By GAYLE SARAN

Staff reporter

Finding South Whidbey Community Park just got a little easier thanks to a new sign installed Monday afternoon.

Gone is the little metal sign marking the “parks and recreation entrance,” and in its place is a 7-by-9-foot wood carving.

The new sign, carved by South Whidbey artist Pat McVay, features an eagle clutching a salmon in its talons, an otter, and deer with a mountain and water backdrop. There is also a touch of whimsey with an owl peeking out of a tree stump while a pileated woodpecker is posed on the other side of it.

McVay recently created a second, similar sign for the park’s sports complex on Langley Road.

How to label park entrances was an issue for several months last year, until the district’s board of directors decided to have McVay make the wood signs.

Parks Director Suzette Hart said she couldn’t be happier with the result.

“We are delighted with the signs. They really enhance the parks,” she said.

“The park’s name is now official instead of ‘castle park’ or ‘playground in the park,’ as it is sometimes called,” Hart said.

The parks sign committee was made up of commissioner Paul Arand and former commissioner Tara Barlean. They selected McVay and worked with the Island County for approval of the finished product.

Cost of the two signs together was $10,000.

The sign committee began meeting more than two years ago. Other artists who submitted designs but the committee went with McVay in part because the committee’s two members liked his other carvings.