Sale along the Alsea Bay

Table your other plans,
it’s time for the Waldport
Great Garage Sale

By Gretchen Ammerman

Oregon Coast TODAY

With almost 30 sites between Seal Rock and Tidewater, the Waldport Great Garage Sale has you covered, with shopping options all day on Saturday, June 5.

“The event has been going on for years,” said Tom Fullmer, executive director of the Waldport Chamber of Commerce. “It was so successful that other communities took notice and started doing community-wide sales too.”

With the coast slowly coming out of the worst of the uncertainties caused by the pandemic, Fullmer wanted to be strategic in choosing this year’s date.

“I could never figure out why Waldport did the sales on Mother’s Day weekend in the past, since there is so much else happening that weekend,” he said. “I was trying to find another date that would work well and was talking to people in the community that had worked on previous Waldport Great Garage Sales, but I knew it couldn’t be too long because people kept asking me, ‘When are you doing the garage sales, when are you doing the garage sales?’”

Fullmer said the sales are as much an opportunity to share no-longer-needed items or score new ones for a song as it is a gathering for locals and longtime visitors.

“It’s really an opportunity for the community to come together,” Fullmer said. “They really look forward to it every year.”

A map of participating sites will be available beginning on Friday, June 4, at the chamber building, 585 NW Hemlock Street; Ray’s Food Place, 580 NE Broadway; the Port of Alsea, 365 NE Port Street; and many other spots around Waldport.

“It will be available online, too,” Fullmer said. “But a lot of people really like to have that printed map in hand.”

Another one of the pickup sites is Wave Broadband, which sponsored the cost of printing the maps.

“They are a sponsor, but they are also planning to have some fun giveaways and activities going on throughout the day,” Fullmer said. “They will be open on both Friday and Saturday.”

Waldport is also emerging from its COVID-enforced slumber with a few exciting new moves, including at the Alsea Bay Interpretive Center, which is now home to the Waldport Heritage Museum. Plans are underway for the grand opening on July 1.

For more information about the sale and to find the interactive map, go to the events page at findyourselfinwaldport.com or the Waldport Chamber of Commerce page on Facebook.