Reece Aiken might not get a chance to fully thaw out this summer.
Next month he will trade Dunedin’s summer bowling greens for the ice rinks of Finland.
The Dunedin Ice Stadium ice-maker is heading to the world curling championship qualifying event in Lohja.
There he will be the deputy ice-maker.
That will involve 6.30am starts and 11.30pm finishes for six consecutive days, making sure the ice remains perfect throughout.
It is a role he filled a year ago, when the event was held in Naseby.
He obviously did a good job, as he has been invited back.
Only this time there is a bit more travel involved.
‘‘I got the email from the lady who does the hiring for these events,’’ Aiken (48) said.
‘‘I had to email her back and ask ‘can she send me any further away from home?’
‘‘The answer was not really.’’
He was looking forward to being immersed in the curling atmosphere, but just as interested in the venues themselves.
‘‘They have ice rinks like we have rugby fields,’’ he said.
‘‘It’ll be good just to see the different venues and how they do stuff and how they set up.’’
It was through lawn bowls that Aiken became involved in curling.
His club of 34 years, Fairfield, took a weekend trip to Naseby to go curling one winter.
After discovering there was a club in Dunedin, he joined.
When the Dunedin Ice Stadium opened he started arriving early, so he would help with preparing the ice.
In 2008 he was offered a job as the stadium’s maintenance man, which snowballed into making the ice. It was something he enjoyed doing and he had learnt much along the way.
‘‘When you first start it’s a bit mind-blowing what’s going on.
‘‘I think the biggest thing is if there’s a problem, being able to tweak something else to compensate for what’s gone wrong.
‘‘It’s stuff you learn. A lot of the stuff I’ve learnt I taught myself, ‘we’ll try this, oh that didn’t work, we won’t do that again’.’’
He has since worked at various international events, notably the world championship qualifiers and the New Zealand Winter Games.
Also prominent was the Asia-Pacific Championships, for which he went to Japan and South Korea.
Ice Blacks coach Peter de Boer has plenty of praise for the job he had done.
‘‘We’re very lucky to have an ice-maker of Reece’s calibre supporting NZ Curling.
‘‘He is passionate about the game and about the art-cum-science that is making competition-level curling ice.
‘‘His selection to attend the world championship qualifying event in Finland is testament to his efforts to learn new skills and grow his knowledge.
‘‘I’m sure this will be the first of many international opportunities for him.’’
The event begins on January 13 and the top two finishers qualify for world championships.
