Located just north of Dallas, Plano doesn’t see much snow or ice, even in the coldest winter months. Even though you can’t drive over to Lewisville Lake and expect to skate across a picturesque frozen surface, you can still enjoy some ice skating in the Dallas-Fort Worth area thanks to all the indoor ice rinks located throughout the area.
The Dr Pepper StarCenters
The Dr Pepper StarCenters are a set of ice rinks associated with the Dallas Stars, the local NHL team. All told, there are seven StarCenters around the Dallas metro area, including one in Plano itself. Admission is $9 for adults and $8 for kids, with an extra $4 for skate rentals. The StarCenters hold public skating hours almost every day, but the times tend to move around because of scheduled events like youth hockey, adult hockey, figure skating, and private rentals for special events.
Galleria Ice Skating Center
Located in the Dallas Galleria on the north end of town, the Galleria Ice Skating Center is located in the middle of the mall and often puts on shows with world-class ice skaters showing their stuff to the passing shoppers. They have open skating hours for the general public, and while admission is $11, skate rentals are only $3. They also have a skating school for kids and adults, with lessons that start with the basics and go all the way up to freestyle figure skating.
NYTEX Sports Centre
The NYTEX Sports Centre is a general sports facility in North Richland Hills several miles west of the DFW International Airport. They use their main rink for rollerskating, ice skating, and indoor turf sports depending on the season, and during the winter it’s all about hockey and figure skating. As a sports facility, NYTEX dedicates most of its time to various local and high-school hockey leagues, not to mention open hockey time for pick-up games and figure skating competitions. Still, they set aside about an hour around noon for open skating.
ICE at The Parks
Like the Galleria rink, ICE at The Parks is an ice rink in the local mall, The Parks at Arlington. The rink is big enough to host an NHL hockey game, but like the Galleria rink, ICE is mostly for open skating and skating lessons. General admission is $9 with $3 for a skate rental, and the rink has both group and private skating lessons available. And if you do well enough, you might be able to take part in the rink’s annual holiday celebration.
You might not think “winter wonderland” when you think of Plano, Texas, but thanks to updated technology, that doesn’t stop the Dallas area from having ice skating rinks all throughout the area. Maybe you’ve never skated before and you want to try something new, or maybe you’re an old hockey pro looking for a new team to join, but no matter what kind of winter wonderland fun you’re looking for, you’ll find it in Dallas.
Image via Flickr by LWYang | Licensed under CC BY 2.0 | Cropped from original
November 23
Four Great Places to Go Ice Skating in the Plano Area
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