Oak Harbor, WA

Naval aviation and a working public waterfront are both unusually visible in Oak Harbor. Naval Air Station Whidbey Island’s Ault Field lies immediately north of the city, and the Navy describes the installation as the Pacific Northwest’s sole naval-aviation support base. Its air-traffic unit controls Ault Field and Outlying Field Coupeville and averages nearly 215,000 operations a year, making military flight activity a routine part of the local soundscape. The station was commissioned in 1942, but Oak Harbor’s history begins much earlier: the city identifies the Skwdabs, a Lower Skagit group, as the first inhabitants of the harbor area. The modern city was incorporated in 1915. It had 24,622 residents in the 2020 census, and Census estimates counted 3,049 veterans during 2020–2024. The civilian waterfront centers on 28.5-acre Windjammer Park and the city marina.

Windjammer provides beach access, a swimming lagoon, splash park, playground, courts and ball fields, picnic shelters, and a 2,100-foot section of waterfront trail. A short distance away, the 420-slip marina adds guest moorage, dry storage, a fuel dock, boat ramp, playground, and an Island Transit on-demand stop. Island Transit’s spring 2026 network was fare-free; Harbor Station connected local routes with Ault Field, Coupeville, and the Clinton ferry. Oak Harbor Library opens seven days a week and supplies public computers and laptop checkout, meeting space, sensory kits, a story trail, and Spanish, Japanese, and Korean collections. State Route 20 crosses Deception Pass at the island’s north end, where the state park offers 38 miles of trails through forest, dunes, rocky shoreline, and freshwater-lake terrain.