Parades, parachutists and plenty more at the Verona Cattail Festival

Julie Druker | Aug 12, 2015

People lined the main street of Verona for the Saturday morning parade marking the 20th installment of the Verona Cattail Festival on August 8 and 9.

South Frontenac mayor Ron Vanderwal opened the festival and congratulated all of the volunteers and sponsors who continue to make the event one of the community's biggest of the summer.

The festival is a much-loved community event that continues to attract locals and tourists year after year to the cattail-filled wetlands of Verona. This year’s theme was “Themes of festivals past” and fairies, birthday party goers, and bog-dwelling creatures of all shapes and sizes, plus many more made for a colorful start to two densely packed, fun-filled days.

Veteran festival emcees Debbie Lingen and Dick Miller awarded prizes and kept guests informed of all the events and activities taking place in and around the Verona Lions grounds.

Highlights included the landing on site of five parachutists from Skydive Gananoque, who thrilled the crowd by jumping from a small Cessna plane high above the festival grounds following the opening ceremonies. Each parachutist expertly hit their mark in a nearby field.

The 20-year anniversary was highlighted on Sunday with Georgette Fry and her soulful choir singing a rousing rendition of Happy Birthday and with guests enjoying a birthday cake generously donated by the Goodwin family in remembrance of long-time festival committee member Joan Goodwin.

Guests of all ages enjoyed educational games, activities and demonstrations indoors at Cameron’s Cattail Centre and this year the children’s activities were expanded to include a 60 foot bouncy obstacle course, a new climbing wall and old-fashioned fun like the new three-legged, stilt and sack race events for kids.

Also new this year were horse-drawn wagon rides along the K&P trail with a shuttle bus taking riders back and forth from the trail to the festival site.

The live entertainment is always a huge draw for weekenders and this year’s line up was hugely diverse, with offerings of rockabilly, blues, Celtic, jazz, easy listening and of course, good old-fashioned rock 'n roll. Performers included a number of local entertainers of all ages like fiddle wiz Jessica Wedden, local old soul country crooner Henry Norwood, and other notable groups like Turpin's Trail, Bauder Road, and Still Standin’

Over 20 vendors were on site selling a wide array of crafts, comestibles and more and the festival volunteers had their canteen running all festival long.

The most popular attractions that keep festival goers coming back year after year like the duct tape boat races at McMullen beach and the antique car show were also well attended.

Congratulations to this year’s parade winners who included Asselstine Hardware, The Casement family, The Youth Centre, Beau Mcilroy, and Lance Duerst.