Iceland Blogs

Someone took this place away.
This place for my child to play.
To be with her friends.
To find joy.
To be light on her feet when the world came crashing down.

Someone took this place away for my child.
This place where she could go and work on her dreams.
This is not right. This is too sad.

On Saturday morning, I saw many many girls in line formations dancing across the ice.
There was a joy in their movement.
They were taking their time to fly and they were making it a very good last time.

We want to clap when a star flys by on ice.
We want to encourage those stars to come out

 I have been skating at Iceland since I was a kid. When I was really young I would go to the ice rink at Hilltop Mall. My siblings and I would have our birthday parties there, and one day *POOF*, it was gone. I was so bummed. I lived in East Richmond at the time and had no idea that there was a rink as fabulous as Berkeley Iceland. I was still determined to have an iceskating party for my birhday because it was so much fun! I was so happy when my parents discoverd that Iceland existed.

 In my early teens my brother and I would trek down the hill and into Berkeley on the weekends. There was absoultley nothing to do in East Richmond where we lived at the time. Iceland kept us out of trouble. He would rent hockey skates and I would rent figure skates and we would skate all afternoon. It was so fun and envigorating. After the public skate session would end we would head up to the CAL campus to play arcade games and air hockey in the student center Underground. The Underground no loner exists, which is a shame. It is yet another piece of Berkeley's past that has dissapeared. I would hate for Iceland to suffer the same fate. 

Our initial fundraising target is to raise $2 Million in donations in order to purchase the rink. Currently, we are expecting to finance the rest through loans.  Of course if we raise more that would reduce our debt burden.  We have achieved our non-profit status and have opened up our bank account to collect checks.  Checks can be made out to: SaveBerkeleyIceland and mailed to:

We need voluntters to hand out flyers, collect e-mail addresses, etc. in front of Berkeley Iceland this weekend, and if it works out, each weekend until the 31st. We are planning to set up a table between 11:30 and 4:30 both Saturday and Sunday. We need people for the following time slots each day: noon to 1:30, 1:30 to 3, 3 to 4:30. To sign up, please contact Laurie at (510) 390-4224 or lauriejeannewilliams@yahoo.com

Thank you

On Sunday March 4, 2007, our local CBS affiliate (KPIX) ran a longer version of the video report they'd broadcast about the rink the preceding Monday. Check out the video on the CBS5.com website. The only problem I saw was the studio anchor botching the URL for our website at the very end (saveiceland[dot]com??).

Last night the Berkeley Landmark Preservation Commission held its first public hearing on the status of Berkeley Iceland. There is good news and lets-wait-and-see news.

First, the good news - the draft NOD (Notice of Designation?) handed out just as the meeting was beginning included the whole building with the exception of the small bit on the East side which houses the mechanical room, ballet room, and changing rooms. The draft NOD (available here in PDF format) includes the front entry, the East and West windows in the upper sections, the rows of windows under the main roof, and the berms on either side of the main building. Very complete and something we can live with when preparing our future plans.