Ice Skating

Living in the Boston area there is one iconic place to ice skate in the winter. The Boston Common Frog Pond sits in the oldest public park in the US and was my intended destination for the day but sadly it had already closed for the season. The recent stretch of warm weather has made maintaining the ice impossible and has resulted in most outdoor rinks have closed.

As an alternative we decided to try some indoor ice skating at the Daly Rink in Newton. Like the Frog pond it was an outdoor rink until 2010 when it was enclosed to provide an extended season and a more comfortable skating environment. My friend Grace knew they ran a Public Skating on Sunday’s so we checked the hours and learned that the Public Skate was from 2-4:45. 

We arrived to find the parking lot jammed with cars and people which set the expectation that the ice too would be packed. It cost a modest $5 for admission and another $5 for skate rentals. We took a seat on the benches after getting our rental skates and laced up. It didn’t take long before we were rink side ready to skate. 

It was perfect timing as the Zamboni was out resurfacing the ice. After several passes the ice looked great and the all clear was given for everyone to get on the ice. As expected the rink was packed with people of all ages. 

As we made our way carefully around the ice we each got more confident and were doing fairly well except for a few falls caused by young kids cutting us off. It was fall down or run over a child. As the time went on we played a game of tag with each of us getting more at ease on the ice and increasing our speed to less than a crawl. After about an hour we took a break on one of the team benches and watched as everyone skated by. It was also time again for the Zamboni to come out again.

As we got back on the ice we were all feeling pretty good and our game of tag was in full force. We skated and played another round of tag for another hour before deciding it was time to call it a day and turn in our skates.