It is a mix of residential areas and commercial enterprises, including crabbing, oystering, clamming, timbering, security training and gravel extraction.

Port Townsend occupies the northern end of the Quimper Peninsula, 5 miles (8 km) east of the northeast corner of the bay.

Cape George is located on high bluffs at the northeast entrance of the bay; Beckett Point is a shoreline community a mile south.

Diamond Point is located at the northwest mouth of the bay, opposite Protection Island, which once hosted a government quarantine station.

Native people – the Klallam (locally: S'Klallam) – have occupied the lands around the Strait of Juan de Fuca for millennia, including locations on Discovery Bay.

A landing party put ashore along the west shore of the bay near what is now Contractor's Point to fill water barrels from the creek there.