SEQUIM — The annual Irrigation Festival will be a little different this year, with an extended parade route, an additional parade and a larger car show.
The festival — the oldest continuous city celebration in the state — will take place May 7-8 and May 12-14 in Sequim.
It commemorates the May 1, 1896, opening of the headgate on Sequim’s irrigation system, which to this day funnels water from the Dungeness River to thirsty land in the surrounding area.
Festival chairman Joe Borden ran down several details for members of the Sequim-Dungeness Chamber of Commerce on Tuesday — including an announcement that the Irrigation Festival royalty float will be unveiled at 5:30 p.m. today at the barn where it is stored near the corner of Fifth Avenue and Old Olympic Highway.
The float makes its debut Saturday in the Tacoma Daffodil Festival.
The festival royalty — Queen Jennifer Brown and Princesses Jessica Horton, Bobbi Gunn and Whitney Bigger — will represent Sequim in 16 parades across the region this year.
Two blocks longer
Sequim’s Irrigation Festival will be two blocks longer this year, going down Washington Street all the way to Seventh Avenue.
That allows the parade to go past more of the businesses that support the festival, Borden said, but it’s also necessitated some additional traffic planning to make sure everything runs smoothly.
“People are saying, ‘Wow, that’s a big scary adventure’ — and it is,” Borden said.
“These folks have supported our festival for many years . . . and they’ve been talking to us for years about having the parade come down there.”
There will also be a “Super Cruz Car Parade” before the main parade, featuring cars entered in the festival’s car show. The cars will caravan to the show location at the corner of West Washington Street and Fifth Avenue.
