Port Townsend's deepest daylight low of 2026 is −3.48 ft MLLW on Tuesday, July 14 at 10:25 AM, computed from NOAA station 9444900 — and the whole run of July 11–16 scores Exceptional. The easy pick is the weekend: both Saturday July 11 and Sunday July 12 rate a flat 100, with the tide bottoming out around 8 to 9 AM at Fort Worden's North Beach. A Discover Pass is required to park.
If you turn over rocks once this year on the north Olympic Peninsula, do it in the next two weeks. A single new-moon run in mid-July pulls the Sound back further, and in more daylight, than anything else on the Port Townsend calendar — and after summer the good water disappears into the dark until spring.
When is the lowest tide in Port Townsend in 2026?
Tidewindow computes windows for the Fort Worden beaches from the nearest NOAA prediction station, Port Townsend (9444900). Here are the eight deepest daylight lows of 2026, ranked by depth, with the score that folds tide depth and daylight together.
| Rank | Date | Low (ft MLLW) | Time of low | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tue, Jul 14 | −3.48 | 10:25 AM | 90 |
| 2 | Mon, Jul 13 | −3.48 | 9:36 AM | 90 |
| 3 | Wed, Jul 15 | −3.10 | 11:12 AM | 90 |
| 4 | Sun, Jul 12 | −3.10 | 8:47 AM | 100 |
| 5 | Tue, Aug 11 | −2.42 | 9:24 AM | 90 |
| 6 | Mon, Aug 10 | −2.37 | 8:33 AM | 90 |
| 7 | Sat, Jul 11 | −2.36 | 7:58 AM | 100 |
| 8 | Thu, Jul 16 | −2.36 | 11:59 AM | 90 |
Computed 2026-07-06 from NOAA station 9444900 predictions, MLLW.
Every one of the eight deepest daylight lows of the year lands in July or August, and six of them fall inside a single week. This is not a coast where good tide-pool days are scattered evenly across the calendar — the Sound saves almost everything for two mid-summer new moons and hands you very little the rest of the year.
Notice too that the two deepest days, July 13 and 14, score 90, while the shallower July 11 and 12 score a perfect 100. Depth is only half the story. The window scale rewards a low that sits squarely in comfortable daylight, and by the 14th the low has drifted to 10:25 AM, where the returning tide starts eating into midday. Sunday the 12th bottoms out at a gentler 8:47 AM. The methodology page shows exactly how depth and timing combine.
The July 11–16 Exceptional run
Deep lows arrive in runs of five or six consecutive mornings around a new or full moon, each day's low landing roughly 50 minutes later than the last. In July 2026 that run opens on Saturday the 11th and deepens through Thursday the 16th — every day of it an Exceptional (90+) daylight window.
| Date | Low (ft) | Time of low | Tide window | Arrive by | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sat, Jul 11 | −2.36 | 7:58 AM | 5:20–11:10 AM | 6:58 AM | 100 |
| Sun, Jul 12 | −3.10 | 8:47 AM | 6:00 AM–12:10 PM | 7:47 AM | 100 |
| Mon, Jul 13 | −3.48 | 9:36 AM | 6:45 AM–1:05 PM | 8:36 AM | 90 |
| Tue, Jul 14 | −3.48 | 10:25 AM | 7:35 AM–1:50 PM | 9:25 AM | 90 |
| Wed, Jul 15 | −3.10 | 11:12 AM | 8:30 AM–2:25 PM | 10:12 AM | 90 |
| Thu, Jul 16 | −2.36 | 11:59 AM | 9:30 AM–2:55 PM | 10:59 AM | 90 |
Computed 2026-07-06 from NOAA station 9444900 predictions. Scores (0–100) weigh tide depth and daylight together.
Watch the low time march down the column: 7:58 AM on Saturday, nearly noon by Thursday. The weekend gives you an early-morning low and a flat 100; the weekdays give you deeper water but a later start. If your calendar only bends on weekends, Saturday and Sunday are genuinely the pick here — you trade about a foot of extra draw-down for a low that lands before the beach fills. If you can take a weekday, Monday and Tuesday pull the Sound back to −3.48 ft, the deepest daylight water Port Townsend sees all year. This same run surfaces up and down the coast; the West Coast minus-tide roundup compares Port Townsend against Seattle, the outer coast, and California the same week.
Where to go at Fort Worden
The Port Townsend prediction station sits right off Fort Worden Historical State Park, and the park is where most people work these tides. North Beach, on the park's Strait of Juan de Fuca side, is the long cobble-and-sand shoreline that opens up on a deep low; the Point Wilson shoreline wraps around to the lighthouse at the northeast tip. (Washington State Parks notes that "though Point Wilson is only accessible through the park, it is not located on state parks land" — the lighthouse itself is federal.) The park also hosts the Port Townsend Marine Science Center, a natural-history museum and aquarium, if you want to put names to what you find.
One practical note before you go: a Discover Pass is required for vehicle access to Fort Worden, as at all Washington state parks — $10 for a one-day pass or $45 for the annual, per Washington State Parks. There are no gate hours to thread on the beach itself, so the tide is your only clock.
What you'll find in the pools
The last two months of community observations logged within a few kilometers of the station skew to hardy, cold-water residents of the rock and cobble. The standout is the Gumboot Chiton (Cryptochiton stelleri) — the largest chiton in the world, a leathery brick-red slab that can reach a foot long — the single most-reported species near the station. Alongside it, observers have logged the Mossy Chiton (Mopalia muscosa), the Frilled Dogwinkle (Nucella lamellosa), the Monterey Dorid and other nudibranchs, California Mussel, Nuttall's Cockle, and even a Giant Pacific Octopus (Enteroctopus dofleini) and a Pacific Geoduck (Panopea generosa). It is a good reminder that the Sound's cobble beaches hide as much as any rocky reef — you just have to look under and between.
Species reflect recent iNaturalist observations near the station (CC BY-NC, © the individual observers); NOAA is the tide-prediction data source. What you actually see depends on the day.
How to work the window
Use the arrive-by time in the table, not the low time — the National Park Service's tidepooling guidance puts it plainly: "Be at the tidepool area at least an hour before low tide so that you have plenty of time to explore safely while the water is receding," and "Return no later than an hour after the tide has begun to rise." For Sunday's 8:47 AM low that means being on the sand by about 7:47 AM.
Footing is the real hazard, not the water depth. NPS notes that reaching the intertidal zone "requires travel over sand, slippery rocks covered with algae, and pools of water with depths of a foot or more," and advises "comfortable shoes that can get wet and still give good traction." And leave the beach as you found it: "Do not disturb tidal pools, marine animals, or other wildlife. If you do handle an organism (again, please don't), return it to the location that you found it." Turn rocks back the way they were lying — the underside is someone's roof.
After July: the rest of 2026
August holds one more strong run — the weekend of August 8–9 opens it, with Sunday the 9th scoring a flat 100 (−2.05 ft at 7:38 AM) and the deeper water arriving Monday and Tuesday the 10th–11th. September thins out to six daylight minus tides, and then the season closes fast: Port Townsend records one daylight minus tide in October and none at all in November or December. That is not a data gap — it is the Sound's rhythm. Through late fall and winter every low below +1 ft arrives after dark, and even the winter king-tide lows land at dusk with only minutes of usable light. If you want to turn over rocks here, summer is the season.
For the day-by-day picture through the year, the Puget Sound low tide calendar has every window; the trip picker finds the multi-day runs like this one, and the year heatmap shows just how alone mid-July stands on the Port Townsend calendar. Curious why the best summer lows all come in the morning? The dawn-lows guide unpacks it. Six mornings, one moon — set an early alarm.