Ice Skating in the Great White South

outdoors in Vermont

One of the things that always made the frigid winters in the northeastern United States tolerable was participating in winter sports. Skiing, snow-shoeing, sledding, and ice-skating.

Paris

The first three we mostly did on winter ski holidays at resorts and in snowy mountain villages, but skating we could also do right in the middle of the city.

Copenhagen

London, Paris, Copenhagen and Amsterdam. Denver, San Francisco, Kansas City and Chicago. And of course, New York City. They all set up atmospheric outdoor ice-skating rinks in winter.

 w Aly & Tori, Thanksgiving Eve @ Wollman Rink in Central Park

Ice-skating became synonymous with our winter festivities from Thanksgiving through Christmas and New Year's in New York at Wollman, Bryant Park, and Rockefeller Center Skating Rinks as well as other pop-up rinks at the Standard Hotel and Battery Park City.

shattered elbow and shattered dreams

I skated every winter ... except the year I shattered my elbow in an indoor rink in New Jersey right before Thanksgiving.

boo hoo ... had to sit this winter out

An operation to put Humpty Dumpty back together again in autumn meant no skating for me for the whole of winter. That was a long, cold winter.

Christmastime @ Bryant Park

This is my second winter in South Africa and I have to admit I am beginning to lose my taste for the arctic temperatures of the Great White North. I guess I'm going soft! The winter weather in Joburg is pretty great. In fact, the weather all year long is fairly mild and temperate. (No humidity will do that for you.) I can't say I miss the frosty cold temperatures of winter like I thought I might.

Still I do miss the traditional sports of winter. Last winter we went skiing in the Drakensbergs. This year we are going ice-skating. Unfortunately there is no way the mild temperatures and blazing sun could ever be conducive to the outdoor experience of our typical ice rinks. In the Great White South, we'll have to go exclusively indoors.

Specifically the Northgate Shopping Center in nearby Northriding. The rink is right inside the Mall. It was really quite nice and not very crowded as it was a school night.

The occasion?

The five year birthday celebration for the Johannesburg Book & Movie Club. A skating party is the perfect party for a five year old. And there was cake!







 It felt good to be back on the ice.

Vince even gave some impromptu lessons. He taught our sons and so many of their friends to skate. What's one more?