Re:Festivals: Coupeville Water Festival
T'ruth took these pictures of the canoe "Stahlo Princess" at last year's Penn Cove Water Festival
We're not canoers (yet) but it seemed like a longish course: miles, anyway
This one is on the way out:
& this is almost at the finish
(From the Bellingham Herald report on the Lummi Stommish festival, 6/19/06:
War canoes, created from a single piece of cedar, are up to 50 feet long....
The canoe of Stahlo Princess, a ladies team except for skipper [Ralph] Jefferson, is painted pink and white.
Training includes two-hour daily workouts, healthy eating and abstaining from drugs and alcohol. It's a commitment, Jefferson says.
"It's a really, really hard sport," he said.
But the winning races made it all worth it, he said.
"It's awesome. This is what it's all about. It's part of who we are. It's been going on for thousands of years."
"These ladies really are champions," he said.
We're not canoers (yet) but it seemed like a longish course: miles, anyway
This one is on the way out:
& this is almost at the finish(From the Bellingham Herald report on the Lummi Stommish festival, 6/19/06:
War canoes, created from a single piece of cedar, are up to 50 feet long....
The canoe of Stahlo Princess, a ladies team except for skipper [Ralph] Jefferson, is painted pink and white.
Training includes two-hour daily workouts, healthy eating and abstaining from drugs and alcohol. It's a commitment, Jefferson says.
"It's a really, really hard sport," he said.
But the winning races made it all worth it, he said.
"It's awesome. This is what it's all about. It's part of who we are. It's been going on for thousands of years."
"These ladies really are champions," he said.
)
(
regarding canoes and culture...
I also came, websurfing, across the following in the Juneau Empire (3/15/05) this morning:
Tribes welcome and thank visitor for canoe
PORT ANGELES, Wash. - When Gerald "Woody" Woodside brought a handmade canoe to the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribal Center, he might have expected a word of thanks.
But tribal members who had assembled for a meeting there celebrated his surprise gift in traditional ways - singing and dancing for an hour and presenting him with gifts in return.
Woodside was a stranger from Port Gamble when he showed up at the center Saturday with a 21-foot cedar-and-fiberglass canoe atop his truck. The interior is built of cedar strips and the outside is shiny black fiberglass with bright orange trim.
He wanted to donate the canoe to youth of the Lower Elwha Klallam, calling the gift simply "a good thing to do."
"I kind of surprised them with it," he told the Peninsula Daily News.
On hand were 80 people who were planning this summer's Tribal Journey, in which people from coastal tribes will travel by canoe from parts of Canada and Washington to a gathering in Port Angeles.
Fourteen men lifted the canoe from the truck and brought it into the center's gym, where they circled the basketball court, then set the craft down on tumbling mats at midcourt.
There it was blessed by elder Johnson Charles, the Lower Elwha Klallam's spiritual adviser. Singers from several tribes took turns chanting songs of celebration and thanks. When they finished, the whole group joined in the "Journey Song."
"This is a vessel that takes us to different places," said Ray Fryberg, a Tulalip tribes member, "different places in the land, different places in our lives."
"How many people can the canoe hold?" asked Michael Evans, skipper of the Snohomish tribe's canoe, the Blue Heron. "An infinite number, but only four or five at a time. So fill it full of people again and again. Fill it full of young people."
)
we also heard the Tulalip Family Singers at the Penn Cove Festival, which are led I believe by the above-mentioned Ray Fryberg
; they are a very inspiring family performance group. Do not miss them if they perform in your area!
regarding canoes and culture...
I also came, websurfing, across the following in the Juneau Empire (3/15/05) this morning:
Tribes welcome and thank visitor for canoe
PORT ANGELES, Wash. - When Gerald "Woody" Woodside brought a handmade canoe to the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribal Center, he might have expected a word of thanks.
But tribal members who had assembled for a meeting there celebrated his surprise gift in traditional ways - singing and dancing for an hour and presenting him with gifts in return.
Woodside was a stranger from Port Gamble when he showed up at the center Saturday with a 21-foot cedar-and-fiberglass canoe atop his truck. The interior is built of cedar strips and the outside is shiny black fiberglass with bright orange trim.
He wanted to donate the canoe to youth of the Lower Elwha Klallam, calling the gift simply "a good thing to do."
"I kind of surprised them with it," he told the Peninsula Daily News.
On hand were 80 people who were planning this summer's Tribal Journey, in which people from coastal tribes will travel by canoe from parts of Canada and Washington to a gathering in Port Angeles.
Fourteen men lifted the canoe from the truck and brought it into the center's gym, where they circled the basketball court, then set the craft down on tumbling mats at midcourt.
There it was blessed by elder Johnson Charles, the Lower Elwha Klallam's spiritual adviser. Singers from several tribes took turns chanting songs of celebration and thanks. When they finished, the whole group joined in the "Journey Song."
"This is a vessel that takes us to different places," said Ray Fryberg, a Tulalip tribes member, "different places in the land, different places in our lives."
"How many people can the canoe hold?" asked Michael Evans, skipper of the Snohomish tribe's canoe, the Blue Heron. "An infinite number, but only four or five at a time. So fill it full of people again and again. Fill it full of young people."
)
we also heard the Tulalip Family Singers at the Penn Cove Festival, which are led I believe by the above-mentioned Ray Fryberg
; they are a very inspiring family performance group. Do not miss them if they perform in your area!
Labels: festivals
posted by yesIah garvey at
2:02 p.m.
1 Comments:
from this year's festival page:
"The Penn Cove Water Festival has formed a new planning committee consisting of community members from the Town of Coupeville, Port of Coupeville, South Whidbey, Orca Network, Beachwatchers, Native Tribal representatives and Skagit Valley College. This committee has been working tirelessly to revitalize the festival and take it in a direction of more traditional Native American culture and traditions with emphasis on Native education and the importance of environmental resources as it relates to Native traditions"
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