RANGELEY – While many Rangeley people said they enjoyed themselves and made money during Snodeo weekend, preliminary estimates suggest attendance and financial gains from last week’s event were down by about 20 percent.
It’s too soon to have firm figures, Rangeley Snowmobile Club Secretary and Treasurer Gail Gavigan said, but considering the weather, “I feel we had a good weekend.” She said she “can’t even begin to guess how many people were there – I’d say that we were down in numbers probably by 20 percent. Money-wise, we might be down maybe 20 percent.”
Gavigan said that since the fireworks scheduled to close the weekend Saturday night were canceled because of rain and high winds, the Snowmobile Club lost less than they might have.
Reports from inn, camp and bed and breakfast owners differed, with smaller businesses saying they had few cancellations, if any, and larger outfits reporting as many as half their Snodeo weekend reservations had been canceled by Saturday afternoon. Sue Lind, of North Country Inn B&B, said that although her inn experienced no cancellations, “I was thinking at any moment they’d come and say they were going to leave.” She added that by 5 p.m. Saturday, the town had sort of reversed direction “and it looked like a mass exodus.”
Margie Jamison, who owns the Country Club Inn with husband, Steve, said she was lucky Snodeo weekend. “I happened to have a lot of drinkers,” she said, and added that even though the area surrounding the inn only had about “2 inches of snow, we had snow machines going all day long. Besides, she said, “There’s so much to do Snodeo weekend,” other than snowmobile.
And even without much snow, plenty of people took part in the radar run races out on Rangeley lake, though to shore-bound spectators, the racers, who were speeding through almost 4 inches of water atop the 14 inch ice on the lake, looked more like jet skiers than snowmobilers, Gavigan said. The only snowmobile club-run event with an exceptionally small turnout, she added, was the Poker Run. The race, which usually has about 250 participants, operates much like a treasure hunt, as snowmobilers, or even people driving cars, ride from place to place gathering cards, trying to end up with the best hand. This year, Gavigan said, only 25 people took part. She said she thinks turnout was so low because most people “don’t realize they don’t need to (race) by snowmobile.”
The weekend was remarkably quiet for the Rangeley Police Department, said Chief Phil Weymouth, despite rumors of heavy drinking on the part of bored snowmobilers. “It was actually a very peaceful Snodeo,” he said. “There were two potential fights,” that police were able to resolve and one warrant related arrest, and no arrests for operating under the influence.
“We normally deal with a couple of fights, several accidents, and OUIs,” during Snodeo, Weymouth said, but, “this year we put the manpower out there, and because of that it was a very uneventful Snodeo for the Police Department, which I think is just absolutely marvelous.” The biggest complaint police had was regarding noise on the lake.
“Instead of going out (on trails) they were racing back and forth across the lake,” he said.
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