Twenty km of skateskiing feels like forty on wheels but the swinging dance with gravity that is the essence of skating plus the extra speed over the classic technique is my choice. Natural ice is seldom smooth. Cracks, the remains of incompletely melted snow, hardened snow mobile tracks all leave their individual challenges to balance and dignity. The long, upturned blades of the Swedish touring skate give them all-terrain capabilities and I found I was clattering over the patches of knaggelis with no problem. Over the winter the water level lowers several meters which drapes the ice sheet over the bottom contours near shore providing the chance to ice skate both up and down hill.
Distant pressure ridges evidence the great forces within the ice sheet and invite closer inspection.
Knowing the ice is 30 cm thick and capable of supporting a bus doesn't erase the nagging image of plunging through but that possibility lends a spice to the experience not entirely equivalent to the risk of road rash in my usual haunts. Ice is a primordial element which, like salt water and mountain peaks, resonates in the primitive parts of our being. The rhythm of skating also speaks to your soul but nowhere more clearly or deeply than in the center of a frozen lake.