Langley welcomes gray whales with parade, ceremony and family events

Whale fins, painted cardboard and children in homemade costumes moved through downtown Langley as the Welcome the Whales Parade carried the island’s most distinctive spring ritual from the Whidbey Island Center for the Arts parking lot to Seawall Park.

The long-running festival, organized by Orca Network with the Langley Chamber of Commerce and the Langley Whale Center, has become one of South Whidbey’s signature weekends. Chamber materials have described it as a 22nd annual celebration, and the event has grown into a fixture that draws both residents and visitors into town before the summer rush.

This year’s message was bigger than pageantry. Organizers used the weekend to celebrate the Sounders, the small group of gray whales that detour into North Puget Sound each spring to feed on ghost shrimp, while also pressing a point about stewardship in the waters that define Langley’s identity. Orca Network and Cascadia Research Collective have said roughly a dozen Sounders have been confirmed in the region in recent seasons, including catalogued whales such as CRC53 Little Patch, CRC531 Gretchen and CRC2249 Hattie. The feeding behavior, often visible as gray whales roll and suction mudflats in Saratoga Passage, Port Susan and Possession Sound, has become both a scientific focus and a local point of pride.

Saturday’s schedule began with costume making and family activities at Langley United Methodist Church at 11 a.m., followed by parade staging at 1:15 p.m. at the Whidbey Island Center for the Arts parking lot at 6th and Cascade. The parade started at 2 p.m. and ended at Hope the Gray Whale and the waterside gathering at Seawall Park about 2:30 p.m. The Langley Whale Center at 105 Anthes Ave stayed central to the weekend, with volunteer docents on hand for exhibits and questions.

The festival’s most practical effect is on the town’s spring economy. Shops, cafes, the Inn at Langley and whale-watch operators all benefit from the visitor traffic, and the weekend has become a reliable shoulder-season boost for downtown businesses. Orca Network also added a Friday evening Whale and Marine Mammal Trivia Night at Thirsty Crab Brewery in Clinton, widening the celebration beyond Langley itself.

Sunday brought a different kind of draw at the Clyde Theater, where a special screening of The Way of the Whale was scheduled at 11 a.m., followed by a virtual Q&A with producer and director Franco Campos-Lopez Benyunes. A fundraising whale-watch trip with Puget Sound Express also departed from Langley Marina, with check-in at 2:30 p.m. and a 3 p.m. sailing. That mix of celebration, education and fundraising comes as gray whale recovery remains fragile: NOAA said the eastern North Pacific unusual mortality event ended in November 2023 after 690 documented strandings, and federal counts show the population has not fully rebounded from its 2016 peak.

For Langley, the weekend linked a beloved public festival to the daily reality of living beside the whales, and to the responsibility of protecting the nearshore habitat that keeps bringing them back.