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CHRIS JULIN: It's easy to understand why Tom McKay took up ice boating if you just stand in his backyard. McKay grew up on Park Point in Duluth. He still lives here. The point is, more or less, a sandbar that separates Superior Bay from Lake Superior. It's a thin strip of land nine miles long. On the lake side of the point, the water is still open. But on the bay side, the water is frozen. Tom McKay's backyard is on the bay side. Miles of ice stretch away from his dock.

TOM MCKAY: Well, we've got the best ice conditions we've had in many, many years, so.

CHRIS JULIN: Tom McKay is decked out in a fur parka like a character in a Jack London story. He's standing on the ice behind his house with his buddy, Bob Hamm. They're rigging the sails on two ice boats. These aren't your usual sailboats. Imagine a sail attached to a motorcycle sidecar on skates. Tom McKay says he and Bob Hamm started ice boating together in the 1950s.

TOM MCKAY: After school as kids used to go out there and rig them up and it was a great entertainment, especially for a young kid of 14, 15 years old. I had my own boat. And to be able to go that fast, it was pretty exciting.

CHRIS JULIN: There were maybe 30 ice boats on the bay back in those days. Bob Hamm says there are about six now. He and Tom McKay own half of them. They built the boats themselves from kits or from scratch.

BOB HAMM: Anybody can build one. It's not like a real boat. It doesn't have to float. So, you know, anybody can build an ice boat. I mean, you can build a high-tech ice boat or a low-tech ice boat. My first ice boat was 2 by 8s, you know, nailed together in the form of a cross laying down with three runners on it. And it worked fine.

CHRIS JULIN: The design hasn't changed much. Three steel runners rest on the ice. One's out front, and there's one on the bottom of an arm that reaches out to each side. It looks kind of like a sprawling, three-legged water bug. The sail sticks up from the middle of the frame. That's where the skipper sits. Tom McKay says the world record speed for one of these craft is about 150 miles per hour. These boats don't go that fast.

TOM MCKAY: We probably run in the range of maybe 30 to 50, maybe sometimes even 60. But there's always the fear factor on an ice boat. You're so close to the ice, and it's going-- the ice is going by. It seems so fast. And whatever speed you're going, it just seems to three times faster.

BOB HAMM: It's a feeling like nothing else. The speed, the sound. It's just getting a free ride off the wind.

CHRIS JULIN: Bob Hamm and Tom McKay sit on their iceboats and pull the sails tight. They creak away over the ice. It's slow-going at first. But by the time they're a city block away, they're zipping along at about 30 miles an hour.

[BACKGROUND NOISE]

They race into the distance. On the far side of the bay, the water is still open, and two huge ships are loading cargo. There's a smoky orange sunset behind the ships. The iceboat sails catch the orange glow. A group of skaters stops to watch as the two ice boats come clattering back across the ice.

[BACKGROUND NOISE]

Bob Hamm says it's a great day for ice boating.

BOB HAMM: It's warm. The wind is blowing. The ice is smooth. What more do you need? It's the old days. And I say I did it when I was a kid, and I'm still doing it.

CHRIS JULIN: Bob Hamm and Tom McKay have been ice boating together for 40 years. They say kids don't go ice boating on Superior Bay anymore, except for them. In Duluth, this is Chris Julin, Minnesota Public Radio.