Pleasant Spring Break Surprise at Lloyd Center!

So I decided to brave the Spring Break crowds for the public session at Lloyd Center this morning. And it was okay!! I had thought that being Spring Break and being such a popular (and visible) rink it would be super-crowded at 10 am. I had pretty much decided that if it were to be a mob scene, I would just go upstairs to the very nice Barnes and Noble, get a cup of tea and enjoy a book or magazine instead. But I was happy to be proven wrong.

I got there just as the earlier freestyle session was ending and it looked to me like most of the skaters were taking off their skates and getting ready to greet the rest of their day. Was it possible? Would I be the only one on the ice for a while?

As it turned out there were a few freestylers and lessons at the beginning of the session. But I was still able to do a little bit of figures for a warm-up down at one end and everyone left me alone for the most part. After some time more and more recreational "Spring Break" skaters started to come, but at that point I felt already established on the session and stayed for at least another hour and got some good work done.

I didn't expect the ice would be that great, what with the extra-heavy skating traffic of Spring Break skaters, but the ice was fine and I totally enjoyed it's flat smoothness (emphasis on the word "Flat").

I wish I could have talked my friend "skatecam" into coming with me - maybe the allure of taking pictures of good, flat ice, pleasant, clean changing areas and pretty-nice bathrooms wasn't enough for skatecam -- I mean, what would be the fun in that??

And of course I had no way of knowing how nice the session might be.

Maybe some other time...