Ice skating in Linköping

Many international students come to Sweden and have never even seen snow or yet ice skated in their life. It often one of the must does in swedish winters. I actually used to skate during the winter in Germany when I was a teenager. So of course, when I decided to move to Sweden my skates were the first thing I packed. Last winter I didn’t use them as much as I would have liked to. This time around I hope to do it much more! Especially since with your own skates you can skate for free at Campushallen. During the winter months the outside running track is covered in ice. This allows for some really nice and long ice-skating sessions.

If you don’t have your own skates, you can lend some at Campushallen for 40kr. With that you can just go to the ice rink and start skating. For all the first-time skaters I recommend wearing some thick socks, as your feet will get quite cold; thick cloves, because of the cold and they will help breaking the fall a bit (and yes everybody falls at some point); and some thick pants like ski pants and/or knee protectors, again to break the fall. When you fall you usually either fall forward onto your knees or back on your ass. Ski pants will give you a bit of a cushion for both scenarios.

Of course, there is also the lake Roxen. Last winter it was frozen solid, so you were able to get on it. We didn’t skate there but just took a walk. This is of course not something you should do alone, cause if something happens to you there will be no help. Also, you have to be very careful if you want to go out on a lake. The ice might seem solid, but it might actually still be unstable. There usually is also public information on whether the ice is considered safe. But I cannot stress enough that you need to be incredibly careful!

If of course you prefer watching ice skating rather than doing it yourself, I recommend going to an LHC hockey match. I wrote about it in a previous blog.

Whatever you do, just enjoy the skating!