The timing and weather co-operated to allow me to take the trike out onto the frozen canal. Ottawa has the World's longest skating rink: The Rideau Canal Skateway is 7.8 km long. On March 5th I took it out at 03:30am in solo configuration. I made certain to avoid being a nuisance and gave the guys flooding the ice lots of space. It was about -10C with no wind. Perfect weather! The ice was good and solid and very smooth since it had just been flooded. It was very slippery. What a complete blast! I was doing controlled spinouts and cutting across areas that would not be fun to skate or walk on. I covered the entire length of the canal twice (there and back). I had to start out in about 6th gear on the Rohloff with the Speed drive in high to get some traction. Turning the wheels abruptly was fruitless. I was able to turn slowly, then when applying a burst of power, the ass end would swing around.
After posting this tale, the following night at about midnight 5 of us (Vic, Mark, Jody, Juergen, Richard) went out again, this time adding the tandem section. It was not quite as slippery because it had not been flooded yet. We had to co-ordinate the power boost, but it swung out even more...