Vashon Island, WA
You Came for the Pain. Stay for the Island.
Vashon is twelve square miles of hills, farms, eccentric neighbors, and surprisingly good coffee. Most riders take the ferry back the same day. The ones who stay the weekend are making a better decision.
A Real Island That Requires a Ferry
Vashon is not connected to the mainland by a bridge. This is intentional — it's a significant part of why the island is the way it is. Getting here means catching a Washington State Ferry from Fauntleroy in West Seattle, Point Defiance in Tacoma, or Southworth on the Kitsap Peninsula. Getting off is free. Getting on costs money. Plan the ferry both ways before you book anything.
Vashon Island
Eat and Drink Well
Vashon has a real food scene for an island of 11,000 people. These are the places worth knowing — for the night before the ride, the morning of, or the long lunch after you've finally stopped moving.
Coffee
Minglement / Vashon Island Coffee Roasterie
Roasting since the days of Seattle's Best Coffee — this is the same building, the same equipment, and an entirely different operation run with genuine care. Sit on the front porch, order something strong, and watch the island go about its morning. Also: herbs, spices, and a shop that takes some time to explore.
Hardware Store Coffee
Opens early. If you're catching a 6am ferry to make the 7am start, this is where you stop first. Know what you want before you get in line.
Breakfast & Lunch
Gravy
Southern and French influences, seasonal local ingredients, and biscuits that are worth making a trip for. Arrive early on weekends — there's a line before they open and it doesn't get shorter. The night-before-the-ride dinner option, or the long post-ride lunch.
Sugar Shack
A Vashon town fixture. Good for the morning or midday, often with live music on weekends. The kind of place you end up staying longer than you planned.
Dinner
The Hardware Store Restaurant
The name is not a metaphor — it used to be a hardware store, and it's been on the National Register of Historic Places since 2000. Good food, right in town. The classic Vashon dinner option, and a community center with better clams than most.
May Kitchen + Bar
The best Thai food on the island — which undersells it. Hidden behind a red curtain, the dining room is covered floor to ceiling in 150-year-old Thai teak paneling. Tuesday nights are dinner and live jazz. Make a reservation.
Bramble House
The fine dining option on Vashon, and it earns it. Locally influenced, exquisite dishes, accommodating of most dietary restrictions. The place to go when you want to feel like you've done something right with your weekend.
The Rock Island Pizza
Pizza, Vashon-style. If you're arriving on the island Friday evening and want something uncomplicated and good, this is it. Also the answer to "what do we feed a group of hungry cyclists."
La Isla
Mexican food from an on-island kitchen — and the reason the Devil's Taco Feast at the end of P2P tastes as good as it does. Takeout only, Saturday afternoons. Plan accordingly.
Bars & Drinks
The Ruby Brink
Bar, butcher shop, and kitchen. Menu changes daily. Everything sourced locally and sustainably. The kind of place that defines what makes Vashon's food scene worth the ferry fare. Closed Mondays.
Dragon's Head Cider — Uptown
Small-batch hard cider made from apples grown on the island, a mile west of town. The uptown tasting room is open year-round for flights, bottles, and small bites. The orchard location — with picnic tables and hammocks among the trees — is open May through October. Either one is worth your afternoon.
Vashon Brewing Company
The local brewery. Open afternoons and evenings. The kind of place where you can rehash your ride in detail with people who either did the same thing or have no idea what you're talking about and don't mind.
Vashon Island
While You're Here
P2P takes you through a lot of the island. Here's what's worth seeing when you're not on a bike — or when you are, just off the main course routes.
Outdoors
Point Robinson Lighthouse
On the east shore of Maury Island, operational since 1885 and on the National Register of Historic Places since 2004. The driftwood beach, picnic tables, and views toward Rainier across the Sound are worth the detour even when the lighthouse itself isn't open. Sunday tours run mid-May through mid-September.
Quartermaster Harbor
The protected water between Vashon and Maury Islands — calm, scenic, and where the Vashon Island Rowing Club trains and races. Jensen Point, the P2P start/finish, sits right on the harbor. Worth a walk after the ride if your legs still work.
Lisabeula Park
A small shoreline park on the west side of the island with beach access, a boat launch, and a sanican. P2P riders pass through this area on course — it looks different when you're not being pitchforked up a hill. Good for dogs, sunsets, and anyone who needs to just sit near water for a while.
Bike the Island (More)
You've already seen most of it from the saddle, but there are roads that don't appear on the P2P course — Point Robinson, the south end of Maury Island, the quieter back roads around Portage. If your legs still work on Sunday morning, these are worth exploring.
Arts & Culture
Vashon Theatre
A functioning single-screen movie theater built in 1947, family owned and operated. First-run films, good concessions, beer available at the counter. This is rarer than it should be. Check what's playing before you dismiss it.
Vashon Farmers Market
Saturdays, May through October, at the Village Green in town. Local produce, food vendors, the kind of crowd that makes you understand why people move to islands. Ride day is a Saturday — come back Sunday and catch the market on the way to the ferry.
Ober Park
The center of town in the best possible way — library, playground, grassy berms, community festivals, and free summer concerts on Thursday evenings in August. No dogs, no alcohol, and no reason to leave quickly.
Only on Vashon
Den of Pin
A vintage pinball museum with 30+ electromechanical machines from the 1950s–70s, all set to free play with your admission. Pay once, play all day, leave and come back. Kids under 7 free; adults 81 and over also free — the pricing policy alone is worth the trip. Monthly tournaments, leagues, and repair workshops round it out.
Dragon's Head Cider Orchard
The orchard location — open May through October — has 4,000 cider apple trees, picnic tables, Adirondack chairs, and a couple of hammocks. Bring food from the Uptown location, or bring your own. Kids and dogs welcome here. The kind of afternoon that makes the ferry line feel tolerable afterward.
The best place to check out "everything else we have going on over here"
is https://www.vashonevents.org/shoppingonvashon. They pretty much have it covered. Food, lodging, events, activities, shopping, .... just go there.
If you are already smitten and want to look at real estate here, get in touch with the fine folks at either of these loyal P2P sponsors:
Windermere Vashon, P2P's perennial Premier Sponsor and hosts of the P2P sandwich stop near the middle of town.
John L. Scott, known for its creative P2P checkpoint and appreciated for its transportation support.
Need something for your bike? Want to rent or buy a bike? Gotcha covered:
Vashon Bikes. Our passion is bicycles. Our mission is to keep you riding year round and for years to come.
Bouldering, anyone? The aptly named Recess Lab has that and much more to happify and tire out your carload.
ISLAND RESOURCES
FOREST WALKSBurton Acres Park – Across the street from the P2P start/finish