Vita’s biggest event of the year is Canada Day. After not being able to hold the event for a couple of years due to COVID, organizer, Ang Boychuk, says everyone is excited for their first Canada Day celebration since the start of the pandemic. 

“We just want the community to be able to have something to do, and because of COVID we haven't been able to have one since 2019, so we're hoping everyone will come out because they're excited to go back and be able to do things again.” 

Boychuk said it was difficult not being able to have Vita Canada Day for the last two years. They tried to have it in 2020, but everything fell through. 

“Everything was booked. Everything was paid for and then it was a no-go. So, we're really excited to be able to do this again, and just to bring the community together.” 

There are a lot of things to look forward to. Boychuk says they have a lot of things for both kids and adults. From face painting to a mechanical bull, there’s fun for all ages. 

She also explains they have some things from past years, but have also decided to include new activities as well. 

“We have a lot of the old favourites: the pancake breakfast, the parade and the ball tournament. And we have a couple of new things like the strongman competition and the mounted shooting.” 

The strongman competition is compiled of events including pulling a 24,000 pound gravel truck 80 feet, squatting a car, and Viking presses. Contestants are separated into five different classes by weight.  

The women will be pulling a diesel truck with a trailer that’s about 14,000 pounds instead of the gravel truck. 

Devin Penner, organizer of the strongman competition, says “We have girls as small as 130 pounds that are going to pull that truck.” 

Organizer, Tracy Bergen, explains what gymkhana is, since it’ll be a part of Vita Canada Day. 

“Gymkhana is a fun horse show, basically you can have your basics like barrel racing and pole bending. I know Jake, who's putting it on for us always likes to add a couple of crazy fun ones. Sometimes a tarp race, stuff like that.” 

Bergen says you don’t need to be great at riding horses in order to join in. 

“It's all about fun and it's, you know, inexpensive to enter. And just for the fun, I mean, they win their little prize money, but it's mainly just all about everybody getting to join in on the fun.” 

There are a lot of activities planned for the weekend, but Boychuk is most excited for the fireworks going off at the end of Friday night. 

“We have the big fireworks show put on by CanFire Pyrotechnics and we're really looking forward to it.”