Longtime Virgin Gorda Easter Festival organiser Darwin George, who died unexpectedly last year, will be honoured during this year’s event, which is to begin March 30, officials said.
Rupert Vanterpool, the newly appointed chairman of the VG Easter Festival Committee, said Tuesday during a press conference that the event, budgeted to cost $100,000, will include a pageant, a cultural food fair, a wet fete, a rise-and-shine tramp and the annual Easter Monday Parade.
The festival will be held under the theme “Welcome to our festivities as we showcase accountability through the cultural eyes of transparency for 2013 in VG.”
Tame spending
Marvin Blyden, chairman of the Virgin Islands Festivals and Fairs Committee, said Tuesday there will be no “wild spending” for the festival, adding that a report should be completed “within a month and a half.”
In addition to the Easter Festival, the 17th annual Spanish Town Fisherman’s Jamboree 2013 will begin on March 29 with a welcome cocktail reception at Fischer’s Cove, followed by two days of fishing. Prizes will be given for the heaviest wahoos caught as well as to the best male, female and youngest anglers.
Want to go?
March 23
Miss Virgin Gorda Easter Festival Pageant, festival village, 8 p.m.
March 28
Opening of Coney Island
March 30
VG Cultural Food Fair, 9 a.m.-5 p.m.
Village opening, 6 p.m.
Performers: Trinidad and Tobago’s Denise “Saucy” Belfon, Antigua’s Tian Winter, and the Virgin Islands’ Lashing Dogs and Showtime Band
March 31
Wet Fete, noon
Virgin Gorda Calypso Show with Trinidad and Tobago’s Bunji Garlin and his wife, Faye-Anna Lyons, as well as the United States VI’s Pumpa and the Unit, among others
April 1
Rise and Shine Tramp, 4-8 a.m.
The Easter Monday Parade, noon.
Performers: Nu Vibes Band from St. Kitts and Nevis, among others