Record crowds for this year’s Will-And-Kate-Plus-300,000 edition of Canada Day booked the hotels solid, choked OC Transpo and kept police and paramedics hopping in the heat.
These pros all did a tough job, but no event of this size can come off without a cadre of passionate helpers giving it away for free.
Also facing the crowds, outnumbered 600 to one, were some 500 NCC volunteers doing countless little jobs at Parliament Hill, Major’s Hill Park and Jacques-Cartier Park.
Ottawa’s races, festivals and regular tourist attractions pack people in all summer, and when the big crowds descend, volunteers shine.
Starting tomorrow, numbers comparable to Friday’s massive Canada Day crowd (albeit spread over two weeks) will descend on LeBreton Flats for Bluesfest. Waiting for them will be a mighty complement of 3,8000 volunteers.
Bluesfest volunteers are perhaps better compensated than most, enjoying a free pass to the festival if they sign up for six four-hour shifts, but they take care of practically everything on the grounds.
I spoke to some of the area leaders who manage the crews, like Cathy Laveille, who is in charge of merchandise and posters. This will be her fourth year volunteering for the festival.
“I take my holidays to do Bluesfest,” she said. “That’s my vacation time, two weeks (of) Bluesfest and a week just to recuperate from Bluesfest.”
High energy and a habit of helping seem to be common characteristics of these Bluesfest diehards, whether it’s Carol Patterson, boss of the Lac Leamy Suites, who also signed up to volunteer at the Jazz Festival this year, or Doug Stewart, point man at the gates, who doubles as chair of the Bluesfest Refugee Sponsorship committee, which is preparing to help a family from Iraq when they arrive in Ottawa later this year.
Nancy Browman, who runs the Mill Street Pub, has made a long habit of volunteering, also helping out at a rape-crisis centre. Every day of Bluesfest, she drives two hours into Ottawa, and fills the spare seats in her car with local teens who otherwise couldn’t get here.
What keeps her coming back?
“Besides being ever so slightly crazy,” she told me, “I absolutely love music, and the variety of music and having that much music in one place for that period of time in Ottawa is so lucky.”
With volunteers like these on the job, I’m not sure how much luck has to do with it.
These pros all did a tough job, but no event of this size can come off without a cadre of passionate helpers giving it away for free.
Also facing the crowds, outnumbered 600 to one, were some 500 NCC volunteers doing countless little jobs at Parliament Hill, Major’s Hill Park and Jacques-Cartier Park.
Ottawa’s races, festivals and regular tourist attractions pack people in all summer, and when the big crowds descend, volunteers shine.
Starting tomorrow, numbers comparable to Friday’s massive Canada Day crowd (albeit spread over two weeks) will descend on LeBreton Flats for Bluesfest. Waiting for them will be a mighty complement of 3,8000 volunteers.
I spoke to some of the area leaders who manage the crews, like Cathy Laveille, who is in charge of merchandise and posters. This will be her fourth year volunteering for the festival.
“I take my holidays to do Bluesfest,” she said. “That’s my vacation time, two weeks (of) Bluesfest and a week just to recuperate from Bluesfest.”
High energy and a habit of helping seem to be common characteristics of these Bluesfest diehards, whether it’s Carol Patterson, boss of the Lac Leamy Suites, who also signed up to volunteer at the Jazz Festival this year, or Doug Stewart, point man at the gates, who doubles as chair of the Bluesfest Refugee Sponsorship committee, which is preparing to help a family from Iraq when they arrive in Ottawa later this year.
Nancy Browman, who runs the Mill Street Pub, has made a long habit of volunteering, also helping out at a rape-crisis centre. Every day of Bluesfest, she drives two hours into Ottawa, and fills the spare seats in her car with local teens who otherwise couldn’t get here.
What keeps her coming back?
“Besides being ever so slightly crazy,” she told me, “I absolutely love music, and the variety of music and having that much music in one place for that period of time in Ottawa is so lucky.”
With volunteers like these on the job, I’m not sure how much luck has to do with it.
