Festival du Voyageur roars back with event of 'historic proportions' after pandemic downsizing

Festival du Voyageur organizers are ready to throw open the Fort Gibraltar doors tothe first full-scaleevent in three years due to the upheaval of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"It is finally time to dust off those capotes, relearn how to tie your ceinture flche and practise those hhos," festival executive director Darrel Nadeausaid at a launch event on Thursday, referring to long wrap-style woolcoats, sashes and the francophone cheer.

"For the first time in three years, we have tents with sound systems, fridges full of great beer and thousands of festival-goers ready and eager to come and celebrate our signature francophone joie de vivre."

The annual 10-day festival, which runs this year from Feb. 17-26,is held in Winnipeg's French quarter,St. Boniface.

It is Western Canada's largest winter festival, celebrating a fur-tradingpast and the French culturethrough entertainment, arts and crafts, music, exhibitsand displays.

It has been held every year since thefirst one in 1970, though the past two years were a little awkward.

The pandemic forced the festival to go strictly virtual in 2021, with music performances broadcast over YouTube and Facebook rather than in tents filled with food and drink, the smell of wood chips andstraw-filled dance floors.

Ahybrid format was held in 2002, with virtual elements and limited outdoor-onlyofferings for visitors.

"We kept hope it would come back, that we would come back, and we are on the cusp of that," saidEric Plamondon, president of the festival's board of directors, calling this comeback festival one of "historic proportions."

To welcome back the crowds in 2023, there are larger heated tents, more flashy light projections, more and bigger snow sculptures, specially crafted beer and sound systems that are "sharper, louder and capable of picking up all the nuances of our musical offerings," Plamondon said.

Indigenous art installations by 15 local and nationalartists will be on display throughphysical and digitalinstallations and projections, while Winter Stories will offer takes told in Indigenous languages.

The Bote chansons mobile concert trailer will be set upin the new Terrasse chansons, where festival-goers can dance or sit near bonfiresand imbibe in somecaribou, chilled inan ice glass.

More than 200 musicians, bothnational stars and emerging local artists, are part of this year's event. Performances will take placeat the festival site as well as related sites and feature big names like Joey Landreth, Tom Jackson, Susan AglukarkandTerra Lightfoot.

Fiddling and jigging contests, a peasoup competition, an ice-carving workshop, a Mtis beading circle, achildren's playground, horse-drawn sleigh ridesand staples like sugar pie and maple taffy are all part of the activities,while selfie enthusiasts can cozy up to animal sculptures in the new snow forest.