RENDEZVOUS
It’s Yukon Sourdough Rendezvous weekend. Listed below are some choice events. Be forewarned: this year’s festival is more fragmented in the past, with events scattered between the Yukon Arts Centre, McIntyre Recreation Centre, the airport and Shipyards Park.
For a full schedule, visit yukonrendezvous.com.
Friday
Canadian fiddling grandmaster Mark Sullivan will jam with Yukon fiddlers during two shows at the Yukon Arts Centre, starting at 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. Tickets are $20 for adults and $12 for seniors, students and children.
Also at 7 p.m., the Yukon Association of Community Living Dance starts at the Rendezvous tent in Shipyards Park.
At 7:30 p.m. at Mount McIntyre, watch Sourdough Sam contestants publicly humiliate themselves one last time during the Yukolympics before the winner is knighted. The victor receives one well-used truck. Tickets are $5.
Or visit the Queen’s Ball. It starts at 8 p.m. at the Yukon Convention Centre. Enjoy Yukon’s Big Band, Gillian Campbell and send out last year’s Yukon Queen in style. Tickets are $30 for adults, $20 for seniors and children.
Feel lucky? The Lions Club Casino will be open at the Yukon Inn from 8 p.m. until 2 a.m.
Saturday
You have two Sourdough Pancake Breakfasts to pick from. Either try the Rotary Club’s event at the Old Firehall, from 7:30 a.m. until noon, or the Rotary Club’s breakfast from 8 a.m. until 1 p.m. at the CYO Hall at 407 Steele Street.
Then head to Shipyard’s Park, where the day’s events will be concentrated, starting at 10 a.m.
The Mad Trapper contests will be held throughout the day. Feats of strength include flour packing, axe throwing, chainsaw chucking, swede sawing and log tossing. There’s $1,500 in prize money up for grabs.
The flour-packing contest starts at 11:30 a.m. Competitors carry hundreds of pounds of flour on their backs in a race to the finish line.
The junior dog-pull starts at 1 p.m., followed by the senior dog-pull.
Or, if your dog is more of a yeller than a puller, the howling contest starts at 4 p.m.
Try your skills on an old-fashioned curling rink at Shipyard’s Park. It’s free.
Kids events, including the egg toss, ring toss, jelly bean guessing contest and marshmallow toss, runs from noon until 1 p.m.
An airshow will be held from noon until 3 p.m. at the airport.
This year’s Yukon Queen will be crowned during a ceremony from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Yukon Arts Centre. Tickets are $20 for adults and $12 for seniors, students and children.
A fireworks extravaganza at Shipyards Park starts at 8:30 p.m. Bring your lawn chair and enjoy the show. Check out the snow sculptures while there.
Or if competitions for the hairiest legs, best beards and moustaches or most impressive tattoos are more your thing, head to the Capital Hotel at 8:30 p.m.
Stay for the Rendezvous Revue, which starts at 9 p.m., to get your fill of the festival’s perennial characters. The lineup includes the can-can dancers, snowshoe shufflers, Gillian Campbell, the Queens, Sams, and other Yukon entertainers. Must be 19 for admission.
Sunday
Another morning, another syrupy pancake breakfast.
The annual Sourdough Rendezvous Recreational Hockey Tournament runs from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. Games will be held at both the Takhini Arena and Canada Games Centre.
Entertainment will be held at the Shipyards Park tent from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. And there will be plenty of kids events, starting with frozen turkey curling at 10:30 a.m.
Sled-dog and skijouring races start at Shipyards at 11 a.m.
The Swede saw and log splitting competitions also start at 11 a.m.
The chainsaw chuck is at 12 and is billed to help “relieve the frustration of a busted chainsaw.” Winner gets a new chainsaw.
Axe-throw is at 1 p.m.. Log-toss is at 2 p.m.
The Rendezvous Wrap-Up Parade starts at 3 p.m. and leaves from the old Canadian Tire building, heading down Fourth Avenue to Main Street, from Main up to Second Avenue and along Second Avenue back to Ogilvie.
NON-RENDEZVOUS
Stone Soup Festival
Call it the anti-Rendezvous. Integra Tire has erected a stage in the back of its lot to throw its own party, which runs from noon until 9:30 p.m. on Friday and Saturday. There will be a ball hockey tournament, an animal fashion show, face-painting and clowns, bands performing on an open stage and more.
Barn Dance
Saturday, February 27 at 7 p.m. at Elijah Smith Elementary School. Tickets at the door are $10 for adults, $5 for children or $25 for families. No experience necessary. All welcome.
If you would like your event listed in GetOut! e-mail details to friis@yukon-news.com.
