If you’ve been to Cottonwood Island Park in the last month, you may have noticed some colourful rocks along the trail.
Prince George residents have been painting rocks to help create Roxy the Rock Snake.
The community art project was started by Sharon Yon.
“I live in Campbell River, but last July we found out my 39-year-old son Jeremy has cancer, and I jumped in my car and I came here and I haven’t gone back, and I can’t imagine being anywhere else,” she explained.
“There’s been a bit of fundraising done for Jeremy since we’ve been here, and this is one of my ways of giving back to the community.”
Yon said she noticed painted rocks along the trail while walking 250 km during the Colour Walk for Hospice and raising $1,000.
“I thought well I should do that, that’s another way I could give back,” she said.
“I’m not a very great painter, I’m a photographer, so anyways I started painting these little rocks, I’ve placed over 300 rocks throughout the parks since May. All of a sudden I started getting these messages and tags about this rock snake and that I should start one. I looked into it, this rock snake, he’s really cool, his name is Rosco, and he’s in Texas, so I thought, he’s in Texas, I can start one here and I don’t think I’ll be stepping on anyone’s toes.”
Yon said she and Jeremy painted the head of the snake and made the sign on June 15th.
A month after the head was placed in Cottonwood Island Park, Roxy has grown to 180 feet long with 788 painted rocks. (As of Friday morning)
“It just melts my heart, seeing the kids coming running along, or they’re yelling out to their mom, ‘oh my god mom look at how big Roxy’s gotten!,” Yon said.
“Other little ones are counting, people from the seniors home coming down as a group and laying their rocks all together.”
Yon added Roxy isn’t only made up of rocks from Prince George.
“I had a lady from Ontario named Christine, she mailed me a beautiful rock, she took a picture of her farm and painted on the rock. It’s on Roxy right now,” she explained.
“I have another lady that contacted me from the Island, she’s got a rock on the way as well. They just want to be part of, right? I thought it was a great creative art project that anyone can be a part of.”
Yon is also asking people to not take rocks away from Roxy, as she’s had to replace about 40 rocks.
When Roxy was started on June 15th, the goal was just to get some rocks going and be creative.
“I was blown away when she got to 500, and now she’s almost to 800, and she’s going to keep going,” Yon said.
“Now people are saying to me the Guinness Record for the longest snake that they’ve recorded in the world is I believe over 3,700 rocks long.”
Yon said it would be amazing for the whole community of Prince George and anybody that’s added a rock.
She added it would be special to her, because it started with the rock she and her son painted.
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