Canada Parks Day

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Canada Parks Day

Written by admin on 21 July 2009

Parks across the country celebrated this weekend, with special events and programs in recognition of the 20th anniversary of Canada Parks Day on July 18th. At White Lake Provincial Park on Hwy17, East of Thunder Bay participants included families camping at the park as well as day visitors from surrounding communities including; Marathon, Manitouwadge and White River. Inclement weather delayed celebrations which were originally scheduled for Saturday afternoon to coincide with celebrations at municipal, provinical and national parks across the country until Sunday afternoon although participants seemed to agree it was worth the wait.

Kids and kids at heart enjoyed face painting, paper bag crafts, sandcastle and sandsculpture building contests, a sunflower spittting competition, a scavenger hunt, and other outdoor contest in the day use area of the park.

Team Sagle racing towards the beach & victory!

Pictured here are three members of Team Sagle ready to race in the day’s most popular competition, the Voyageur Race, which was held every thirty minutes throughout the afternoon. Groups of three passengers per canoe, raced in heats of two on either side of an approx. 150′ buoy rope. While the centre passenger was the ‘Princess’ (regardless of gender) sitting in the middle of the boat simply to give instruction and encouragement to his or her team mates, the other passengers tried dilegently to work in unison though their efforts were waning as each team eventually realized this was quite disadvantageous. The lone paddle holder at the stern trying to advance and steer the vessel as the person at the bow had only their hands/arms to paddle with frantically, inevitably throwing their canoe off course and giving both princess and paddler a good shower.

Though there were prizes and certificates awarded for many of the events and competitions contestants were clearly competing for sheer enjoyment and to this end, all were victorious. Participants came and went between stations of activities and competitions, which were supervised by nearly a dozen park staff, who ended the day leading a walk along the beach to judge the sandcastle and sandsculpture competition before tallying scores from the various events and distributing prizes to participants.

: My “Kitty” ready to go to the Canada Parks Day celebrations! I painted her with my make-up, I think I might invest in face paints and a book or two, it is alot of fun!