touch, but there are no lifeguards, and the boat ramp gets busy with water-skiers and motorboats in the mornings and evenings. Fair warning: trains run on the opposite bank day and night, rattlesnake warning signs are posted, and there is no cell coverage from any major carrier out here.

Steel Lake is the in-town option for Federal Way, a 46-acre natural lake ringed mostly by homes, with a designated public swim beach inside the 52-acre city park on its southern shore. As a place to swim it could not be more convenient: free parking, restrooms, a playground, and the beach all sit within a short walk of each other.

But this is a lake to respect. News reporting describes water that starts shallow then drops quickly to 5 or 10 feet a short distance out, reaching 24 feet toward the center, and characterizes it as cold, deep, and very murky, with a dense mat of milfoil weed on the bottom in places. Multiple drownings have occurred here over the years, so keep swimmers, especially kids, close to the shallow shoreline.

Nine Mile Recreation Area is Riverside State Park's day-use hub at the eastern end of Lake Spokane, the long Spokane River reservoir historically called Long Lake. Washington State Parks maintains a designated swimming area here, which makes this end of the lake an easy, official place to swim near the town of Nine Mile Falls.

The park describes the site as a busy hub for water activities in summer, and that is worth taking literally: a boat launch and two docks sit right at the same spot, so motorboats share the open lake beyond the swim zone. Summer hours run 6:30am to dusk, and dedicated parking for water access keeps the walk to the shore short.

Island Lake Community Beach is the local swimming hole for the Poulsbo area, a designated swim area inside a 23-acre Kitsap County park on the shore of Island Lake. The lake is non-motorized, only electric trolling motors allowed, which keeps the water calm and the whole scene mellow.

The county has clearly set this one up with families in mind. The swim area is kept separate from the fishing pier, where swimming is prohibited, and life jacket kiosks sit right at the water. Add a playground, picnic shelter, and walking trails, and it is an easy lake to swim in without driving far from town.

Salmon La Sac Swimming Hole is the kind of spot people picture when they hear the words swimming hole: teal water sliding over smooth granite boulders before widening into a deep, cold, emerald green pool, reported at roughly 8 feet deep, with a rope swing on site. It sits on the Cooper River right at Salmon La Sac Campground, about 19 miles north of Cle Elum on the edge of the Alpine Lakes Wilderness.

Access could not be easier, the pool is right at the road and campground at around 2,300 feet in the Cascades, framed by Douglas fir and mountain views. The trade off is popularity: the Forest Service warns the trailhead lot is extremely busy seven days a week in summer, so come with a backup plan. And the water stays cold all summer, which regulars will tell you is part of the point.

West Green Lake Beach is one of two official places to swim on Green Lake, the glacially formed lake at the heart of one of Seattle's busiest parks. This is a classic city swimming hole: a sandy and lawn-backed beach near the Bathhouse Theatre with swimming rafts, a low diving board around 4 to 5 feet, a high board around 12 feet, and lifeguards on duty during posted summer hours.

Visitors say the water warms up nicely in summer, and some hardy swimmers keep at it year-round even though winter dips are described as very cold. The 2.8-mile paved path around the lake makes it easy to walk or bike in when the parking gets tight.

Pine Lake Park is that rare thing near Seattle: a free, lifeguarded lake to swim in. The 19-acre City of Sammamish park sits on the wooded eastern shore of Pine Lake, about 20 miles east of the city, with a roped-off sandy swimming beach staffed daily by lifeguards from June 21 through September 2, noon to 7pm on the 2026 schedule. Reviewers note the shallow lake warms up nicely, so summer swims are actually comfortable.

The site has been a swimming destination for over a century, starting as French's LaPine Resort in the 1910s before becoming a public park in the mid-1960s. King County tests the beach weekly for bacteria in swim season and counts it among beaches with historically good water quality, which is reassuring for a suburban swimming hole this popular.

Mount Baker Beach is one of Seattle's classic Lake Washington swim spots, a city park beach next to Colman Park a few miles southeast of downtown. Instead of sand you get the grassy lawn typical of Seattle's lake beaches, plus a dock, a diving platform, and a roped-off swim area for proper freshwater swimming.

One important caveat before you plan around it: the bathhouse was damaged in a July 2025 fire, and as of the most recent city update, lifeguard service remained suspended, with no confirmation it returned for the 2026 season. The place to swim is still there, but treat it as unsupervised open water until you can verify lifeguards are back.

Columbia Cove Park gives Brewster a natural swimming hole for anyone who'd rather swim in a lake than the municipal pool next door. The park sits on Lake Pateros, the Wells Dam reservoir on the Columbia River, right where the Okanogan River joins in, and Douglas County PUD officially lists a designated swimming beach among its facilities.

It's a simple day-use setup in Okanogan County's arid shrub-steppe country, part of a chain of PUD shoreline parks along the reservoir, with the city's RV park and boat launch adjacent. One thing to note: the City of Brewster flags a rock bar in front of the boat launch that gets worse when the water is low, so be mindful of conditions when levels drop.

Lake Cushman has a reputation for clear water, and campers at Skokomish Park's day-use beach back it up, describing the swim area as clear and surprisingly warm in summer. The park is owned and run by the Skokomish Indian Tribe on the reservoir's south shore near Hoodsport, and the swim beach is the big draw for day visitors.

This is casual, family style swimming from shore, with reviewers mentioning a rope swing and volleyball nearby. Just remember it is a deep reservoir with no lifeguards, so the bottom can fall away quickly past the designated shallows, even at a friendly swimming hole like this one.

Lake Washington is the big freshwater lake that borders Seattle, Bellevue, Kirkland, and Renton, running roughly 22 miles long and reaching 214 feet deep. Swimming happens at developed public beach parks along the shoreline rather than at a single wild swimming hole, and Seattle Parks runs several of them, including Madison Park, Magnuson Park, Denny Blaine, and Matthews Beach, several with seasonal lifeguards.

The water at these shoreline beaches is calm and lake-like, with no current, which suits families and casual swimmers. The lake famously recovered from mid-century pollution after sewage was diverted in 1968, and by the recovery era it was documented as roughly twice as clear as it had been in 1950.

Chinook Park is the day-use side of the Crescent Bar Recreation Area near Quincy, sitting on the shore of Wanapum Lake, the Columbia River reservoir behind Wanapum Dam. With six sandy beaches, a boat launch, and picnic shelters below the basalt cliffs of central Washington's canyon country, it is an easygoing swimming hole option for this stretch of the Columbia.

This is flat reservoir water rather than river current, which keeps things gentle, but there are no lifeguards and jumping or diving into the water is prohibited anywhere in the recreation area. The boat launch and marina bring steady jet ski and pontoon traffic right offshore, so keep swimmers on the designated beaches.

Duvall Beach is the kind of river swimming hole that families keep coming back to. It sits on a sandy stretch of the Snoqualmie River right at the edge of downtown Duvall, inside McCormick Park, and the water here moves slow and stays calm and warm through summer. That makes it better for wading, splashing, and lazy floating than for any serious swimming, which is exactly what most people show up for.

The soft sand beach is easy on little feet, and the city reportedly puts out free loaner lifejackets right on site. If you want to make an outing of it, the flat gravel Snoqualmie Valley Trail runs straight into the park, so you can walk or bike in before cooling off in the river.

Cascade Lake is the swimming centerpiece of Moran State Park on Orcas Island, a forest-ringed lake below Mount Constitution with a buoy-marked swim beach at the main day-use area. Visitors describe the water as clear and, unlike a lot of Washington lakes, not glacially cold, which makes it genuinely comfortable for summer swimming rather than a quick polar plunge.

You actually get two swimming holes for the price of one here. The main beach is a roped-off, shallow, sandy-entry area built with young kids in mind, while a quieter lagoon nearby offers deeper water for stronger swimmers, though its rocky bottom gets slippery on the way in and out.

Blue Hole is exactly what it sounds like: a vivid blue-green pool in the middle of the Ohanapecosh River, reached by a very short, easy trail from La Wis Wis Campground in Gifford Pinchot National Forest. The Upper Cowlitz people historically fished this spot, and the trail itself shows up on a Forest Service map from 1917, so this swimming hole has been drawing people for a long time.

The water is cold, no way around it. One visiting family called it freezing but so refreshing, which about sums up swimming in a river fed from Mount Rainier. The pool itself is calm enough for wading, but the river around it is serious whitewater, so stay in the hole proper.

Medina Beach Park is a small city-owned swimming hole on Lake Washington in the quiet residential city of Medina, on Seattle's Eastside. The setup is simple and pleasant: a modest 50-foot stretch of sandy beach with walk-in water entry, a swim float anchored offshore, and a dock that doubles as a launch spot for paddleboards and kayaks.

The City of Medina staffs the beach with lifeguards during the summer months, July through August, which makes it a family-oriented swim spot rather than a swim-at-your-own-risk shoreline. Outside that window the guards are gone, so keep closer watch on kids near the dock and float, where the water gets deeper.

Cranberry Lake sits at the northwest end of Whidbey Island inside Deception Pass State Park, and people have been swimming here since the 1930s, when the Civilian Conservation Corps built the bathing area, stone seawall, and picnic shelters that still stand today. The whole area was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2019, which makes this one of the more storied swimming holes in Washington.

The swim zone is roped off with floating buoys right next to the parking lot, in the open grassy area the CCC cleared at the lake's east end. Multiple sources describe it as a family-friendly roped-off swimming beach with picnic tables close by, and there is even a seasonal lake store and espresso stand nearby in summer.