Al Quaal tube slide open for the season

ISHPEMING — The cold temperatures didn’t stop kids from having fun on the tube slide at the Al Quaal Recreation Area Tuesday.

The tube slide opens around this time every year so kids — and even some adults — to enjoy the ride down to Teal Lake. There was some warm weather earlier this month, but that didn’t hurt the conditions of the slope.

“We always have to wait until we get freezing weather so we can have the kids go onto the ice behind me [on Teal Lake],” tube slide operator Brad Sharland said. “Without the ice pack, we can’t really send any kids down, so that was the only problem we had starting up this year, but we had plenty of snow.”

The tube slide is normally open Saturdays and Sundays from noon to 5:00 p.m. Sharland said up to 100 kids a day use the slide.

“It’s just fun to see the kids interacting with each other; they come here and they form little groups and they just have a lot of fun,” Sharland said. “We have a little warm-up shack down at the lodge down there (at the base of the hill) where they can get hot cocoa. Some kids have birthday parties down there, so it’s just a lot of fun for everyone.”

There is no age limit for using the tubes, but Sharland recommends having younger children ride with their parents.

It costs $8 to rent a tube for the slide, and Al Quaal also has special rates for groups of 10 or more.