Mother Nature rains on 2023 boat parade

It didn't just rain on the Swinomish Yacht Club's Lighted Christmas Boat Parade Saturday night.

It rained hard after a gray day of steady rain.

But that hardly dampened enthusiasm for what has become a beloved La Conner holiday season event.

Downtown restaurants were filled with diners at tables with waterfront views. Folks wearing heavy coats and raingear and carrying umbrellas and glow-in-the-dark balloons on lighted poles made their way to the popular Swinomish Channel boardwalk, eager to see the lighted flotilla.

This year's theme was "Candy Land," and the decorated boats briefly provided a sweet contrast to the bitter cold conditions.

Parade entrants and outdoor spectators coped with chilly conditions made worse when a numbing rain hit a few minutes after the first colorfully lit vessels ventured from La Conner Marina. A few umbrellas came out. The smaller than usual crowd was never more than one-deep along the boardwalk and petered out completely south of the La Conner Pub and Eatery except for a small clump at the Calico Cupboard end.

Boats bearing lights with more colors than what's found in a roll of Lifesavers, along with gesturing Santas and beaming gift boxes – while staffed by skippers and guests hailing their shoreline fans with repeated wishes for a "Merry Christmas" – helped everyone warm to the occasion.

At least as much as possible.

But the parade did not last long and neither did the crowd. They melted away. Those leaving immediately for the first time in memory did not create a 30-minute-plus traffic jam with its corresponding red taillights twinkling bumper to bumper from the roundabout back to First Street.

The forecast for Saturday night had called for wintry rain – limiting to perhaps fewer than 10 the number of boats on the channel – and had led some to take to social media earlier in the day to ask if the parade would be canceled.

Yacht club representatives responded that the show would, indeed, go on.

So, paradegoers kept their reservations at La Conner eateries and inns and hardy souls made their way to the boardwalk. Most were bundled in favorite winter fashions. Even the several leashed dogs were dressed in warm sweaters. Some were lit up with strings of lights.

"We didn't know for sure if they'd still have the parade," said Gina McCarthy Torpey, of Enchanted Locks Hair Salon, who braved the rain, nonetheless.

"I'm glad I came," she said. "It was beautiful."

Torpey, wearing a stylish hooded winter coat, noted that numerous people watched from the heated comfort of their parked cars at the south end of town.

"At least," she noted, "it didn't rain during the first few minutes of the parade."

Shelter Bay resident Ernie Gomez, who works in La Conner, had a strong inkling that the parade would be held as scheduled.

"A lot of people," he pointed out, "had reservations at the restaurants and hotels."

Lisa Judy of the La Conner Artists Gallery Co-Op in the Pier 7 Building, whose grandparents, the late Jerry and Donna Blades, promoted and helped coordinate the boat parade for years, didn't let the weather quell her holiday spirit.

She donned for inside attire her red-and-white Mrs. Claus costume, described variously as adorable, cute, fabulous and pretty.

Many of the same terms were used to describe the lighted Christmas boats.

But not the weather.