The annual Canmore Highland Games has added a new dimension on a new day just in time for its 24th year.
The Highland Games in Canmore has traditionally offered a full day of events on the Sunday of the Labour Day Long weekend, capped by the Evening Ceilidh, which this year features Montreal-based Celtic band, Solstice.
But this year to kick off the games, organizers are hosting Taste of the Highlands in its large festival tent on Saturday (Aug. 30) from 6-10 p.m.
Taste of the Highlands organizer Greg Stevenson said this adult-only event offers wine tastings, finger foods and, more importantly, given the flavour of the weekend, Scotch tastings.
“Wine is a rare thing in the highlands right now,” Stevenson said with a laugh, “but there is going to be an extremely Celtic component with the Scotch and the food and we expect to have some haggis there. It is about connecting people with the social aspect of being together and celebrating Celtic life and having a few glasses of wine.”
Tickets for Taste of the Highlands are $30 in advance or $40 at the door.
Adding this event is an opportunity to better utilize the tent, which is heated and can seat 900 people, and to create another social event for those who arrive in Canmore on Saturday and for those who can’t get tickets or are not inclined to go to the Ceilidh.
“It’s more just trying to match the capacity of our facility to other potential things we can do and we are always looking for new ways to utilize the tent facility and the mountain backdrop to try and show everybody a good time,” said Stevenson.
Sally Garen, one of the festival organizers, has been searching for an event for quite some time that would better use the tent and complement the games without taking anything away from the main Sunday events.
“Every year we said there’s this big, huge beautiful tent sitting idle on the Saturday night and we just never came up with the right thing to do on that evening. We thought because a lot of the competitors and attendees come in on the Saturday night that we should have something for them, but it needs to be different from what we’re doing on Sunday and Sunday night,” she said.
“That tent starts going up Thursday or Friday and they build the other tents around it. It’s a really big setup and if you don’t use it, you’re crazy.”
Gates open on festival day, Aug. 31, at 7 a.m. with a pancake breakfast starting at 7:30 a.m. The rest of the events continue through the day until the massed pipes and drums at 5 p.m. The evening Ceilidh begins at 6 p.m.
The events include, as always, highland dance, piping and drumming competitions, the heavy sports contest, sheep dog demonstrations, clan tents, Celtic wares and traditional food and beverages.
Returning this year is the tug-of-war competition. Teams are encouraged to register in the eight-man team (100 stone or 1,400 lb maximum plus coach) and the eight-women team (80 stone or 1,120 lb maximum plus coach). Entry fee is $100; winner takes all. Contact Canmore Highland Games at 403-678-9454 or [email protected] to register.
Garen’s father, Don, organized the first highland games in Canmore in 1991. In that first year, Garen said they might have had five bands, which was a great turnout.
“At that time, Calgary highland games was getting one or two so we thought we were doing really well. That first year we had a band come from Edmonton and the pipe major said to us, ‘I think you’ve started something good here,’” she said.
The highest number of bands that have attended the games at one time is 25 with the average coming in at 17 or 18. With 25 members per band, Garen said it’s easy to fill the sports field at Centennial Park for the massed bands.
“(The bands) just love to come to the mountains and I think that is why we had immediate success. It IS another thing they could attend here, it was cultural, it was in the mountains, you could look around and revel in it and, of course, it is really fitting that we have highland games here because King Malcom III was one of the very first organizers of an event like this,” she said.
King Malcom Cenn Mor or Canmore, which means “big head” or “great chief,” is of course Canmore’s namesake and the first of the House of Canmore, according to www.royalhistory.com.
According to a survey conducted by the Canmore Highland Games in 2012, the modern form of the Highland games, is an economic boon for Canmore.
“We’ve done a survey and a lot of our people stay two, three, four nights,” she said, adding many of the tickets already sold for this year’s event have gone TO people from beyond Calgary, the northwestern U.S. and B.C.
“We were shocked when we did that survey and people were staying so long,” she said.
“We did want to know if people were spending money. We figured that it was at least a million (dollars) in that year and that is a really conservative estimate that year. Factoring in hotel rooms, meals, admissions, gas, pub, have a beer, things they buy, it’s quite wide reaching.”
Canmore’s games – being the last games of the season – decides the provincial champions, Garen said.
It’s likely the largest games in Western Canada, as well.
“Going back to 24 years old, one of the nicest things for the competitors is they get to reunite. They might not all attend the same games, but a lot of them come here because it’s a big reunion for bandsmen who don’t see each other. It’s a real coming together,” she said.
Go to www.canmorehighlandgames.ca for full event information or to buy tickets.
