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In the midst of the axe throwing, tree climbing, sawing, and parade that make up Squamish Day’s Loggers Sports Festival, it’s easy to overlook the many volunteers who make it possible. While the bulk of the volunteers help out on festival days, happening this year July 30 to August 2, preparations begin months to years earlier, with a dedicated board and other volunteers sinking in untold hours to make sure the festival runs without a hitch.
The wood was lathed and inspected for quality to ensure each competitor’s logs are the same. The buildings were repainted and reroofed months, and volunteers work half the year training up new and returning athletes to dazzle spectators across a range of events. The Squamish Recorder spoke with three of the volunteers behind that work, Jacquelin McNicol, who helps steer the festival year round, Josh Hampton, who helps out as part of a construction team, and Meghan Hall, who helps train the next generation of competitors along with the rest of the team.
McNicol is the person everyone seems to be checking in with, whether it’s about a missing part or a hundred-year-old note found on a shelf explaining how something used to be done, the scale of what she oversees is easy to underestimate.
“For the weekend, we’ve got about 350 [Volunteers] for all the events,” she said, “and then seasonally, this team here, we’re pretty much around when we’re doing things.”
Behind that is a board that meticulously plans out each year’s festival, grounds upkeep, and thinks up ways to use the grounds to better serve the community. McNicol brought in Josh Hampton in the first place. The two have known each other for more than 20 years, and when the festival needed construction work beyond routine repairs, Hampton stepped up and hasn’t looked back.
Hampton has volunteered alongside a team to help with some of the construction for the festival for the past four years now. This year, that meant a full overhaul of two auxiliary buildings with new roofs, new exteriors and reframed doors. He estimates he’s already put in 60 hours on the project, much of it packed into the final stretch, which he admits is a pattern. “We always talk about getting on things earlier,” he said, “but you know how that goes.”
What keeps him coming back isn’t really the work. “I love the event. Jacqueline and Rob are just great people,” he said. “I just like to give back to the community when I can, you know? It’s kind of how I was raised.”
Meghan Hall helps run the Timber Training Club, the volunteer group that develops the athletes who eventually compete at Squamish Days, on top of sitting on the festival’s board as the Vice President. The club has about 20 members and meets weekly, with the goal of feeding new talent into the sport.
“Our mandate is really to grow logger sports,” Hall said. “Bring new competitors into the sport, and then help existing competitors develop and grow their skills.”
She fell into it through her husband, a former college competitor, and has stayed involved ever since moving to Squamish. Her favorite part of the weekend has nothing to do with axes or saws. For the last few years she’s worked the start and finish line for the bed races. “You get to see the whole community come out and be involved,” Hall said. “All the different teams, the costumes they come up with, the themes, and how excited they are to be a part of it.”
That sense of community isn’t limited to the people who work the events. It’s what McNicol comes back to when asked what keeps her doing this after so many years. New businesses that have never been involved before often reach out asking how they can help, and long-time volunteers keep returning year after year, alongside their kids.
“This town’s great,” McNicol said. “It’s not, you know, new Squamish, old Squamish. It’s all one Squamish.”
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