Plans shaping up for Bald Eagle Festival

Update: Correct starting time for parade is 12 noon

 


Plans are shaping up for Cathlamet’s Bald Eagle Days summer festival July 15 and 16.

The two-day festival includes the traditional parade, street fair, and fireworks show.

Organizers are enhancing the relatively new geocaching event, turning it into a two-day family geocaching competition treasure hunt.

Geocaching is a real-world, outdoor treasure hunting game using GPS-enabled devices. Participants navigate to a specific set of GPS coordinates and then attempt to find the geocache (container) hidden at that location.

Organizers have hidden several geocaches in the community with special travel bugs for the first to find. A travel bug is a dog tag with a trackable bar code that can be followed online as it travels the world from one cache to another.

Geocaching can be done from any smart phone. And for people who don't have a smart phone, organizers have many other hidden treasures to find. Participants can turn in their stamped treasure map on Saturday for the chance to win prizes.

Other action on Friday include the sidewalk art contest from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and live music, first at the farmers’ market on Puget Island and later at the Tsuga Art Gallery on Main Street. Tsuga will celebrate its sixth anniversary that afternoon with a reception and live music.

Also, organizers hope to have a concert by Skamokawa Swamp Opera at the Pioneer Community Center. The Pioneer Community Association is working with contractors to finish installation of a fire sprinkler system and sprucing up; the concert depends on whether or not building officials find all upgrades in good order.

Saturday action starts with a pancake breakfast sponsored by the Kiwanis Club of Cathlamet, 7-10 a.m. at the Elochoman Slough Marina. Proceeds go to youth and children’s programs sponsored by Kiwanis.

The annual fun run has been cancelled this year.

Main Street will close to vehicular traffic at 9 a.m., and vendors and other exhibitors begin setting up the street fair.

Participants in the Bald Eagle Parade will converge by 9:30 a.m. in the Wahkiakum High School parking lot to prepare their entries for judging. The parade starts at 12 noon (editor's note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly state the starting time was 11 a.m. The correct time is 12 noon.). The theme of this year’s festival and parade is “Where Tranquility Meets Adventure.”

During the afternoon, the Wahkiakum Historical Museum will offer train rides for kids and root beer floats. At the Cathlamet Fire Hall, firemen will lead tours of the facility and equipment and provide popsicles for refreshment.

The Bank of Pacific is hosting activities for children; the events include a large inflatable room, balloon animals, face painting, red neck horse shoes, a fishing hole, and shooting gallery.

Local fire departments are scheduled to hold their annual waterball tournament in front of the bank later in the afternoon.

The Chamber of Commerce has lined up a varied group of entertainers for the street fair. Hank & Lloyd and Layton & Pam Elliott will perform throughout the afternoon on the Main Street stage.

Saturday evening, The Cliffs of Cathlamet, 4 p.m., and The Mutineers, 6:30 p.m., will provide entertainment at the River Mile 38 Brewery Beer Garden.

And of course, the day ends with the fireworks show over the Columbia at 10 p.m.

 

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