Prince Albert Tourism and others are looking back on the summer season. (File Photo/paNOW Staff)

By Michael Joel-Hansen

Summer Tourism

Looking back on the summer season

Sep 2, 2019 | 8:00 AM

The summer is starting to draw to a close and those involved in more tourist heavy endeavors are reflecting.

Amber Pratt, CEO for Prince Albert Tourism and Marketing Bureau, which operates the visitor’s centre said they noticed some more people coming through from further away places.

“Some different countries and provinces that we haven’t had as much of lately, we did have quite a few people from the states, some from Europe,” she said.

From May to August, the visitors centre saw 2442 people come through their doors. This is up from 2018 where they saw 2236 people come through, however that year the centre was not open on Saturday.

Overall Pratt said it was a successful tourist season for the city. She said they generally got positive reviews from people about the city’s recreation facilities and parks standing out. Pratt said recently they have noticed more people travelling by different means.

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“We’re noticing a lot more people going through town with their RVs,” she said.

Pratt added the lack of camping and RV options in or near the city is an issue, which has been brought up to her and leads to people passing through or not extending their stay.

For the city’s museums, Michelle Taylor, manager and curator for the P.A. Historical Society said they were happy with the number of people who came to visit them.

“Our attendance was down a little bit, but we were steady usually through all the museums, which we really enjoyed, and we were sitting about 10,000 people using the museums,” she said.

The historical society operates a number of facilities in the city including the Prince Albert Historical Museum, the Rotary Museum of Police and Correction, the Evolution of Education Museum and the John and Olive Diefenbaker Museum.

Taylor explained generally the numbers of people who come through the doors of museums overall has been trending downward, but she said they have not seen a large drop off.

This summer was the first one where many people had the chance to see the new Indigenous history room, which features a number of artifacts and includes murals painted by artists with the help of the community. Taylor said she heard mostly positive reviews about the new exhibit.

“People have really enjoyed the changes we’ve done to the historical museum and we’ll continue working in that Indigenous space,” she said.

Taylor added there were a few people who didn’t appreciate the changes, as some people didn’t like how some exhibits had to be put away to make way for the new exhibits.

“Most people got that it was time for the museum to change,” she said.

Another positive area for the museum was there seasonal tee room, which was provided by Heejung’s House. Taylor estimated around 1,300 people came to the eat at the temporary restaurant. This is a big increase from last year where the vendor left part way through the summer.

“Today being her last day there was 50 people there, which is pretty good for 16 seats outside and 12 or so on the inside,” she said.

Kevin Pee-ace shows the Indigenous murals when they made their debut in the winter, the new Indigenous room got positive reviews from many of those who came through the museum (Michael Joel-Hansen/paNOW Staff)

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MichaelJoel.Hansen@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @mjhskcdn