Route 55 won the trophy as the best judged ribs at Ribfest 2015. Photo by Dennis Chippa.
The third annual Ribfest wrapped up at the Voyager Hotel Sunday with the moment of truth from three days of effort around ribs and chicken.
The announcement of the 2015 Judges and People's Choice awards came down and in the end, it was Route 55 who won for the best ribs in the minds of the judges.
Troy Katerenchuk of Route 55, says his crew loves the competition and the trip up from London.
“We love North Bay and our people here, they just love our ribs.”
Troy says the secret is no great secret.
“Hard work, lots of rub, lots of sauce, and good taste.”
People’s choice winner was Jack the Ribber, who tied with Railroad Ribs for second in the judges’ opinion.
Hundreds of ballots were cast, which even then represented just a fraction of the pile of ribs and chicken eaten during the three day event.
The weekend also featured inflatables for the kids, a rock wall, martial arts demonstrations, dunk tanks, live bands and Sunday’s live performance from summer challenge’s cast of the Littlest Mermaid.
Check out drone video of the event courtesy Petar's Final Cut http://www.petarsfinalcut.com:
Tracy Sloan, one of the organizers, says Ribfest was always about fun for everyone.
“The Voyager Inn when it first started it was a really big community hub. There were bars in there, there were restaurants in there, and we wanted to bring that back and we wanted people to know that the Voyager is a great place to be and also that we’re part of the community. We’re part of a residential community so we wanted to make sure that this is something that you know would be appropriate for everybody.”
The community seems to have picked up the message, as literally thousands came out over the three days.
Co-organizer Sara jane Valiquette admits even they were surprised by the crowds.
“We were overwhelmed with the attendance this year. We were so excited for the way the people just wanted to come together and make all of our hard work worthwhile.”
Speaking of hard work, Sloan says the work on next year's event begins very soon.
“Tuesday we start planning for next year. We’ve actually been talking about it today, Sara Jane and I, and we were talking about what we’re gonna do, not to make it bigger but better. So I guess we’ve already started to plan for next year.”
With proceeds at the gate, through draws, the dunk tank and from vendors all going to Community Living North Bay, that organization came out a big winner, trophy or not.