September 15th 2025
Nestled in the north end of St. Catharines is a wonderful, secluded 34-acre island called Henley Island. It’s home to the Henley Regatta, a world-renowned rowing venue which has operated there since 1903. Once on the island, it’s hard to imagine that you are actually in the middle of a city. I mean, all cities have parks, to be sure, but not like this. Surrounded by the waters of Martindale Pond, city housing is far enough away that you forget civilization surrounds you. With trees, meadow, rolling land and water it feels like you are at a resort.
On site is a clubhouse owned by the St. Catharines Rowing Alumni Association, and fortunately for us, it is available to rent for special occasions. And for us, that special occasion is our Annual Fall Round-Up Brokers B.B.Q.
Like most of the traditions that make up our social event calendar, the Broker B.B.Q. didn’t start out on Henley Island. In fact, the first few were held in the backyard of our Broker/Owner, Wayne Quirk. But a combination of growth on the part of RE/MAX Garden City Realty and the installation of a backyard pool made that site just too small to accommodate everyone.
For a number of years, while we operated the Burlington/Waterdown arm of our company, we held the event at Place Polonaise, located right on Lake Ontario in the Town of Grimsby. But development closed that pavilion down, and the consolidation of our operation to Niagara brought us here to Henley Island.
This year’s theme was pure Western. There were games set up for the kids, including axe throwing (plastic axes), ring toss, corn hole, and for the adults, what is a hoe down without line dancing. Many thanks to Ruth of ENI Productions, the line 
dancing queen who taught us the steps. She’s been doing that for more than 33 years, so she definitely knows the moves, and although we had booked her for a fixed time period, she was definitely in the groove and stayed with it right to the end. Domenic Cortese, our regular DJ, kept things in spirit with an amazing assortment of classic country, and even our own Jim Holiko took to the microphone and belted out some great songs.
Food was once again supplied by Dave Moukperian of Fiddler's fame. Ribs and pulled pork are his signature claim to fame, but eating wasn’t limited to that alone; we also feasted on chicken and beef skewers, lasagna, mac and cheese, multiple salads and much more. And what’s a meal without dessert. Strawberry crumble and apple crisp made a delightful ending to dinner.
It was nice to see an assortment of cowboy hats and boots, glitter and bling. Regardless of the event we are hosting, it’s always amazing to see our people interact and mingle. Sometimes we get busy in our own orbit of activity. These opportunities to network with our coworkers are very special indeed.
A special thanks to Deb Quirk, who worked so many hours behind the scenes making it all come together, and to the wonderful team of servers at Henley Island, Tom and June Lockhart and Ted Kennedy, who take such good care of us and who over the years have become part of the family.
Well, Broker B.B.Q. 2025 is now in the history books. I think I can speak on behalf of everyone there when I say we look forward to doing it again next year. It was an amazing event. Oh, what a night!