Canada Day won’t be forgotten by the City of Meadow Lake.
A series of events and activities are planned for Lions Park in Meadow Lake July 1, allowing residents and tourists alike the opportunity to gather and to celebrate Canada’s 156th birthday.
“Things get underway at 10 a.m. with a free pancake breakfast in the park,” explained Regan Beck, the city’s parks and recreation manager. “That will go until 12 noon. Also, starting at 10 a.m., the local minor softball team will be hosting games at Diamond 6.”
The softball games are scheduled for 10 a.m., 12 noon, 2 p.m. and 4 p.m.
“Starting at 1 p.m., we’ll have our bouncy castles up and running, glitter tattoos will be available and an interesting one we’re adding this year is a wrestling demonstration,” Beck continued. “It’s a sort of exhibition to allow people to give the sport of wrestling a try. That’s a neat one to add to the festivities that day. The Northern Pikes Wrestling Club and head coach Chris Brownrigg reached out to me about setting up the wrestling mats in the park as a way of showcasing what their sport is all about. It’s a great idea… another organization in our community doing great things, and we’re happy to help out.”
The bouncy castles, glitter tattoos and wrestling exhibition will be held from 1-3 p.m.
“We cap things off in the evening with our big fireworks show, which is always a hit,” Beck added. “We’re all set up for that and looking forward to it.”
Unlike last year, Canada Day celebrations will not feature a movie in the park.
“The reason we decided to bump the movie until maybe later in the season is the amount of sunlight we have in the park at this time of year,” Beck explained. “We are looking at possibly doing a back to school celebration in September and we may tie a movie in with that. Our community registration night would be held around the same time, but we’re only in the very early planning stages for that event. Last year, we also had to stop the movie partway through to do the fireworks show and then resume the movie afterward. We really like the idea of hosting a movie in the park, but feel it would be better later on in the year when the sun goes down a little earlier.”
As for the fireworks show, Beck said the city was super impressed with how it went last year.
“We’re expecting a similar type show this year,” he noted. “It’s always a fun day to get out there. Hopefully the weather is nice. We have a great park and we’re looking forward to having a lot of people in the park that day. We’re anticipating a really good day.”
The topic of Canada Day was also raised during Monday’s (June 26) city council meeting when councillor Tom Harrison asked about the various events taking place that day.
“They were supposed to get a hold of you (Harrison) about cooking pancakes,” stated councillor Mauri Young.
City manager Diana Burton echoed this.
“We thought council could cook the pancake breakfast,” she said.
The pancake breakfast will be prepared at the Lions Park concession booth.
by Phil Ambroziak