Since 1996 the community of Yellowknife has dedicated the month of March to a celebration of snow, ice, music and glorification of a big jolly guy with a thick white beard and a heart of gold. No, not Santa…The Snow King.
Part of the mandate for the festivities is to promote the city as a tourist attraction during the winter season.
It takes an entire crew of people two months to build a snow castle on Great Slave Lake, essentially competing with themselves to make it bigger and better each year. The site offers a variety of activities and plays host to snow carving teams from around the world who populate the castle’s exterior with sculptures. It’s turned into a big enough deal that Rick Mercer made a point of visiting (so did Ben Mulroney, but who cares). In the interview the Snow King described himself as “local colour.”
Anyway, snow carvings!
And if you’ve travelled that far you may as well experience some other local fun: Check out the views of ice-locked houseboats from the Bush Pilot’s Monument, buy some garbage mitts (Manitoba’s finest!) at the fabled Weaver & Devore northern goods store, drive on the ice road to Detah, and count some wild chickens, aka. ptarmigans. They’re pterrific!
More info at snowking.ca.
Are you still looking for ptarmigans? There are actually only seven in the photo. I lied.
