Despite wind chill temperatures reaching -15 C on Jan. 21, hundreds of people skated, strolled and lined up for BeaverTails on the Rideau Canal Skateway under a sunny blue sky for the first time in almost two years.
The Skateway officially opened at 12:30 p.m. on Sunday, three and a half hours after the scheduled opening time of 9 a.m. announced on Jan. 20.
The delay was needed to ensure the Skateway was properly frozen after overnight flooding, according to a post from the Rideau Canal Skateway on X, formerly Twitter.
The Skateway closed to skaters the evening of Jan. 24, just four days after opening. According to the NCC, this closure is temporary and the Skateway will reopen as temperatures permit.
Marie-Eve Dumais, a skater celebrating her 44th birthday, called the atmosphere “amazing.” Even though she was skating by herself, she said with the amount of people on the canal, she didn’t feel alone.
“You see animals, you see kids, you see older people, and it’s just freaking amazing,” Dumais said. “It seems like we stop the time when we come on here.”
Kurt and Sarah Randall, and one of their children, Felix, 17, were among many families spending quality time on the ice.
“We’ve done it since they were babies in the stroller,” Sarah Randall said. “It’s one thing that everybody still likes to do all together.”
Kurt added the family is on the Skateway “all the time” when it is open.
“I’ve been in Ottawa for 20 years now,” he said. “So [we’ve skated] every winter except last winter.”
In January 2023, the average mean temperature was -4.8 C, more than five degrees warmer than the month’s historical average of -10.2 C.
The canal’s closure caused “a lot of anxiety from kids about climate change” and its impacts, Sarah said.
Ottawa resident Bridget Vickers said she was “so sad” when the skateway didn’t open in 2023.
“We went to the other skating things around the city, but […] it’s not the same,” she said.
Vickers and her partner Adam Hughes spent Sunday afternoon walking hand in hand in the snow beside the skaters. She said she’s keeping her fingers crossed, hoping that the Skateway will be open for Valentine’s Day.
Hughes called the Skateway “iconic” and part of “a really unique Ottawa experience.”
“Everybody just has a smile on their face,” he said.
At the time of opening on Sunday, skating was only permitted between the Fifth Avenue and Bank Street access points, but quickly expanded to reach the Pretoria Bridge. A post on the Skateway’s X feed that afternoon reminded skaters that ice conditions “will be variable.”
Even so, Dumais said it was “very special” to find out the Skateway would open Sunday.
“I was like, ‘Best birthday gift ever!’”
Featured image by Maia Tustonic.
