Ice-skating: free and nostalgic

By Stephen Hlawaty
Outdoors Columnist

Embrace weakness. There's a mantra that you don't hear very often. For this column, I did exactly that. I embraced the athletic art of ice-skating and, not surprisingly, fell flat on my face.

When it comes to outdoor activities, we all have our strengths and weaknesses. But too often, perhaps, we tend to gravitate toward our strengths when participating in the great outdoors. For me, that means skiing, mountain biking, camping and hiking. A two-fingered hand would suffice, however, for counting the times in which I'd gone ice-skating.

Lacking experience in something should not necessarily preclude you from trying something. In fact, the newness of an experience is an adventure all its own, even if it is met with wobbly knees, sore ankles and a cold, wet bum. And therein lies the life lesson for embracing weakness.

While I have never been an active participant in ice-skating, I have been an active observer of ice-skating all of my life. My experience with watching how true ice-skating is done grew from the New York Islanders season ticket holdings of my father, brother and two uncles. With four season ticket holdings in the family, I was almost guaranteed to watch a live hockey game every week, should any one of the four not be able to make it. I remember the screeching sounds of cutting ice blades as they carved into freshly resurfaced ice. I marveled at the rooster tail of spraying ice chips as a hockey player would come to a skidding stop.

Spending time with my cousins on Hudson Valley's Greenwood Lake, though, taught me that there is a big difference between indoor and outdoor skating. The Greenwood Lake locals would trudge through snowdrifts with shovels, brooms and skates in tow on their way to the frozen, windswept lake. Once there, they'd have to shovel and brush away whatever snow was piled up from the last Mid-Atlantic storm before taking to the ice.

But the shovels and brooms--necessary tools for any outdoor skater--were no Zamboni. As a result, the glide on outdoor ice is generally a bit bumpier than indoor ice.

So was the case when I recently ventured onto the frozen City Park Lake. Before I bounced my way onto the ice, I asked some kids who were getting ready to skate whether the ice was smooth. They grinned at me, and sizing me up as a chump on his way to getting some lumps, said that the ice was fine, adding the disclaimer that it was also free. Free, I understood.

I found the lake in surprisingly good shape, not at all like the frozen rippled Greenwood Lake of my cousins' home. Or maybe I was just trying to convince myself of that, seeing there were several children no more than 6 years old who were careening all around me. It didn't matter, though. I was skating, and it was fun.

The prophetic kids with whom I spoke earlier said that the nearby hook-and-ladder company maintains the ice, regularly monitoring its thickness and safety and closing the rink during warmer weather. Indeed, the City Park Lake has been closed for ice-skating for much of January due to warm temperatures. Nevertheless, there's plenty of winter ahead of us, which should allow City Park Lake to remain open into March.

Other outdoor ice-skating opportunities include the skating rink in Old Town Square in Fort Collins. This charming little rink located at the corner of Walnut and Linden charges $2 for admission and $1 for rentals. Smaller children can learn to skate by leaning on plastic trashcans that are provided by the rink staff members.

In February, the Old Town Ice Rink will be open Fridays, 4:30 to 8:30 p.m.; Saturdays, 11 a.m. to 8:30 p.m.; and Sundays, noon to 6 p.m. Schedule updates can be found at the city web site www.fcgov.com/recreation.

The Ice Rink at the Promenade Shops at Centerra in Loveland provides outdoor ice-skating seven days a week with a $5 admission fee and $2 rentals. And if indoor skating is more your style, consider the Edora Pool Ice Center. For more information on its indoor skating services, call 221-6679 or visit the web site www.fcgov.com/recreation/edora-pool.php.

While I'll probably never become a great ice-skater, it didn't hurt--too much--to try it again. And though I struggled to keep from falling and often fell, giving new meaning to the term slap shot, the experience was a new adventure.