The streets of Campbell River have opened up with a series of free, family-friendly events and entertainment that will continue until September.
“We think that this is a great opportunity. Hopefully COVID is starting to leave us and we have the ability to return to a new normal. This whole set of opportunities with the downtown core is meant to bring us out of what we’ve been experiencing over the last couple of years in reduced ability to program and to get out and interact and socialize. This is really on the flip side of it. We want to be able to blow the lid off of this and get everybody downtown and enjoying what Campbell River has done. Campbell River has a lot to offer both the residents in the surrounding area and visitors to it,“ explained Robin Mitchell, the city’s Manager of Recreation and Culture.
“These programs and the opportunities with businesses and the various partnerships that Royce and Karen and Linda have set up, in order for us to be able to run all of these events downtown. The next three months are going to be absolutely mind-blowing.”
Karen Chappell, Adult and Community Special Events programmer, added, “We have what is called our Campbell River Live Streets, which has six major events that happen every Wednesday evening in the downtown core, we shut the street and we offer a large event.”
This interview took place last Thursday. ‘Go by Bike Week’ is now over, but it is an example of the kind of event Campbell River is hosting. The associated activities include:
- Thursday – a celebration station at Active Living Physiotherapy in Larwood Plaza. (bike maintenance, Track Stand competitions).
- Friday – celebration station from 7 AM-8:30 AM at Seymour Pacific Developments (breakfast)
- Saturday – Bike Swap at Spirit Square from noon to 4PM. All kids bikes sold for $30. Adult bikes for $60 and premium bikes for $100. Opportunity to test drive e-bikes.
Checking the community calendar on the City of Campbell River website, the next special events are both scheduled for Sunday, June 26: Greenways Loop Day and the Campbell River Buskers Festival.
School gets out the following Wednesday, June 29, after which this calendar will be bursting with activities. These include:
- Battle of the Brushes on July 20, 2022
- an Evening Street Market,
- Chalk Art Festival,
- Salsa & Latin Night,
- Music in the Night
- and Rockin’ River Country Stomp.
“One of our big headliners this summer, which I’m personally really excited about is our finale of the summer for our large live streets. And we have Jesse Roper coming and he’s a massive draw on Vancouver island. We had to really bump up our numbers for licensing and everything for that event,” said Chappell.
There are also a lot of activities taking place every week:
- Concerts in Spirit Square, every Tuesday at noon and Thursdays at 7 PM. There is a list of the concerts for June on the Spirit Square website
- The Farmer’s Market, Sundays from 10 am till 2:00 PM, in Shopper’s Row until September 11th.
- Lots of smaller events like yoga classes, in-line dance classes, and other daily activities
Campbell River seems to have some underlying goals, one of which is the transition to greener modes of transportation.
“Yes, that is a big aspect of ‘Go by Bike Week.’ It is a provincial campaign that goes on. There’s a Spring one, there’s a Fall one and a Winter event as well. It’s just a way to promote cycling in the communities,” replied Royce Pritchard, Sport and community special events programmer.
Do you want to identify some of the city’s other goals?
“We did some impact assessment work earlier this year, where we spoke to the community to see what the biggest impact our department has on their lives. What kept rising to the top in every single interview we did was community involvement, social interaction, supporting local businesses. That was extremely important to all the residents of Campbell River. So by offering a lot of activities in the downtown core and all of the activities that we are offering are free of charge,” added Chappell.
Mitchell added, “Roy, I’d like to on behalf of the staff of Campbell River, both Royce, Karen and myself, thank you very much for reaching out to us, to give us the ability and the opportunity to be able to talk to you and to talk to people that listen to your show. We’re excited to see them down there. We want to reiterate that it’s for everybody. We just love to see families come down. It’s free entertainment. There’s some major concerts. Check out our website for more information or Facebook . Hopefully the weather will also change. This will go rain or shine, but hopefully in most cases it will shine and, we’ll see everybody down there and hope to have great time.”
Top image credit: Art Battle – Photo courtesy City of Campbell River
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