![]() We get groups of 30 or 40 people who are coming just to go in the sub," said Isabelle Ingles, the owner of Izzy's Schooners Patio and Lookout, whose spacious back deck gives tourists the best view in town of the 90-metre-long vessel. Izzy's Schooners Patio and Lookout's back deck offers the best view in the village of Port Burwell to see the province's only submarine-turned-history museum. They come from as far as London, Windsor, Kitchener-Waterloo and the Greater Toronto Area, and before they leave, they usually spend some time and money in the shops and restaurants on Robinson Street, Port Burwell's main strip. "We were turning people away every day last summer." Submarine feeds local businessesįor tourism purposes, the boat can carry half-capacity of 2,200 people a season, and 2,192 spots were sold last year. ![]() "Most of those were single spots on different tours where they wanted to fit two people into one spot and we just couldn't do it. "We sold all but eight," he said of the open spots to tour the boat. But if last summer (June to September) was any indication, there is plenty of public interest in booking spots on a tour. Raven won't make any predictions for this summer. Still, things are looking up for the museum. Raven said the regular shutdowns put the Elgin Military Museum even further behind in its debt to the municipality. Now that pandemic health restrictions have eased, he hopes business will pick up for a tourist attraction that's all about tight quarters. Ian Raven, director of the Elgin Military Museum and HMCS Ojibwa, stands between the ship's twin engines. It also said "it is highly unlikely the Municipality of Bayham will ever be able to recover the monies owed to it." Tours nearly sold out last yearīy 2025, the municipality will have paid off about a third of it, according to a March 2019 staff report. The museum defaulted on its debt and, several lawsuits later, the Municipality of Bayham ended up getting stuck with the bill. However, those visitors failed to materialize in numbers large enough for the Elgin Military Museum to pay off the $6- million cost of lugging the ship nearly 2,000 kilometres. The pandemic is just the latest snafu in a string of bad luck for the Cold War relic-turned-tourist attraction in Port Burwell, Ont. The landlocked submarine was supposed to attract tens of thousands of visitors a year when it was moved in 2012 from Halifax to the tiny village of 600 on the north shore of Lake Erie. "It was a quick walk through the boat and then a discussion outside." "When we were open, we were running at 50 per cent capacity, and even that was challenging with the size of the compartments inside the submarine. "Compartment sizes basically closed us during most of COVID," said Ian Raven, director of the Elgin Military Museum and HMCS Ojibwa. Inside, however, it becomes abundantly clear there is simply no such thing as social distancing on a submarine. ![]() From the outside, at nearly 90 metres long and eight metres wide, HMCS Ojibwa is huge. ![]()
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