Festivals flood frozen lake
Snowking's Winter Festival wraps up as Long John Jamboree gets going
Jessica Davey-Quantick
Northern News Services
Friday, March 24, 2017
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Great Slave Lake might be frozen, but it's anything but quiet. This weekend, many events are coming together to offer a wild rumpus in the middle of Yellowknife Bay.
Yellowknife Bay will be hopping all weekend with a number of festivals and events, including Burn on the Bay, above. - NNSL file photo |
The Snowking's Winter Festival wraps up its season while the Long John Jamboree kicks off. Dogs will hit the ice for the Canadian Championship Dog Derby and the Burn on The Bay will light things up tomorrow night.
"It is nuts on the lake," said Erika Nyyssonen, a.ka. Frida Frost, the Snowking festival director.
She has been involved in the winter shenanigans for eight years, festival director for seven, and says having all of these events next door to each other is a great thing.
"The energy is pumping," she said. "People, families, hang out all day long. There's a lot of things going on and I think it's really exciting time to be down there."
The castle has been holding dominion over that corner of the lake for 22 years. The Long John Jamboree has been hitting the ice for six.
"It's a mutual benefit of having people attend both our festivals in a weekend. We have a lot of people come down to the castle who have never been because Long John brings them down to the lake, so that's really neat," said Nyyssonen.
She didn't have solid attendance numbers for this year's festival, but thinks it will be similar to previous years, which hover around the 12,000 to 14,000 mark. Thanks to more tour operators adding the snow castle to city tours, Nyyssonen said she's anticipating an increase on top of the usual number of locals.
Michelle Demeule, president of the board of the Long John Jamboree, is also expecting her festival's numbers to climb, thanks to the return of the De Beers Inspired Ice Carving Championship.
"People really need to come down and see the ice carving as they're happening," she said.
The carving will be fully complete by tomorrow afternoon, and the finished statues lit up that evening. She said generally attendance is around 1,000 people per day, but she's hoping this year it'll climb to 1,500.
"I think they're just enthusiastic about the end of winter, being the spring and being outside where it's warm and enjoying some activities," she said.
But both say none of it would be possible without herds of volunteers.
The Snowking Festival has a few paid positions, but Nyyssonen says even those require a lot of volunteer time. She estimates that every year, her event has around 50 or 60 volunteers, doing everything from helping to build the castle to security and the ticket booth.
"I think it's the uniqueness of the castle, the experience just to be there and be part of it, and that you're contributing to a festival that's so unique and really embraces winter," said Nyyssonen, adding they could not put on the festival without their volunteers and sponsors.
Demeule said in addition to Long John's 10-person board, the festival recruits around 40 to 60 volunteers.
"Seeing how enthusiastic my volunteers are every year ... I'm just really pleased to be able to do this with them," she said.
"Yellowknife has long cold winters, and people really needed an excuse to get out of their houses, put on their long johns and go have some fun outside."
Both festivals have released their full schedules of events on their websites. Additionally, two events at the Snow Castle - the Ecology North fish fry and the Snowking Cup hockey tournament - were rescheduled from last weekend to this Sunday.
