JAMESTOWN – About 20 canoes glided onto shore at Jamestown on Sunday as the Jamestown S’Klallam tribe prepared to welcome about 600 visitors on the Paddle to Lummi Canoe Journey at the tribe’s Stommish Grounds near Bellingham by July 30.
After an overnight rest, the crews will launch for Port Townsend.
On Sunday, tiny dots of canoes appeared on the horizon and slowly emerged from the fog that was settled on the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
“The waters were calm but there was quite a bit of the fog,” Tabitha Phair, who was pulling on the Lummi canoe, said.
“The fog finally lifted about 2 in the afternoon
“Now we are just getting ready for the festivities and good food.”
Phair hails from Lummi Island, where members of regional canoe families are expected to gather July 30.
One of the Lummi canoes’ skippers Jeff James Jr. – who wore a traditional feather headdress made of hawk feathers – spoke for the group as their paddles were held up as symbols of peace as he asked to come ashore.
Drummers, singers and other tribal members of the Jamestown S’Klallam welcomed them.
It was James’ second year on the journey and first as a skipper.
“It is a huge responsibility and I am very honored to do it,” he said.
The stop at Jamestown was the second for the Lummi canoe, which will join the journey to go back home by journeying along the Strait and down through the Puget Sound.
Among this year’s canoe participants from the North Olympic Peninsula are the Jamestown S’Klallam, Lower Elwha Klallam, Makah, Quileute, Hoh and Quinault tribes.
Canoes arrived in Jamestown from the Quileute, Hoh, Quinault, Makah and Lower Elwha Klallam tribes.
Elaine Grinnell, a storyteller and elder in the Jamestown S’Klallam tribe, greeted the canoes welcoming them to the festivities.
She hailed the pullers as warriors who were able to fight through the thick fog to arrive at the site.
A dinner was prepared for the group at Sequim High School and members were to camp out at Greywolf Elementary School before preparing to leave for Port Townsend this morning.
“It is a really significant event,” said Heather Johnson-Jock, Jamestown S’Klallam tribal council secretary who will also join the journey as a puller.
“It is about renewing the connections of our peoples.”
The annual Canoe Journey honors the traditions of transportation and trade used by coastal tribes of the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia, and was started in 1989 by Quinault elder Emmett Oliver with the “Paddle to Seattle.”
Those crossing the Strait came from Beecher Bay, T’sou-ke, Musgamakw Tsawataineuk, Esquimalt, Ahousaht, Gold River and Tsartlip First Nations, as well as one from 14 federated tribes on the west coast of Vancouver Island.
Rain is expected to dump on the Puget Sound area over much of this week, but pullers said they expect to keep paddling to Lummi Island as long as winds stay subdued.
An important day on the way to Lummi will be the landing at Point Elliott near Mukilteo, where regional tribes met with Territorial Gov. Isaac Stevens to sign Treaty of Point Elliott in 1855.
This year will be the first time since the treaty was signed that all the related tribes will gather on that beach.
