The annual Waterfront Festival returns this Saturday and Sunday with a boat building contest, a marine swap meet, and even a funeral march, complete with music.

Opening Day for the Anacortes Farmers Market is Saturday, bringing sunshine, good friends, fresh produce, specialty foods and shiny, happy handcrafts to the area next to the Depot Arts Center.

The sign on Commercial Ave. says it all: the city and the parks foundation have gone over the top. They have over $325,000 pledged for the repair of the Tommy Thompson Parkway trestle that was damaged by a fire.

The city Parks and Recreation Department is asking climbers and hikers to stay out of the Skyline Arête area of Mount Erie because nesting peregrine falcons have moved in. Jonn Lunsford released a map showing the area to avoid.

The two refineries on March Point participated in an oil spill response drill on Monday that was conducted by the state Department of Ecology, in association with a private, non-profit contractor, Marine Spill Response Corp. 

The old railroad bed that linked March Point to downtown Anacortes, now paved, was a vital link to the dozens of industrial facilities that lined Fidalgo Bay in the last century.