Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Prince George found a safe way to come together and celebrate Family Day.
Thanks to innovative organizers and community support, a city-wide scavenger hunt, dubbed Family Day Adventure Cruise, was a huge success with about 400 vehicles and 1,400 individuals participating.
However, organizers say the number of participants is most likely much higher as it’s impossible to tell how many people were out and about attending one of the 25 activities set up throughout the city.
"Our goal was to give everyone in the city something to get excited about this Family Day and I feel like we met that goal. I am over the moon happy about how everything went," said lead organizer Dave Horton.
"We saw people doing the cruise on foot, taking public transit and with their own vehicles. My desire was to break the winter and lockdown blues with smiles all across the city and I think we did that today."
Participants downloaded an 'Adventure Card' with 25 activities on it that they then had five hours to complete.
There were Waldos to be spotted at UNBC, Pine Centre Mall and downtown, while at the same time Tano Fuel on the Lheidli T’enneh reserve served burgers and bannock to hundreds of cars.
Big Brothers Big Sisters, YMCA of Northern BC and United Way were busy playing drive-thru games, handing out treats and engaging the hundreds of participants who came through their sites.
Horton says, much like Halloween’s Candy Cruise when most communities were planning to downplay events, Prince George rallied together and worked with health restrictions to give its citizens a safe and fun option.
The event was organized in just one month with the help of Ness Lake Bible Camp.
Spokesperson Dayna Penson said the idea came from a brainstorming session at the camp.
“We were talking about Candy Cruise Prince George about what other ideas we could try and make happen if the lockdown continued. I was leaning towards trying to get people through our (Ness Lake Bible Camp) property when our office manager Rhonda Linaker said ‘why don’t we do a city-wide scavenger hunt?’ Once she said it we knew it was the perfect idea for Family Day.”
However, organizers say the event was made possible because of Prince George’s community-minded local leaders.
“Dave and I sent the first mass email looking for partners just over a month ago and we had no idea it would become something so great. The list of partner organizations was long and showed that the pandemic really has brought us together.”
Prizes for participants will be handed out through the next week, but you’ll need to make sure you have filled out your Adventure Card marked with completed challenges and posted a copy of it along with photos to Instagram or Facebook tagged with #pgadventure cruise.
Winners will be drawn from different categories including completed card, partial card, best photo, random photo draw and more.
