Watering Down Some Winter Fun Freezing Temperatures Help Elmira Man Groom His Own Piece Of Hockey Heaven
Chuck Sandelin doesn’t care if it’s a white Christmas. He just wants a cold one - a very cold one.
Some crisp arctic air will transform his carefully tended pond of water into the only public hockey and ice skating rink in North Idaho’s two northern counties.
“If it’s not cold, you are dead in the water,” said the 58-year-old who turned into a hockey junkie three years ago.
He’s itching to open the rink and apparently so are hundreds of residents. They call and stop by, wanting to know when they can use the rink Sandelin sunk in a field 14 miles north of Sandpoint.
The semi-retired logger and sawmill operator was appalled that there were no public places to skate other than frozen lakes and creeks. Sandelin’s been driving to Spokane or Creston, British Columbia, to get in some ice time and play in the hockey leagues.
“In Canada, every little town has at least one rink; some have two,” he said. “It’s just unreal that between Bonners Ferry and Sandpoint there is not a one.”
With Schweitzer Mountain Resort and its skiers, and the rising popularity of figure skating and hockey, Sandelin is shocked no one has built an ice rink here yet. The closest public rink is in Post Falls.
The owners there had an outdoor rink last year, but this winter en closed it and put in a chiller to make ice year-round.
Sandelin couldn’t afford to be that fancy. He tore down his horse arena to build his nearly regulation size hockey rink.
“No dust in it now, just ice,” he said after spraying a fresh coat of water on. “Everybody want’s to skate but there is just no place to go here. I thought I would give people a place.”
Sandelin has pumped gallons of money into his venture. He sold a logging truck to buy a tractor and Zamboni, a machine that grooms the ice after skaters tear it up. He dug a water well, installed lighting so the rink can be used at night, and has about $10,000 worth of hockey gear in a nearby trailer to sell and rent to skaters.
“My wife thinks I’m a little nuts,” he confessed. “For the last few months my entire income has been zero. I contemplated for months if I should sink into this what I have.”
The idea was to cut down on his driving time to and from rinks and be able to skate whenever he wanted in his own back yard. So far there’s been lots of work and little skating. He’s not in bed until 1 a.m., out making ice in the cold night. “Sometimes I think maybe I should have just gone skating,” he said with a laugh.
Sandelin talks about ice like a gourmet chef talks about food. Before he ever moved any dirt in his field he traveled to other outdoor rinks to see how they were crafted. He went to Colorado and watched concrete being poured at the new Olympic skating rink in Salt Lake City.
He almost bought the old chiller system from the skating rink at the Coliseum in Spokane before it was torn down. “What this county needs is a good indoor arena, but I’m only one guy. I can’t pull that off,” Sandelin said.
There’s already been a few hockey games on the less-than-perfect ice at Sandelin’s rink. A nonprofit group also has formed, The Sandpoint Hockey Association, to get the sport going here.
“This is the test year. I’m gonna give it a try and see how it goes,” Sandelin said. “There will be plenty of fun here.”
If the ice rink flops, Sandelin said he can always pour concrete over it and go for the roller hockey and roller-blade crowd. Sandelin plans to offer 90-minute skating sessions. The cost is $4 for hockey players and $3 for other skaters. To check if the rink is open, call 263-1390.
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