(upbeat music) - [Speaker 1] You have arrived to the land of the Muckleshoot people.

- [Narrator] For millennia, indigenous peoples have traveled along the ancestral highways of the Salish Sea.

- We welcome you with open hearts.

You have permission to come ashore.

- For us, it's cultural revitalization.

(Muckleshoot chanting throughout) It's singing the old songs, the new songs.

It's honoring our ancestors.

It's passing those teachings down from the eldest to the youngest so we can continue to revitalize our culture and learn from our people.

It's, it's a display of unity.

It's a display of strength and it's a display of healing for our people.

- We welcome you to- - [Narrator] This year, the Muckleshoot tribe hosted the journey, welcoming canoe families to the shores of Alki Beach.

- [Donny Stevenson] So this is our, literally, within the heart of, of our traditional homelands.

So our people, the Muckleshoot people, have been doing this exact thing at this exact location since time immemorial.

That our (indistinct) exist from the, the the shores of the Salish Sea here all the way to the, to the Cascade Range.

- We are hungry and tired.

We humbly ask your permission to come ashore.

(yelling, clamoring, cheering) - Yeah!

- [Pat Charlie] We're rejoicing because we're finally becoming a whole person again with our rightful place to have our singing and drumming.

- [Narrator] Canoe families travel for miles, sometimes for weeks at a time, before meeting at the homelands of the hosting tribe.

- Oh, I can't believe it.

You know, it feels like we just left our shores and that was, you know, 11 days ago.

When you get out on the water on those early days you know, the water is glass, calm.

And you set out for your destination.

And you all you could think about is your ancestors that have come before you that have done this for thousands of years.

- So, the canoe journey, we're traveling on what they call the ancestral highways, which are which is in the Salish Sea and all of the tributaries that flow into the Salish Sea.

When we're out there, we believe we're traveling with our ancestors during that time.

(tribal chanting) - [Narrator] Once ashore, each tribe has the chance to present what's called protocol.

They sing, dance, and drum together.

(chanting, drumming) - I think it's incredibly meaningful and powerful for us as tribal nations to be able to connect and come together and share this space.

To have an exchange of culture, have an exchange of songs, of dances, to bring our canoes together in, in a a gathering like this - [Madrienne White] We want to make sure that our guests feel honored and that they have space to be heard.

This is just, this is a sign of respect that we're showing our guests and we wanna make sure that they feel that they have time on the floor to share whatever it is that's on their heart.

Whatever it is that's, that might be from their, you know, respective tribes and cultures.

- The singing and dancing is more or less a a celebration that we're safe on the water, we're sharing culture.

- [Speaker 2] It shows that we're still here.

We are thriving as a, as a people as the first people of these lands and waters.

(uplifting music) (electronic chimes)