Join Orca Network and Gary the Gray Whale for the 5th annual Welcome the Whales Day Festival & Parade on Saturday, April 19, 2008, from 10 am - 5 pm in Langley on Whidbey Island, WA. .

Orca Network, the Langley Chamber of Commerce, and South Whidbey Rotary are sponsoring the fifth annual Welcome the Whales Day in Langley, Whidbey Island. This event honors and celebrates the spring arrival of resident gray whales to Whidbey Island with fun and educational activities, music, presentations, and a parade of species featuring the handsome 20 foot Gray Whale, Gary. Begin now to design your critter costume for the parade - or if you don't have time to make a costume, come early in the day to create your costume before the parade.

The day begins with hands-on educational displays, costume-making, and kid's activities at the Methodist Church Fellowship Hall (3rd and Anthes St.), beginning at 10 am. The Whale Museum is bringing their Gray Whale Skeleton project, so you can help put the bones together while learning about these amazing whales. Staging for the "critter parade" begins at 12:45 in the parking lot at Cascade and 6th St. The parade begins at 1:30, down the hill on Cascade and First Streets, ending at the Langley Waterfront Park for music and celebration, and hopefully viewing gray whales swimming nearby.

At 3 pm, educational slide shows will be presented at the Methodist Church by Erin Falcone of Cascadia Research, and by Orca Network staff and Cindy Hansen of the Whale Museum. Erin will discuss our local gray whales and the overall population of gray whales along the Pacific Coast.

Orca Network and Cindy Hansen will present a slide show on our recent wonderful trip to Baja to visit the gray whales in their mating and birthing lagoons, where we were honored to meet a few of the "Friendly" gray whales of Baja.

We hope you will join us in this fun celebration, and come strut your fur, fins, or feathers with us as we welcome home our favorite spring visitors, the majestic Saratoga Gray whales.

(Volunteers are still needed!)

Click here for detailed information.