Sold-out Easter egg hunt lasts 2.5 minutes at Sugarbowl Park

More than 80 children descended on Sugarbowl Park on Saturday for the third annual Hippity Hop Easter Egg Hunt, a community event that sold out all registration spots and scattered 1,000 Easter eggs across the park’s grounds before the hunt consumed every last one in two and a half minutes.

The event is entirely volunteer-run, organized each year by Fort Erie residents Ana and Stephen LeClerc with their son Roman, without municipal support or formal organizational backing. It began as a small street gathering and has since grown into one of the town’s few dedicated Easter events for young children.

Ana LeClerc told Fort Erie Radio she started the hunt after moving to town during the pandemic and finding nothing like it already in place.

“We moved here in 2020 and we didn’t know anybody, and I have only one child, and doing (an) Easter egg hunt by yourself is pretty boring,” said LeClerc. “There weren’t any Easter egg hunts in the area either, so this is why I’m doing it.”

Registration opened in mid-February and ran until noon the day of the event, a cutoff LeClerc set to allow time to organize kits, track participants and keep the check-in process manageable.

Despite weeks of availability, the majority of the 80 spots filled in the final five days before registration closed. A small number of families who arrived without pre-registering were turned away at the gate.

This year’s event offered 20 more registration kits than the previous year, up from 60 in its second year. The hunt was open to children aged two to eight. Eggs were spread across the park, with some placed closer to the starting line for the youngest children to keep the scramble fair.

For the first time since the event launched, LeClerc required a donation to register, either monetary or in the form of egg hunt supplies such as fillable eggs, chocolate or small toys.

“The last two years it’s been a free event and I’ve been paying for it myself,” she said. “This year, because of the times, we need a little assistance.”

Supplies donated by families went directly back into the eggs used at the event. LeClerc also asked attendees to return empty eggs after the hunt for use the following year.

Local businesses contributed prizes to a penny raffle held alongside the hunt. Sponsors included Picard’s Peanuts, which donated a retro-themed gift box; Garrison Automotive; Stacked Pancake; and Tim Hortons, which provided 100 Timbits.

The penny raffle is intended to offset costs and, eventually, to do more. LeClerc’s longer-term goal is to grow the event to the point where proceeds can be donated to a community-chosen charity, with supporters voting on the recipient online.

“My goal is to make enough one day, hopefully next year or the year after, where we can donate to a charity where everyone will vote online,” said LeClerc.

For now, funds raised go toward covering expenses for the following year’s event. Asked what she hopes children take away from the afternoon, her answer was brief.

“I just want kids to have fun,” she said.

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