If We Built It – They Will Come

25 Days – A Festival Diary
Setting up Camp (Troy Greencorn)

With an annual event the scale of Stanfest, our small team plans year-round. As the calendar flips from June to July each year, every cell in my body starts to signal me that it’s time to head home to Canso. This year, I want to offer you all a chance to experience the excitement with us through this blog.

This weekend, we pulled our trailer onsite and set up camp. I felt an instant sense of calm. There is an anxious feeling this time of year, planning from afar. It goes away when I’m onsite and able to get busy.

The ideal site building cycle is a 5-week process, 3 weeks to construct and 2 weeks to take it all down and tuck it away for another year. Both the build and tear down can be done quicker, but spreading it out makes it more fun and allows for a better job.

Canso is a remarkable community. The community of 800 or so residents punches way above its weight when it comes to volunteers. For 27 years, and army of 600 volunteers have pitched in to pull off the event. Festival time is like a reunion. Now living away from Canso much of the year, I get to spend time with old friends and make new ones within our volunteer ranks.

Over the years folks have found unique ways to help the event that fit with their interests and abilities. We have folks who come and help mow the 15 or so acres of fields. A team of great cooks prepare meals for festival staff in the last 8-10 days of set-up, when it is tough to get home for meals. Many come out on fence day to help put up 5 kms of snow fence all over the site. There are a thousand jobs, so nobody is turned away.

In recent years we have seen our volunteers come from further afield, around the world in fact. For years, we had a wonderful volunteer (Simon) come every second year from Australia. He would travel practically across the world, drop his knapsack and be driving tent stakes within minutes of arriving. There is a culture of volunteer tourism within the festivals sector. It is a great way to reduce costs and really get to know a community and its people. We will introduce you to some of these volunteers as our teams assembles over the next 3 weeks.

Today, we plan to tackle building the mainstage. It has two immediate benefits. One, it is a clear signal the ramp-up has begun. Two, it opens up our storage building, giving us access to many more site elements. Here are some pictures from the day.