A Civilized Weekend

This is how a lot of folks come in for the Festival.

Well, Ma and Pa packed up the skiff with handmade goods and a cooler and floated off to the island for a weekend Seafood Festival and Arts & Crafts Show.  I don’t think they will make a song about it, but a fun time was had by one and all.

Local art carving.

It was held in Coffman Cove, an ex-logging camp/fishing port turned “town” which is what all our communities on POW Island are.  I won’t say it is small but I’m pretty sure all residents have to go off island to find spouses!  Well, all 165 Coffman Coveans pulled together a great event.

More carving, salmon run.

It was 100% rain all three days but we were under tent and no one up here seems to mind a little water.  It would be nice if it were a warm rain…  They pulled in 30 some venders and some wonderful raffle prizes.  With 165 people your raffle odds go way up!  I won two wildlife ink prints and a $25 gift certificate to the local diner – it almost paid for two hamburgers for our lunch one day!

Linn whooping up a hat.

But who wanted hamburgers with all that seafood.  I couldn’t believe the first meal, Lar got fried halibut which we eat at home 3 X per week.  He said he wanted to taste how someone else cooked it, something about not burned…  Over the weekend we had our choice of oysters, B B Q salmon, clam chowder in sour dough bread bowls, shrimp gumbo and a vender flew in fresh fruit from America!!  Her lines were the longest.  We tasted peaches and Washington sweet cherries!

Linn's Bare skin blankets on display.

We have a friend here who makes stone jewelry and I helped at her booth.  I sold all my fish shaped pot holders and debuted my animal hats.  They were a big hit.  Other venders were a varied lot and a lot different than you would see down there.   There were wood carvers, rustic furniture makers, and beachcombers “found” art.  There were bone artists ( I will leave that description up to your imagination) and several native, tribal art booths.  I am not a fan of the stylized red and black animal spirit print but to each their own. A gal made waterproof fabric bags called Mermaid Purses that were cute.  Christmas spoiler alert!  There is a wonderful soap maker on island and a beader that works with pinhead sized beads.  There was even a tie died tee shirt maker who never left the sixties!  A woman who had sewn “Grandma” style full aprons sold out – is this a trend that I missed?

Cat with all her stuff, she had half the tent and was a big hit.

Plus they had entertainment!  It was listed as a battle of the bands, but no bands showed up.  We were instead serenaded by several Bob Dillons with guitar.  They had a hilarious fish topic poetry slam (who would have guessed?  Fishermen do spend a lot of time alone on their boats with thought of fish.) and fireworks over the Bay.  I love fireworks!

This young lady posed for me, (if you look close) she is wearing rain gear under her dress. 

 Besides set up and breakdown and all other grunt work, Larry got to walk around and talk to new people.  He took his walkingstick with all the National Parks emblems on it.  It is a real conversation piece.

Yes indeed,  A great time was had by all.

Tents with band playing bluegrass in the center tent.

Larry said to add that on the way home we sneaked (lets not use that word since we weren't supposed to go that way, lets use) took short cut on to the main road to home that is closed for construction to check on their progress.  It is ten miles that is being paved with a finish date of 2016.  After all summer they now have a whooping 3 mi. prepped then is it mud slides and rock the rest of the way.  The current detour is a one lane forest service road that won't be passable in the snow...should be an interesting four winters 'round here.