Rink Opens after Renovation

The rink opened again today.

When I got there at 8:50am, HALF the ice was coned off, with one half of the ice still being worked on, and lessons were only in the other half. I asked my student to go warm up, and was then told by another parent that they were letting skaters get on the ice only for their lesson!

Hmm... the rink didn't tell me that!

I put on my skates and came out of the coaches' room. As I walked (in guards, of course) along the new mat they had put on the floor, I almost slipped! These were like plastic-rubber, and very smooth, didn't go so well with my skate guards!

In fact, I did slip later in the morning, when someone called me from behind as I was walking back to the coaches' room and I tried to change direction too quickly. Turns out I changed position pretty quickly - from standing to sitting.

When I stepped on the ice, the first thing I thought was, this is so hard! It didn't bother me too much, though, until I decided to show my student a backspin...

For some reason, I felt like I was in a dream - everything seemed just too organised, too orderly, too peaceful to be true. Each skater & coach had their space, and we weren't running into one another as we usually would in the small lesson area. I couldn't put my finger on it, and could only attribute it to the fact that the only people on the ice are those having lesson, and we have a whole half rink... I was starting to wish every day could be like this - ONLY skaters in lesson can be on the ice!

I was jolted back to reality when I asked my student to do a Waltz jump... another coach called me over and said, they aren't allowing jumps today - the ice is too thin!

Hmm... the rink didn't tell me that!

At 10am, the rink was officially open to public. The other half was open, and the skaters who had lesson earlier and still hanging around were allowed to get on the ice again. There were occasional announcements to remind skaters that "no jumps are allowed for these two days".

Well, give them a few more days to make the ice thicker. The ice itself does feel better, just that the thin-ness of it is scary!