Gone Curling
This past Saturday, I headed up to the Niagara Falls Curling Club for a night of curling. I was fortunate enough to be able to go with three groups of friends - from grade/high school, college and work.
Jeff & John trying to sweep a stone into the house.
Additional photos are viewable in my photo gallery.
While a bunch of us had been kicking the idea of getting curling ice team during the holiday week around for a while, we were initially told there wasn’t any available ice and gave up on the idea. Not knowing this, my brother had planned to drive in from work Thursday evening through the night and work from home Friday during the day, with the sole purpose of curling Friday night. Needless to say, he was upset to hear we wouldn’t be able to go and (hopefully jokingly) informed us all how we ruined Christmas for him. A phone call later, my friend Justin talked the curling club into staying open later than normal for us, and we began to see who was interested.
I’ve never met anyone else stateside who’d gone curling previously, but each time I’ve mentioned it, folks have always expressed an interest in trying it out. Even though we didn’t find out we had ice time until Tuesday afternoon, we ended up nearly filling three full sheets of ice!! (A total of 8 people fills a sheet.) Unfortunately, my brother ended up getting sick and couldn’t make it.
Although Canada is less than a couple miles from my apartment, I rarely go up there & hadn’t crossed the border on a weekend night since high school. We didn’t experience any holdup when passing through customs at the Rainbow Bridge and actually received a bit of a smirk from the Canadian customs officer when we told her what we were entering the country for.
Only a couple of the group (including myself) had gone last year - for the majority it was their first time. I somehow managed to brush up my skills & remember the rules enough to explain them to first the friends I rode up with and later everyone on my sheet. The curling club has a bar overlooking the ice below. As I was pointing out some aspects of the games going on below, I thought I spotted the sister of a good friend of mine on the ice, but wasn’t sure. I called her cell phone but received no answer, so I figured I was mistaken & continued to explain the game. Shortly thereafter, the girl in question turned around and recognized me - what a small world!
Details on curling can be found in the Wikipedia Curling article & rules/animated graphics at Curling Basics. If you’re not familiar with the basic idea, think of bowling, except on ice, with brooms & the ball (stone) doesn’t just have to make it down the ice, but it also has to stop. It’s Canada, so of course there’s beer involved as well. The object is to get as many of your stones into the target (house) closer than any of your opponents. Eight stones are delivered a round (end) by a team, two by each player. It’s impossible for sweepers to make a stone deviate laterally from it’s course, but sweeping can greatly extend the distance a stone travels.
We curled from 10pm until midnight. I was impressed with the skill level exhibited. Few of the group feel on the ice, but the tumbles were still enjoyable!