Sk802 thanks and follow up

[Kitty Bartlett]

Hi all,

Thanks so much for coming out to Citizen Cider last night. It was great to see some familiar faces and meet new skating friends! Thanks to Rob and Lola for the skate sharpening demos, to Chi for coordinating the gathering, and to Citizen Cider for hosting us. I think our group ended up being about 30 people- not bad for an impromptu gathering on a Friday evening! Kudos to those of you who traveled distances to join us, including Richmond, Huntington, Ferrisburgh, Lincoln and Saint Albans.

As promised, we are following up with links to a few resources that you may or may not have seen:

- Sk802 website: Chi developed this comprehensive website earlier this winter and it is a great one-stop-shop for Chittenden County skating info. It has a lot of the info I am linking directly below. Also let her know if you have ideas on other cool things that she can easily add!

- Vermont Nordic Skating Google Group: This Google group has about 1,000 members and is the vehicle used by most people to report on ice conditions. If you don't subscribe, you should. It's a game changer for finding where there's good ice. It's also a great education to read other skaters' trip reports. Note that you can tailor your settings to receive each email in real time, a daily digest or no email. I also recommend joining the NH Google Group if you are up for a drive for skating. Jamie Hess in the NH group is generous with his time and often leads group outings on NH ice. The NH group is where he offers/coordinates those. Jamie is a huge reason why we have such well developed nordic skating in New England and he too has an excellent website. 

I'll also take a second to plug ice reporting. The more people who are sharing information about skating venues, the better our crowdsourcing is for good skating. You don't have to be an ice expert to send in a photo and short description of a body of water near you. And, it could be as simple as saying "we got two inches of snow in Burlington last night so ice will be covered."

- Getting Started on Wild Ice Guide: This is a manual that the Northeast Nordic Skating Working Group put together to help orient newcomers to the sport. At the end, there's a handy safety checklist for what you should consider for wild ice skating. 

Dan Spada's Wild Ice Youtube Channel This channel has a variety of skating videos, both instructional as well as short clips from Dan's skating adventures that are quite beautiful. Dan's short instructional videos are excellent. This 20 minute long video on safety gear and tips is a good primer.

Here's hoping for a nice spell of cold, dry air and that we'll see you on the ice soon. In the meantime, please be in touch if you have questions or other good ideas about how we connect and grow this wonderful community!

Warmly,

Kitty