Bob Hendrickson, IOHT

ISHPEMING — Winter starts to feel long in the month of March. With hints of spring not far off, there is no better way to enjoy the last days of the season than getting out and playing in the snow.

The Greater Ishpeming-Negaunee Area Chamber of Commerce is moving forward with planning the West End Winter Wonderland. This year’s event will take place at Al Quaal Recreation Area on Saturday, March 13 from 1p.m. to 4 p.m.

The GINCC will be following a COVID-19 mitigation plan to reduce gathering size and keeping all activities outside. This will be a much different event comparted to past WEWW. Primarily it will focus on drawing families for an afternoon of structured winter activities, sharing some laughter and a chance to win some great prizes.

Activities will include sledding at the gully hill behind Birchview School, snowshoeing on the Baby Lake Trail and snow sculpting in the field on the north side of the park.

To make it fun and unique, the GINCC is encouraging families to build a cardboard sled at home and bring it to slide on, the snowshoe scramble will have a mystery message encoded along the trail to un-cypher and the snow sculping will be open to all creative ideas such as snow statues or snow forts.

People are asked to bring their own equipment for all activities. But if needed, Wilderness Sports will be on site with a limited number of snowshoes to use and West End Ski & Trail will be there with snow bike demos. The equipment will be sanitized between use.

All participants will all be entered into a prize drawing and free giveaways will be provided. Pre-registration is required and cost is $5 per person or $15 for a family.

To register go to Eventbrite: https://ginccweww.eventbrite.com for more information check out the GINCC Facebook event page or go to www.gincc.org.

The event is sponsored by the GINCC Rock Stars: Northern Michigan University, TruNorth Federal Credit Union, Bell Auxiliary, Upper Peninsula Power Company, Cleveland-Cliffs and Eagle Mine.

To learn more give us a call 906-486-1111. Our hours are 9 a.m.-5 p.m., Monday through Friday. The office is located at 910 U.S. 41 West in front Jubilee Foods & Fuel.

Editor’s note: Bob Hendrickson is the executive director of the GINCC. He currently resides in Negaunee with his wife, Laura, and daughter, Sierra. He enjoys mountain biking, skiing, fishing and hunting along with family time.