Exclusive dining experience could be coming to National Historic Site near Toronto
If you live in Toronto and haven’t visited the Peterborough Lift Lock, you’re making a huge mistake.
In fact, a mistake of world record proportions.
Approximately 130km from Toronto sits the world’s highest hydraulic lift lock. For those of you not raised on the Trent-Severn waterway (another National Historic site!), that means that everyday this bad boy lifts and lowers boats roughly 20m (65 ft) in the air.
And now you could have the chance to have dinner under them.
That’s right, how does a meal beneath 1,500 tonnes of water sound? ‘Cause that’s what Peterborough & the Kawarthas Tourism is trying to turn into a reality.
So last month they held a dry test run, during which they had 12 people canoe along the Peterborough canal in a Voyageur canoe (36′ Montreal to be exact) from the Canadian Canoe Museum. The lucky participants took a ride up one side of the lift, spoke to the lock master about the history of the locks, took the lift down again, and then ate a gorgeous, locally sourced meal prepared by celebrated local chefs in an area usually restricted to public access. This is what Under Water Dining at Lock 21 is all about.
The test run went well and, according to Peterborough & the Kawarthas Tourism representative Kelly Jessup, plans to open the experience to the public are in the works.
“It will happen, it’s just a matter of determining when it will happen,” says Jessup.
Currently, the goal is to offer the dinner this fall if possible, with the goal of having a full-time schedule in place by the time summer 2017 comes around.
No word yet on how much the exclusive experience will cost, but the chance to eat at a National Historic site in such a unique setting is certainly enough to wet whet our appetite.
“Tourism is changing dramatically, and it’s difficult for small destinations to keep up, so we’re trying to leverage our unique assets,” Jessup explains.
Mission accomplished.
You can sign up for their newsletter to find out as soon as they release tickets for the dinner: www.thekawarathas.ca/newsletter
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