It happens every year. People get stir crazy for spring to arrive.
Oh sure, many of us still have ice on our minds right now, thanks to the playoff run for our beloved Estevan Bruins, which will ultimately culminate with this city hosting the Centennial Cup national junior A hockey championship in late May. But even those fixated on an activity associated with winter are thinking about spring.
We get to look forward to warmer temperatures, longer days, sunshine, flowers blooming, yard work, gardening and all the other fun stuff associated with April.
We haven’t had that stretch of six or seven consecutive days with double-digit highs as of yet, but we’ve had some nice days to enjoy the outdoors.
It seems like there has been even more anticipation for spring this year, and a lot of that is due to the city’s integrated pathway and sidewalk project.
For all the excitement about this addition to our community last year, we didn’t have a lot of time to enjoy it. Construction on the first new pathways didn’t start until the middle of July, thanks to all of the work that needed to happen in a relatively short amount of time for the project to get off the ground.
We only had a few weeks or a few months to walk or jog on them, take a bike ride and enjoy the beauty of our area.
Snow was cleared from some of them in the winter months for our recreational amusement, but others were not, and that made sense. After all, clearing snow from a pathway is going to cost money, just like it does from a street or avenue.
The pathway that runs from Perkins Street to Kensington Avenue in southeast Estevan offers some stunning scenery, but it wasn’t essential to remove snow from it in the winter.
And with the wildly inconsistent weather we had this past winter, with the prolonged cold stretches and other numerous days in which temperatures were at or above zero, you have to wonder how much activity some pathways would have in January or February.
Now that we’re into April, expect to see a lot of people out and about.
If the Mercury were to do 101 Things to Experience in Estevan this Spring (like we do in the winter and summer) our master pathway system would likely top the list. And we could probably throw a few pathways onto the list.
The pathways offer something for everyone. Want to walk at a leisurely pace? You can do that. You want some challenging terrain with hills that will get you some tougher exercise? Enjoy it. You want to jog? Go for it. You want to cycle? You can do that, too.
Just make sure you respect each other. It’s important for those who are looking for serious exercise to respect the slower walkers. And it’s important for the slower traffic to not cause an impediment for those who are jogging or cycling.
(If you see someone you know on a pathway, and you want to chat, please do so off to the side).
We’re starting to see events booked for the pathways, such as the Coal Country run, walk and cycling event on May 14.
It’s going to be a busy spring in the Estevan area. We have all the events starting to return to the southeast. We have the Centennial Cup coming. It looks like the Estevan Exhibition Association is finally going to be able to host the Energy City Ex. in four days, with the fair and rodeo together on the same weekend.
It’s a fun and exciting time of year.
But it’s still important for us to get out and get some much-needed exercise. Our new pathway system provides everyone with that opportunity.
