Parade Floats, Exploding Boats...40 Years of Sea Cavalcade!

For forty years Sea Cavalcade has been Gibsons' biggest and best annual party. It is the climax of a Gibsons summer, when the town looks and feels its best, and everyone - residents and visitors alike - is feeling festive. It's a great tradition, and we hope it will last at least another forty years.

Sea Cavalcade was born in 1969 in order to bring the summer festivities of the Sunshine Coast's small communities together. Instead of having each Coast community host its own summer celebration at a different time - Sechelt had May Day, Gibsons had Dominion Day, and Port Mellon had Labour Day - event organizers decided to hold one big celebration in Gibsons, piecing together the best events and activities from other ones. The result was the Gibsons Sea Cavalcade, officially opened that year by Premier W.A.C. Bennett. The Coast News gave their verdict on August 27th 1969: "3 Day Sea Carnival Whopping Success."

Sea Cavalcade might look different in 2008 than it looked in 1969, but the basic substance remains the same. On a hot summer weekend in July or August, Gibsons springs into activity for three days and everyone (or so we suspect) feels a little more relaxed than usual. People wander the streets and take part in the festivities. That being said, it hasn't been the same every year - over Sea Cavalcade's four decades, events have come and gone. Some have changes over time, some new ones have been born, and some traditions have nobly withstood the test of time.

The most stalwart Sea Cavalcade tradition of all might be the big event itself - the parade, where community groups rally each year to put together the bigger, better, and more exciting floats with which to parade from the upper town to seaside lower Gibsons. The venerable and spectacular fireworks display could claim the same honour.

Both the parade and the fireworks display have been a feature of Sea Cavalcade since 1970. Other events that still appear at modern Sea Cavalcades include logger sports and the popular Keats Island swim - a race in which intrepid souls kick and splash home to Gibsons from the Government dock on Keats Island, approximately a mile. Community cookouts, salmon barbeques and other gastronomic revelry have come back year after year as well.

Some of the Sea Cavalcade traditions of yesteryear have gone away, though, and none of these dearly departed traditions were as flamboyant as the Boat Blow-Up. Beginning in 1970, for reasons not entirely clear, it became traditional to open the year's festivities by demolishing a derelict boat with explosives in Shoal Channel. Perhaps inexplicable, the Blow-Up was nonetheless wildly popular, and the tradition persisted for many years.

Many suspected 1979 would be the last year of exploding boats in Gibsons Harbour, after an over enthusiastic blast shattered windows from the Bluff to Grantham's Landing. But the Boat Blow-Up was not to be stopped; after a year's absence, it came back in 1981 under the auspices of The Beachcomber's special effects crew, who promised to use much less dynamite than before.

Another Sea Cavalcade classic was the tugboat race. It ran for the last time in 1979, foiled by the difficulties tugboat captains had in obtaining insurance to participate in a race all too likely to blow a boat's engine. While it was alive, it was not only a world-class tugboat race but the World's Largest Tugboat Race - perhaps, too, the world's only. The normally placid waters of Shoal Channel would be boiling and churning long after the mighty tugs had left, cheered on by the multitudes ashore.

The Sea Cavalcade Queen contest has all but disappeared over the years. Over the first two and a half decades of the festival the selection of candidates, the Miss Sea Cavalcade Pageant, and the crowning would occupy a major part of the public's attention. The Sea Cavalcade Queen and her princesses were unlucky if they didn't appear in at least two Coast News front pages in July and August. Nonetheless, new events have taken over from the once-central contest. From 1989 onward a senior lady who embodies the finest characteristics known to Gibsons life has been selected as the year's Gibsons Golden Girl. For nearly twenty years now, age, wisdom, community involvement, and generosity have been celebrated in this unique event.

Any brief description of such an important town event is bound to miss the myriad details that make Sea Cavalcade as enjoyable as it is. If it were just a weekend of amusing events in an attractive setting, it would never have lasted for four decades. No - Sea Cavalcade is what it is because it is Gibsons', and the Sunshine Coast's chance to come together, talk, and make merry. Neighbours and old acquaintances alike run into each other on the street and catch up. New friendships are formed. Visitors, as always, are welcomes with open arms. It's hard to imagine a Gibsons summer without Sea Cavalcade. We look forward to seeing what the next forty years will bring!