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Morning Edition
Cathy Wurzer and Britta Greene

‘You have this feeling of floating’: Skaters delight in perfect lake ice in northern Minn.

Sven Hoaglund inspects the ice at sunrise in the Boundary Water.
Sven Hoaglund inspects the ice at sunrise in the Boundary Water Canoe Area Wilderness on Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2020. Ice conditions there have been exceptional this year for what's known as "wild ice" skating.
Courtesy of Matthew Baxley

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It's been an incredible year in northern Minnesota for what's known as 'wild ice’ skating. (More on that here.) That's because we haven't had much snow, so the lakes are clear to skate across. Plus, cold temperatures early in the season, combined with light winds, have left a perfect, glassy surface on the ice.

Matthew Baxley, co-host of WTIP’s Boundary Waters Podcast, is among the skating fanatics who have been putting in as much ice time as they can before the weather changes. He went out earlier this week with friends John Oberholtzer and Sven Hoaglund, and sent Morning Edition an audio postcard from their day.