Elfstedenkoorts!

This week the whole of the Netherlands has been gripped by Elfsteden fever!

The Elfstedentocht or the Eleven City Race is a 200 km race skated on frozen canals connecting 11 cities in the Northern Province of Friesland. 16 000 skaters are expected to take part and in order for the event to take place the ice needs to be at least 15 cm thick over the entire course. For this to occur it needs to be below 0ºC for at least 10 nights and days in a row. The race starts at 5 am with a cut off time of midnight. Skaters have to collect a stamp at each city and also three other secret check-points. It is a very prestigious race under grueling conditions and the winner is guaranteed instant fame in the Netherlands. Farmer Evert van Benthem won the race twice in a row in 1985 and 1986 and set a record time of 6 hours, 47 minutes. Needless to say he is a national hero.

The route of the Elfstedentocht in Friesland. The race starts and ends in Leeuwarden and includes the cities of Sneek, Ijlst, Sloten, Stavoren, Hindeloopen, Horkum, Bolsward, Harlingen, Franeker and Dokkum.

This week it came pretty close to being held but the ice was too thin in some of the Southern parts of the Friesland. Saturday would have been the best day since it is supposed to warm up again from Sunday. Saturday was forecast to be about -10ºC, Sunday about -1ºC and then going into the positives again from Monday and into the week (apparently 3ºC is warm! lol). So for now, the race is off for this year.

The race hasn’t been held since 1997. Apparently the conditions were perfect in Dec 2012/Jan 2011 but then it started snowing. Snow is bad because you can’t really skate through it and it also insulates the ice and prevents it from becoming thicker. The snow from last week Friday has been sitting on the ice all week and even though it has been really cold the ice still wasn’t thick enough. In the second half of the week the Dutch army began clearing snow off the frozen canals in Friesland in an attempt to help the ice to grow but no such luck. I think they started a bit late… To anyone who complains about how the government spends your tax money at least it is not for using the army to clear snow off the ice for a skating race!!

The Dutch love skating and are completely crazy over this race though. It has been the topic of conversation, the news and newspapers for the whole week. Some people at work have even taken some time off to go skating while the ice is still good. We were in the city doing some admin yesterday and we saw some special Elfsteden cookies and things available with packaging covered in the Friesland flag. And some shops had a special 11% discount for Elfstedenkoorts. I think it is great that the tradition of this race has survived and people are as excited about it as ever.

We would love to witness an Elfstedentocht while we are living in the Netherlands, the atmosphere in Friesland must be amazing. Hopefully one year. Friesland gets seriously crowded though and if you actually want to see any of the skating it is probably best to stay home and watch it on TV, lol.

So it was supposed to start warming up from today but it started snowing as I started writing this! So still pretty cold! But we are expecting to go into positive temperatures again from tomorrow. We can only hope as it is seriously cold and the train service has been reduced while it is freezing.

In other news we watched ‘Girl with the Dragoon Tattoo’ at the movies last night and Justin is coaching under 16 cricket again today (they have an indoor tournament today). I am glad I am wrapped up indoors! And later we have been invited to have dinner with some of Justin’s cricket people.

Hope you have a good week! Coming soon: Bron’s surprise visit to Jo’burg =)

x