Wednesday Night Skate Blog

Sometimes fate doesn’t give you a choice. Sometimes you absolutely, positively have to skate over a bridge.

On October 21st, we had great weather, and it was our second-to-last Wednesday Night Skate. Logically, it was our last chance to skate into Brooklyn over the Brooklyn Bridge.

We had a great turnout — in fact it would be the last big crowd we’d see during the season. The group performed well, handling the wooden slats of the Brooklyn Bridge stoically.

A quick tour to the Promenade preceded our long run back to Manhattan Bridge, which was also handled admirably by the group.

Later in the bar, we celebrated a skater birthday with shots of Jameson and lots of Blue Moon beer. Happiness was experienced by all.

Sometimes it’s not about distance and speed. In fact, we try to avoid those two things whenever possible. That’s because there are times when you just want to skate off the beaten path and enjoy the leisurely ride. Rolling along side streets, places away from the tourists and landmarks, and quiet neighborhoods is just as much fun as skating over a bunch of bridges.

On October 14th, we did just that, with a twisting and turning route through the downtown areas of Manhattan. Starting from Union Square, we ended up criss-crossing from the Lower East Side to the South Street Seaport. In the process, we visited places such as Greenwich Village, Canal Street, and Thompkins Square Park.

The skaters, who didn’t know where we’d end up next, seemed to enjoy the apparent randomness and feeling of adventure as little-used side streets took us from one area of Manhattan’s nether regions to another. Officially, WNS designates it The Mystery Skate — and the mystery of it all is a big part of the fun.

On October 7th, we combined several “sight-seeing” routes into one. We passed the United Nations, skated up Madison Avenue to 72nd street, went into Central Park and skated the loop, relaxed at the Central Park Bandshell, and then hit Times Square for some group photos and mass admiration. After Times Square, we sailed down to Bleecker, rounded Washington Square Park, and headed back home to Union Square.

Sounds like quite a trip, but in reality it’s no big deal for the awesome skaters of the Wednesday Night Skate.

Our September 30th skate ended up being an intense cardio workout for the group of about 50 skaters. Why? Because it was our first truly chilly night since the start of the season. We had to keep moving to keep warm.

And to top it off, it was time to revisit our famous Three Bridges Route.

We kept all of the rest stops to a minimum, bypassing many of them altogether, and quickly reached the 59th Street Bridge. We sailed over the bridge, waiting only for the slower skaters to reach the other side. Then we kept it moving, on over the Pulaski bridge and to a gas station where we had an extended break to load up on snacks and water.

Finally we headed home over the Williamsburg Bridge, still keeping our swift pace. The group handled it all very well. Apparently, since it was towards the end of the season, everyone was in pretty good skating shape.

We hit the bar to replenish the spent calories and quench our thirst with beer (and in some cases, vodka & tonics). Another great night for WNS.

Well, not really. We would have loved to meet the President. But Obama was long gone by the time our skate started on Wednesday, September 23rd. During the day, President Obama and representatives from all over the world – including Iran’s Ahmadinejad and Libya’s Colonel Gaddafi — gathered at the United Nations.

But even though he and the other world leaders were done with their business at the United Nations, the effects of their visit still lingered on the streets of New York: entire avenues were closed by the NYPD, blocked off even to pedestrian access in some areas. And traffic was, as they say, a bitch.

Thus, it was the job of the Wednesday Night Skate to provide our usual first-class skating experience while avoiding the madness and mayhem created by the aftermath of all that international power descending upon the city.

We started off by going up 8th avenue as far as we could to Penn Station. Then, we skated over to 10th avenue, and skated uptown for quite some time. This kept us parallel to the closed streets of Lexington avenue and the United Nations (and as far as possible away from it) while giving us a great workout.

We skated up 10th avenue all the way to 71st, then turned and skated to Riverside. From there, it was down the West Side Path, taking a break at the Intrepid (and pausing for one of our famous group photos). We continued skating down to the path to Chelsea Piers.

Finally, we left Chelsea Piers and cut across the city to return to Union Square.  A collectively tired group then hit the bar for hard-earned beer and food.

Much like when we broke the rules, we decided to go to Brooklyn on our September 16th skate, despite the threat of drizzle. A couple of drops did hit us as we rolled over the wooden planks of the Brooklyn Bridge’s bike & pedestrian path, but it was no big deal. We made it through the entire skate without getting washed out.

The route consisted of entering Brooklyn via the Brooklyn Bridge, then skating around until we reached the Promenade, and then returning home on the always pleasant Manhattan Bridge.

Upon returning to Manhattan, we hit the bar, where tired skaters loaded up on food and relaxed with drinks in hand.

In a group as large as the Wednesday Night Skate, we end up celebrating quite a few birthdays. Sometimes, we’re lucky enough to have a particular member’s birthday fall on a Wednesday, and at the bare minimum we’ll celebrate (and embarrass) that person by singing them “Happy Birthday” at some point during the skate.

On September 9th, a young lady had a birthday, and had a special request for a route: she wanted to go to the South Street Seaport. While we had done that route quite a bit this year, we couldn’t say no to the request, and took the group down the Westside Path, through the Atrium (where we paused to sing to her) and across through Chinatown and Little Italy.

After leaving Little Italy, we headed up to Astor Place. We had a little bit of extra time on our hands, having only skated for about an hour and a half, so we headed to the always-smooth streets of St. Mark’s Place, and then to Thompkins Square Park.

Afterwards, we headed back to the bar, where the real celebration began – with lots of booze and mingling, skater style.

It’s famous among inline skaters, or at least among Wednesday Night Skaters: it’s what we refer to as The BIG Hill. No, it’s not the hill in Central Park — that’s tame by comparison. The hill on the Central Park loop is a long and arduous, but of relatively shallow incline. What we’re talking about here is the steep incline of the hill on 106th street and Lexington avenue.

The night started out with a roll up Park Avenue, all the way up to 116th street. It was a nice ride with just a few stops — the speed demons of the group burned pavement, while the rest of the skaters glided along the smooth Park Avenue asphalt.

After reaching 116th street, we turned East and skated across to reach Lexington avenue. We suddenly found ourselves the victim of streets that were in the process of being repaved. They were ripped open and unskateable. We had to hop onto the sidewalk — all 50 or so of us, and skate through Harlem on the sidewalks, stared at and occassionally cheered on by residents who rarely have seen a large pack of inline skaters rolling through their neighborhood.

In the distance, skaters could see The BIG Hill looming, preparing themselves for the nearly 35- to 40-degree incline that awaited.

Through sweat, heavy breathing, and burning thigh muscles, The BIG Hill was conquered by all. After a break, we sought out the smooth pavement of 5th avenue, then took a quick tour through Times Square to satisfy the curiousity of a few skaters visiting from Europe. After all the Times Square photographs had been snapped, we returned to 5th avenue to skate home to Union Square, and many skaters packed the bar afterwards, ordering carbohydrate-based replenishment (i.e. beer) and easily-digestable protein (i.e. burgers).

We were promised rain-free weather for our August 26th event, and it was a pleasant and sunny day.

Then suddenly it started to drizzle, a few drops here and there, at exactly 7:45pm. Talk about luck — or lack thereof. On a day when it wasn’t supposed to rain, we started getting hit with a few drops.

As stated before, on rainy days we try to avoid going over any bridges.

But enough was enough. So we did our venerable Three Bridges Skate, risking the possibility of being rained on.

And guess what? We got rained on, during our trek to and over the third bridge.

No big deal though, nearly all of the skaters took it in stride. Some even remarked that the rain was “refreshing”, given the extreme humidity the city had experienced recently. Skaters really are the best.

But let’s hope the New York City weather “forecasters” can start getting it right.

Our August 19th skate seemed doomed — it was 94 degrees during the day and thunderstorms were moving in. Luck was on the Wednesday Night Skate’s side however, as these storms seemed to fall apart as they reached the city. The group of 42 brave skaters ended up only having to deal with overcast skies — and some serious heat & humidity.

The WNS Staff decided to skate up the West Side Path to start the night off. The path is always great — it’s smooth, provides long stretches of uninterrupted skating, and takes us past the stalwart Intrepid Museum.

After passing the Intrepid, we skated into a small oasis just off the Path that doesn’t seem to get the attention that it deserves: Clinton Cove Park.

Beautifully kept, Clinton Cove Park falls under the umbrella of the larger Hudson River Park. One of the most interesting attractions in the tiny park is Malcolm Cochran’s Wine Bottle sculpture. Inside this large sculpture is a “home” complete with small rooms and a toilet. You can’t go inside of it, but there are windows and portholes that give you a view of what’s inside. It’s actually bigger  than most New York City apartments.

After Clinton Cove, we headed further uptown to 72nd street, eventually turned onto 9th avenue, and soared down to 28th street. From there, we used the bike line to get to Bleecker and the surrounding areas. Despite the threatening weather and the extreme heat, we pulled off another great skate.