A message from Lauri Roche to our volunteers.
I am so grateful to all the volunteers who attended the Saanich Fair this year and helped out the RASC in our biggest outreach of the year for our Centre.
Thanks go to:
Ken Mallory, Brian Barber and Calvin Schmidt from the Centre of the Universe loaded up the trucks on Friday morning and took everything to the site, put up the tables and tents, arranged the tarps and lugged boxes and bins.
On Saturday morning Ken Mallory and Alex Schmid put up telescopes while Jeff Pivnick, Kevin Bertles and Ben Spiller kept everything working smoothly under the tent.
The Saturday afternoon shift was Ken, David Lee and Jim Cox on the telescopes with Sid Sidhu and Dorothy Paul in the tent. We estimated about 200 in the morning and Sid had his counter out with 265 in the afternoon. The day started off with clouds but the sun came out by 10:30 or 11 and stayed the rest of the day.
On Sunday Ken Mallory and Alex were there as usual with the telescopes, accompanied by Chris Gainor, Randy Enkin and Susan Grady. Jill Sinkwich also stopped by. The sky was mixed with large clouds but the sun peeked out enough to show the crowds. It suddenly started to rain large drops mid-morning and we had to hustle to rescue some of our equipment to get it in under the tent, and move the tables to get the materials we were giving out away from the dripping tent edges.
The Sun came out not too long after and we were able to continue, even though we were all a bit damp. Thanks to Susan for rescuing me from anxious moments. Some Skynews magazines, brochures, handouts and planet cards didn’t make it, though, ending up in a soggy mess. Notes were taken on how to prevent further problems when rain strikes another time.
In the afternoon, Marjie Welchframe, Moira Hourigan and Brock Johnson joined the team and, under Marjie’s steady hand, the afternoon was very successful. We clocked in 571 guests to the booth on Sunday.
Monday was misty with the promise of clear skies by mid morning. No such luck. David Lee, Kirsten Pederson and Alex had their telescopes ready and waiting but the sky was socked in until almost 12:30. Sandy and Wyman Lee chatted to many people that morning from the tent. The afternoon shift with Brian Barber, Sid Sidhu, Brenda Sopow, Garry Sedun and new volunteer, Alexandra White, was blessed with sunshine, though, and the telescopes were popular right up to the end of the day. We estimated about 450 for Monday’s totals.
We gave away a great little telescope on Monday in our raffle to a wonderful young person who lived with their parents in North Saanich. They were all excited and delighted to get the scope. Thanks to Alex and Ken for putting it all together on Saturday morning and to Brian, Sid and David for helping the winner become comfortable with the telescope before leaving with it from the Fair.
A big thank you to Brian, Sid, Garry and Brenda who did the tear-down, loaded the trucks back up and then traveled to the Centre of the Universe to unload all in pretty good time.
It takes great teamwork (along with some muscles) to make the Fair happen every year and I am so thankful to be a member of a community like our Victoria RASC group.
Thanks to everyone. If I have missed anyone, I apologize!
I hope we get to see some new faces at the Fair next year and for the loyal volunteers…you have one year to recover before we call on you again!
