World Ocean Day in Sherbrooke NS - The Whale Sanctuary Project

(Amy Simon is the Whale Sanctuary Project’s Community Liaison Officer in Nova Scotia.)

While the Whale Sanctuary Project team is hard at work to complete the sanctuary and welcome its first whales, I lead our enthusiastic group of local volunteers who tirelessly spread the word about the project by putting on local events and maintaining the operations of our Visitors Centre. This past Saturday, June 1st, the Whale Sanctuary Project and St. Mary’s Municipality co-hosted the first-ever St. Mary’s Ocean Day Celebration.

As part of World Ocean Day, Saturday’s event celebrated all things ocean, including science, conservation, and community. Close to 500 people gathered in and around a big blue tent at the Whale Sanctuary Visitors Centre in Sherbrooke. There were ocean-themed games and face painting, artifacts to explore and ocean experts to meet. There was also giant walkable map of Canada’s seafloor and an immersive 360-degree video experience where visitors could experience the sense of walking underwater.

The Whale Sanctuary’s Visitors & Operations Centre in Sherbrooke, Nova Scotia, is about 20 minutes from the sanctuary site.
Amy Simon, the Whale Sanctuary's outreach coordinator in Nova Scotia welcomes visitors.
Young visitors take a walk across a giant map of Canada. (Map courtesy of Canada Geographic. Education)
Learning about whales at the Ocean Wise table outside the organization's SEA DOME.
Part of the Ocean Wise display of whale bones, teeth and baleen.
The SEA DOME gives groups an immersive 360-degree experience of walking underwater.

The Whale Sanctuary Project has attended Ocean Day events in other areas of Nova Scotia including Halifax and Lunenburg, and we felt it was time to bring Ocean Day to St. Mary’s. To make this happen, 12 volunteers put in over 120 hours and some stellar local organizations participated with fun and informative booths to make this a truly memorable community event: St. Mary’s River Association, St. Mary’s Trails Association, Oceans X students, Ocean Wise, Dome Exhibition, The Soap Company of Nova Scotia, Luna Sea Solutions and the Port Bickerton Light House.

With St. Mary’s being a coastal community, the ocean plays a big role in our own lives as well as the lives of the whales we seek to help. While we continue our work to complete the sanctuary, our local team of volunteers will keep on spreading the word at events like Ocean Day.

Ocean Week Canada takes place from June 1-9. The Whale Sanctuary Project will have team members and volunteers at other Nova Scotia events in Halifax and Antigonish on Saturday June 8th. For more information and attendance details, visit https://oceanweekcan.ca/events/.