Derek Neary
Northern News Services

Fort Simpson (July 05/02) - Canada turned 135 years old in grand fashion in Fort Simpson Monday.

The annual Canada Day parade featured blaring sirens, countless balloons, a multitude of flags, lots of cheering and kids picking up candy thrown all over the streets.

The parade judges awarded the top prize in the corporate division to CIBC's float. The bank employees donned striped prison uniforms and converted the box of a pick-up truck into a jail-house motif. In no endorsement of white-collar crime, they called themselves the CIBC bandits.

Bank manager Laurel McCowan said she and her employees began working on the float two weeks in advance. Being in the banking business, they are sure to invest their $200 prize money, right?

"No," McCowan said. "Actually what we're looking at doing is putting it towards a trip. We want to go to Virginia Falls."

Second place, $125, went to Parks Canada. Deh Cho Hardware captured third, $75.

In the private division, the Deh Cho elders' float, a Suburban sporting banners with wildlife scenes, took the $200 first-place prize plus two round-trip tickets to Edmonton aboard First Air. The Stanley Isaiah Foundation finished second, while Deh Cho Health and Social Services wound up third.

"It's exciting for them, actually for all three (floats) because they're all related," said Kathy Tsetso, CEO of Deh Cho Health and Social Services, which had a hand in all three entries.

Following the parade, many residents proceeded to gather at the papal site for more festivities and a slice of one of two cakes, decorated like Canadian flags.

There was a lot to celebrate on Monday. Natalie Villeneuve, 8, said Canada is a great country because of the "friendly people."

"I make a lot of friends," she said.

Leif Amundson, 12, said he appreciates this nation because "it's a free country -- no slavery."

Lionel Menacho, also 12, was thinking in the moment on Monday. Holding a handful of recovered treats from the parade, he replied, "You get candy."