Penn Cove Water Festival

Coupeville, WA

The Penn Cove Water Festival features annual tribal canoe races, Native arts and crafts, demonstrations, storytelling, dance performances, artist demonstrations, authentic Native foods, children's activities, and exhibits and displays. Come visit this year or get involved today!

Photos courtesy of the Island County Historical Society

Support the Penn Cove Water Festival!
A 501 c 3 non-profit organization
Send your contribution to
Penn Cove Water Festival
PO Box 393
Coupeville WA 98239

For lodging and visitor information, please email Island County Tourism at

SherryeWyatt@IslandCountyTourism.com.
or visit:
The Central Whidbey Chamber of Commerce

2011 Whale Wheel
by Roger Purdue
Artist Roger Purdue wants to see whales honored, and he wants them to return to Penn Cove. He wonders if the whales remember that bad things happened to them in the Cove, and if they could be watching and waiting for us to do the right things, so they can return.

All the right things happened to bring about the creation of the Whale Wheel. A magnificent piece of cedar was about to be reduced to kindling, and though Roger could no longer do it himself, a group of talented carvers was willing to do the work.

The wheel shape reminds us of the Native American Circle of Life, and similar teachings by professor David Suzuki on the continuity of life. Just as all of the atoms in our bodies were part of other life forms before us, they will be dispersed to yet other living things after us; perhaps the salmon, the bear or the whale. ###

Holding to tradition, the Penn Cove Water Festival is represented by an original design by Tsimshian artist Roger Purdue.

This year's design is the new "Whale Wheel" design, depicting 5 Orcas in the Northwest Native art style. The design will not only adorn the 2011 Water Festival T-shirts, posters and fine art prints, but is also featured on the new Whale Wheel being carved by local Coupeville carver's under Roger's direction. The carved whale wheel will replace the salmon wheel, carved by Roger and unveiled at the 1995 Penn Cove Water Festival.

The immense, beautiful interactive salmon wheel has been a favorite focal point of the Coupeville waterfront, with residents and visitors giving it a spin as they walk by. The salmon wheel will be "retired" and put on display in the Island County Historical Society Museum, and replaced by the new Whale Wheel. Roger chose orcas for the new design of the wheel, to honor the orcas and to remember the whales taken and killed during the Penn Cove orca captures of the 1970s.

Carvers of the new Whale Wheel, designed by Coupeville artist and carver Roger Purdue: Back row - L to R: Dick Weber, Peter Wolff, Gordon Grant, Joseph Albert. Front row - L to R: Jim Short, Chris Eliassen, Phil Kempbell. Photo by Lynda Imburgia

The donation of Roger's art talent is reproduced on T-shirts, posters and fine art prints, which can be purchased at the Information Booth at the foot of the Coupeville Wharf. The Water Festival Association appreciates Roger's generosity, which raises funds to support the event and contributes to its ongoing success. Framed posters and prints are available year 'round at Windjammer Gallery, at 22 Front Street, near the Water Festival Information Booth during the Festival.

Purchase T-shirts with the 2011 Whale Wheel, this year's Penn Cove Water Festival Logo in Coupeville at the Coupeville Wharf Store, on the historic Coupeville Wharf.

In memory of Charlie Sneatlum

Photo by Lynda Imburgia
Charlie Sneatlum drums and sings his family song to bless the 2006 Coupeville Canoe Races

Photo courtesy of the Sneatlum family/Muckleshoot tribe
Charles Sneatlum with mother

The Penn Cove Water Festival Association Dedicates the Penn Cove Water Festival to the life and memory of Charlie Sneatlum, and to honor the memory and history of the Chiefs of Coupeville:

Chief Charlie Snakelum (Snatelum) (Sneatlum)
Chief Charlie George
Chief Charlie (lil George)
Charlie George (Tenas)

Many thanks to Charlie's family for bringing him to Coupeville to bless the Festival and Canoe Races with his presence in 2006 and 2007. His words, songs, and smile still waft over the waters of Penn Cove~

You can do your part to keep Penn Cove clean.

Pollution from run-off can harm and devastate marine life, even in Penn Cove, but it can be reduced significantly by residents everywhere. It starts where Puget Sound starts: here. Here are a few basic guidelines.

If you use chemicals like pesticides or fertilizer on your yard please be very cautious and if possible eliminate them entirely. When phosphorus in fertilizer washes off of our lawns into lakes, rivers, and eventually into Puget Sound, it causes rapid growth of weeds and smelly algae blooms that can harm fish, wildlife and public health.

Check under your car for oil spots, and if you see them, you're not only wasting oil, you are also polluting the land, which runs off into the rivers and streams, or directly into Puget Sound. If you wash your car, soap and oily residues can run into the Sound as well. Please use commercial car washes with controlled drains whenever possible.

Bacteria from pet waste can raise fecal coliform in Puget Sound to unhealthy levels, so please bag up and dispose of pet waste. If your septic system is in disrepair it may be leaching coliform into the soil and the Sound. Make sure your septic system is functioning well.

Wherever we live – in cities, suburbs or rural areas, from the South Sound to the North Sound and throughout the Salish Sea, our daily actions can contaminate stormwater runoff with pollution. Untreated stormwater flows down gutters and ditches, over roads and yards and into storm drains, or directly into streams, rivers and lakes and into Puget Sound – where it impairs reproduction and lowers immunity of the full range of marine organisms, from microscopic plankton to the Southern Resident orcas.

To learn more about how pollutants run off the land into Puget Sound and how to reduce them, see: