NEAH BAY — You can visit the Makah reservation this week for the nearly nonstop dancing, singing and storytelling by tribes from the Pacific Northwest and Canada, described by one participant as “the Indian Woodstock.”
You can also go for The Stuff.
Whether you want to buy a “Paddle to Makah” button, have an eye for Northwest Native arts and crafts or merely have a hankering for Indian tacos or fry bread, some 80 vendors are ready and waiting for you along the waterfront.
The wares run from strands of beads that cost $1 each (six for $5) to painstakingly handwoven cedar hats that cost up to $2,000.
Vendor tents are arranged near the circus-sized tent on the Neah Bay School athletic field on the west side of town, where dancers and singers perform every day this week through Saturday, and possibly on Sunday.
Free and open to the public, the thunder of drums and voices starts about 11 a.m. and continues into the late evening.
Called “protocols,” the songs, stories and dances by more than 50 Northwest tribes and Canadian First Nations celebrate their cultures and the 2010 Tribal Canoe Journey and thank their Makah hosts.
The Makah tribe will give the last presentation, said Crystal Denney, tribal journeys coordinator, and the tribe has planned a “big show.”
Nearby, small tent cities looking like multicolored mushrooms shelter the canoe journey participants, with scores of Honey Bucket portable toilets at strategic locations.
Electric golf carts shuttle the elderly and the disabled between the protocol tent and the street fair.
Clallam Transit will run its bus to Neah Bay, No. 16, on a schedule that is as close to normal as the event will permit, said the public bus agency’s dispatch center.
Campgrounds have been prepared at the Makah Tribal Center and the Hobuck Campground.
Those who want to volunteer to help can phone Michelle Parkin at 360-640-5336.
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Editor and Publisher John Brewer can reached at 360-417-3500 or john.brewer@peninsuladailynews.com