A tired but very happy chairman Tory Delaurier is looking back on the eleven-day Iroquois Falls Winter Carnival that wrapped up this past Sunday.
“It was an overwhelming success.”
Proof of that success: A sell-out for the show that featured tributes to Shania Twain, Toby Keith and Alan Jackson; 300 people participating in the fishing derby; and the wrap-up event: the return after a 30-year absence of the demolition derby. Delaurier says about 500 spectators were expected. The final count topped one-thousand.
So you can count on another demolition derby next year.
“As of now, yes,” he says. “The carnival committee’s going to look at everything, we have a final meeting at the end of the month. But we want to continue the demolition derby. It’s a committee decision, but it looks very promising that we’re going to do it again, of course.”
Next year, Delaurier expects more than six cars for the derby. The winner this year was Kevin Godin of Kapuskasing.
Still looking back, Delaurier says he learned that the opening ceremony should be moved back to the first Friday night instead of Thursday, which was a school night.
“We had good attendance but we’d have better if we had it on a Friday, the opening ceremonies. That’s with the fireworks and the sliding and the maze and the oval.”