Mother Nature brought her finest for the 38th annual Pumpkinfest in Port Elgin (Saugeen Shores) as temperatures soared and thousands came out to take in the wide variety of events and activities.
The celebration begin at 10:00 a.m. on Saturday, September 30th with the annual performance of the national anthem by the Chantry Singers.
It was then followed up with the annual ‘pumpkin seed launch’ competition with invited guests.
Prior to Covid, each VIP contestant was required to ‘spit’ a pumpkin seed with a distance to be measured to determine the winner. This year, however, due to restrictions, the contestants launched their seeds from ingeniously designed launchers.
Two students, Clayton and JR Barker (ages 14 & 12), designed ‘seed launchers’ that proved very effective.
Among the contestants were: Mayor Luke Charbonneau, MP Ben Lobb representative Pat O’Connor, Bruce Power representative John Peevers, Bruce County Warden Chris Peabody, radio personality Brian Longmire, Saugeen Shores Vice-deputy Mayor Mike Myatt and Councillors Dave Myette and Rachel Stack.
Stack, the only female competitor, came out the winner launching her pumpkin seed more than 30 feet.
The fun event is the annual kick-off to the weekend-long festivities at Pumpkinfest.
