Young, old, newcomers and veteran mussel lovers alike piled into their cars Saturday morning and arrived at the mussel-filled fun known as the 20th annual Penn Cove Mussel Festival, held in downtown Coupeville.

It was the first Mussel Festival experience for John and Judy Opheim of Oak Harbor, but just before noon on Saturday the couple was already in the thick of things. They stood in line early to wait for their mussel chowder contest ballots, tickets for the mussel farm boat tours, and other Mussel Fest activities.

“We’re doing it all,” Judy Opheim said. “We’re most looking forward to the boat ride though.”

To tease their appetite for all the chowder tasting, the Opheims dove into a bowl full of sauteed mussels prepared by Coupeville resident David Day outside Bayleaf.

“They’re delicious,” Opheim said.

Twenty-somethings Jenna Hustead, Mandy Hoover and Shawna Keen were busy taking some group pictures to commemorate their Mussel Festival experience.

The girls headed over to the Mussel Festival after reading about it in a Seattle publication.

“We wanted to do something different and fun — this sounded like it,” Hustead said.

For others, the Mussel Festival is a yearly adventure. It was the fifth year John and Lori Morrison of Sammamish came to covet their favorite mollusk.

“There’s just something particularly beautiful about this area that adds to the experience,” Lori Morrison said.

This year they brought along their friend, Penny Yarbrough of Puyallup, to join in on the mussel reverence.

“We first came to the Mussel Festival by chance,” John Morrison said. “We stopped in Coupeville on a car trip through the island and when we got here this festival was going on — it was so much fun that we kept coming back.”

Morrison was hungry to get the chowder tasting going, and he, too, dove into eating a plate full of the mussels that Day cooked up in a giant paella pan, just feet from the long, winding line to Mussel Fest headquarters.

“Oh, those smell so good,” was the cooing phrase repeated by those patiently waiting to enter the Coupeville Recreation Hall for their Mussel Fest info and itinerary.

The Penn Cove Mussel Festival originated 20 years ago, and for the first dozen years, was held at the Captain Whidbey Inn’s historic lodge. Festival founder, Captain John Stone, owner of the Captain Whidbey Inn, is often one of the judges of the mussel eating contest.

Festival sponsors, Penn Cove Shellfish Co., remain integral in the organization of the event. Pre-Mussel Festival, Rawle Jefferds estimated the shellfish company would supply about 4,000 pounds of mussels to the festival for the chowder contest, cooking demonstrations and also for people to take home fresh from Penn Cove.

His brother, Ian Jefferds, heads the Penn Cove Shellfish Co. operation and was helping lead the cooking charge inside a packed mussel and beer garden tent all weekend.

“We wouldn’t be able to put on this festival without the dedication of our countless volunteers,” said festival chair Rita Kuller.

And while the festival has grown since its days at the Captain Whidbey Inn, and it continues to grow, Kuller affirms that the Mussel Festival won’t outgrow its shell.

“Our whole goal for the festival is to create something that’s undoubtedly fun and that people can enjoy at their own pace,” she said.

Things to look forward to for next year’s Mussel Festival? Better muscle up, as Kuller and her festival organizing associates are looking for people interested in a sanctioned strong man competition. What better way to bring more mussel, er, muscle to town. Visit www.penncovemusselfestival.com for more information on past and present Mussel Festivals, including the winners of this year’s chowder, mussel eating and recipe contests.