Though his father called the Blue Mountains their home, Brelgur never felt more connected to it than he had to a half-dozen other places where his father's waggons would stop to buy and sell. As a young dwarf, peeking out from the back of the waggon, he got to see the vaults of Erebor, the bustling markets of Lake-town, the open spaces of the Undeeps, the narrow alleys of Bree-town, the lofty spires of Duillond, and even the towering walls of Minas Tirith a few times.

For his seventieth birthday, his father gave him a waggon and a pair of ponies to pull it. The suggestion was clear: it was time to find his own trade routes and make his own way in the world. What he lacked was capital. The caravan-trade is all about turning one pile of coin into goods that can be turned into a slightly larger pile of coins at the next step, which then turn into goods again. A waggon and ponies make a good start, but you need that first pile of coins, or first waggon-full of goods, to get the cycle started.

Brelgur started working in the Maker's Hall at Thorin's Gate, collecting crafted items to bring to the front of the hall to sell to visitors and merchants. Since the goods he handled were not his, the coin he made was barely enough to keep himself and his ponies fed; it would take decades to earn enough to buy his first waggon-full of trade goods.

A cold autumn night under the stars, a walk to try to think of a solution, and a slip on the ice in one of the small ponds -- which rarely thawed fully in these mountains -- gave him an idea. The next day, he brought his waggon and a selection of tools to the pond. After many axe-strokes he'd split the large plug of ice from the small pond into two. The ponies helped him pull one half up to where he could saw it into blocks of a size he could just barely lift into the waggon. After a hard day's work he had a waggon full of large blocks of ice, covered in insulating straw and canvas.

The next day began the long trip to the Shire. He lost a couple of days, and more melting than he'd hoped, in Rushock Bog, but by time he reached the market of Michel Delving, the ice blocks were still about two thirds of their original size, which was still enough to easily keep a root cellar cold for months. With an initial investment of nothing but a handful of coins for tools, straw, and canvas, and a day's work, he'd created a starting round of capital. It was time to use the ice-road as the heart of a new trade route of his own.