Seattle's Secret Beach

Where is it? We were at Golden Gardens yesterday and it was packed, but packed is not the problem. You kind of want it to be packed unless there's absolutely no space to stake out as your own with a blanket or towel. It's the parking. REI had some kind of event that privatized half the upper parking area, so things were pretty dire. We'd given up and were headed home before a divine intervention parted the cars for us. So given that it's a hot day early in the summer and there's a race of some kind going on, where the hell do you park? Do you try to score something at Shilshole and walk over? Do you keep driving up the hill and rapel down from where ever you find something?

Or do you just skip it and head to Colman Pool like our office mate just told us she did yesterday? Heated saltwater and West Seattle views? What's not to love? We also have reports of impromptu beachifying at Gasworks Park and other Lake Union locations occuring at various times over the weekend, but what we're really looking for is one decent beach with sand, swimmable water and parking. Is there such a thing?