Ferries from Tahlequah

Tahlequah is Vashon Island's back door. Fifteen minutes from Tacoma and thirty kilometres of island road from the island's main terminal, it serves the quiet southern end and almost nothing else.

The crossing

Tahlequah to Point Defiance takes about 15 minutes, with 20 sailings in our timetable and 40 across the terminal in both directions. Operated by Washington State Ferries.

⚠ Two terminals, one island, thirty minutes apart

Vashon's other terminal, Vashon Heights, is at the northern tip and carries 195 sailings to West Seattle and the Kitsap Peninsula. Tahlequah carries 40, all of them to Tacoma.

They are not alternatives to each other in any practical sense. Booking or planning against the wrong one costs half an hour of driving on a two-lane island road.

What is at this end

Very little — a ramp, a waiting lane and the island's southern farms. The island's shops and services are at Vashon town, roughly in the middle, twenty minutes north.

Point Robinson lighthouse, on the Maury Island lobe east of here, is the nearest thing to an attraction and it is a drive away.

The Vashon end-to-end

Cyclists use this terminal as one end of a straightforward island traverse: on at Tahlequah from Tacoma, north through the island, off at Vashon Heights to West Seattle. About thirty kilometres of rolling road with two very different ferries at each end.

Timing

Twenty sailings across the day on a small vessel. Summer weekends can leave vehicles for the next boat, which on a fifteen-minute crossing is a short wait rather than a lost afternoon.