On Saturday we went downtown for the annual lighting of the tree as part of Cavalcade of Lights. I do this so often that I think it deserves its own tag. Here’s the 2002, 2006, and 2007 blogs. The featured artist this year for me was Serena Ryder who sang her latest single Little Bit of Red and another song, they also had the Canadian Tenors and some other artists.

This year, they opened up the raised viewing area around Nathan Phillips Square so people could go there without being kicked off. It was a good thing too, because the square was packed. I don’t know why so many people go just to see the turning on of the lights. We got some skating in too, which was less crowded but still packed. The ice there is not that great, although I didn’t think it was as bad as previous years. I think it’s a good balance of slippery-enough-to-skate and walkable, actually the roughness is beneficial because it makes it harder to fall.

There were fireworks at the end, and the rink came to a stand still as everyone watched it. This year, they had climbers scale down the two city hall towers as fireworks blasted from their backs. I wonder how much they paid for that??