vt ski + ride, jan. 2016

Vermont’s Mountain Sports & Life

vtskiandride.com

FREE WINTER 2016

VERMONT’SBEST LOCAL

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100 GREATCOMPS, PARTIES

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DREAM SKI HOMES &

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BILL MCKIBBEN’S FORECAST+

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VERMONT’S NEXT SUPERSTARS

YOURWINTER FUN LIST

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vtskiandride.com WINTER 2016 1

CONTENTS / 01.03

FIRST TRACKS

TRENDS | GOING UPHILL, FAST, p. 4Free your heel and join in skiing’s fastest growing trend: going uphill.

WINTER FUN LIST | 6 WAYS TO PLAY LIKE A KID, p. 9Fat biking, dog sledding, indoor surfi ng—these sports are not just for kids.

LODGES | VERMONT’S POSH HOSTELS, p. 11Vermont’s hip hostels have great food, comfy beds and rocking bar scenes.

APRES-SKI | GOING WHOLE-HOG LOCAL, p. 15Many resort chefs are using ingredients grown or made right down the road.

SKI TOWN | WHAT’S NEW IN THE DEERFIELD VALLEY, p. 19Here’s why everyone is buzzing about southern Vermont’s hidden gem.

COLUMNS

COMPETITION | TY WALKER GOES BIG, p. 47The Stowe 18-year-old snowboard phenom prepares for Fenway’s Big Air.

COACH | SO YOU’RE AN ACTION SPORTS PARENT? p. 49Action sports and Olympic coach Bud Keene on the best ways to help your kids.

COACH | TIPS FOR SKIING TREES, p. 51Ski fi lm star John Egan gives his advice on staying safe and skiing fast in the woods.

RETRO VT | THE FIRST SKI RESORT TURNS 80, p. 53Greg Morrill tells the great story of how Suicide Six came to be.

CHAIRLIFT Q/A | BILL MCKIBBEN’S FORECAST, p. 64The climate change activist, Nordic skier and author on what’s in store for winter.

FEATURES10 UNDER 25: THE NEXT......FREESKIERS, p. 24Seven young freeskiers, a convert-ed bus and a powder safari are the ingredients for 21-year-old Brooks Curran’s next movie.

...NORDIC RACER, p. 32With her fi rst World Cup gold, Vermont’s Sophie Caldwell puts the Nordic racing world on notice.

...SKI MEISTER, p. 34She jumps. She shoots. She races. Meet Tara Geraghty-Moats, the 25-year-old from Fairlee you will never, ever keep up with.

3 DREAM SKI HOMES, p. 38A peek inside three amazing ski homes and the stories of the people behind them.

100 PARTIES, COMPS, CLINICS & MORE, p. 56Our calendar of the best events around Vermont.

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Tara Geraghty-Moats takes a break from her World Cuptravels to revisit the place she learned to jump.

Be sure to visit okemo.com for great deals on lift tickets and lodging as well as a calendar of all the exciting events happening at Okemo Mountain Resort.

1-800-78 OKEMO LUDLOW VERMONT okemo.com

#itsokemotime

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PUBLISHER, Angelo [email protected]

EDITORIAL

Editor/Co-Publisher, Lisa [email protected]

Creative Director, David Pollard

Assistant Editor, Evan Johnson [email protected]

IT Director, Eric Whittaker

Contributing Editors:Biddle Duke, Bud Keene, Brian Mohr, Greg Morrill

ADVERTISING SALES & DISTRIBUTION

Christy Lynn, Advertising [email protected] | 802-388-4944

David Payne [email protected]

Greg [email protected]

Circulation and Distribution Manager: Lisa [email protected]

Business Manager: Elsie Lynn [email protected]

HEADQUARTERS

VT SKI+RIDE is published four times a year by Addison Press Inc., 58 Maple Street, Middlebury, VT 05753

VT SKI+RIDE print subscriptions are available for $24 (U.S.) or $35 (Canada) per year. Digital subcriptions are free.

Subscribe online at vtskiandride.com

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VERMONT’S NEXT SUPERSTARS

Ok, I’m in awe of just about everyone in this issue. Who wouldn’t want to trade places with Brooks Cur-

ran? At 21, he’s already a photographer and fi lmmaker to watch, if you judge from his cover shot and photo

essay of “The Next Generation Freeskiers” (page 24) showing Noah Ranallo, Tim McClellan, Marcus Wadlington, Dylan Dipentima and Tami Razinger. And they are all under 23.

When I met World Cup ski jumper Tara Geraghty-Moats, a 22-year-old from Fairlee, Vt., I couldn’t help but wish I’d had the gumption that she had at age 9 to launch o� a ski jump.

Watching Nordic racer Sophie Caldwell, 25, from Peru, Vt., win her fi rst World Cup race in Janu-arywas equally inspring. And I can only imagine how much fun Stowe snowboard phenom Ty Walker, 18, will have as she takes center stage this February at Boston’s Big Air competition in Fenway Park.

Seeing what these Vermonters and others have accomplished makes you realize there is so much opportunity in this state to take on winter in many, many ways.

Yes, there’s alpine, snowboard or cross-country skiing. But there’s also dog sledding, fat biking, ex-treme sledding and even indoor surfi ng. With winter seeming all too short, we decided it was time for a “Winter Fun List” and to start ticking o� what we can do.

My New Years resolution? Make the most of ever bit of winter—and live by climate change activ-ist Bill McKibben’s mantra (as he says in our Chairlift Q/A on page 64): “Never take a snowstorm for granted.” —Lisa Lynn, Editor

GO TO VTSKIANDRIDE.COM TO:

WATCH Check out some of the best footage of East Coast skiers and riders, including video footage from The Notion crew, Ty Walker, Sophie Caldwell and more.

WIN We’re giving away amazing ski weekends with lodging, li� tickets and even photo gear for selfies.

SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE Don’t miss an issue or any of our news updates, deals or contests. Sign up for our free digital edition and e-newsletter.

At 21, Brooks Curran, the pho-tographer behind “The Next Generation Freeskiers” and our cover, already has a number of fi lm credits but this is his fi rst major magazine article. Watch for the web video, “ The No-tion,” the story of his bus trip west in search of powder, to be released by Ski the East.

Creative director David Pollard is the genius responsible for the design of Vermont Ski + Ride.When he’s not snowboarding or working on this magazine, Pollard is at his day job as art director for Yachts International or painting Vermont landscapes.

On the last day of 2015, photographer Oliver Parini got lucky: it fi nally snowed during his shoot with ski jumper Tara Geraghty-Moats, (“The Next Generation Ski Meister”). Parini, an avid snowboarder, also photographs for The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Wine Spetcator and other publications.

MEET OUR CONTRIBUTORS

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ON THE COVER: Pilot Noah Ranallo , 20, airs it out on a bluebird day at Stowe last November. Photo by Brooks Curran.

Be sure to visit okemo.com for great deals on lift tickets and lodging as well as a calendar of all the exciting events happening at Okemo Mountain Resort.

1-800-78 OKEMO LUDLOW VERMONT okemo.com

#itsokemotime

GOINGUP

@SOUTHFACE

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REAL. EASY CARDS EASY TO LOAD CARDS

FOR USE AS LIFT ACCESS!

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MEET OUR CONTRIBUTORS

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FIRSTTRACKS

HEADEDUPHILL, FAST

It’s dawn on a powder day and you have the entire mountain to yourself. The journey started in darkness. You booted up in the parking lot, stretched climbing skins

on your skis and set off uphill by headlamp. As your heels lifted with each step, your heart rate quickened and your legs assumed a slow, steady burn. With every rhythmic glide, the surrounding hillsides brightened from pink to dazzling white as the sun emerged over the ridge. Now, the trails lie blanketed in fresh, untouched snow. There isn’t another soul to be seen and work doesn’t start for another two hours.

Welcome to skinning. This winter, when the chairlifts are stopped and the parking lots are empty, groups of skiers and

split-boarders will be working their way towards the summit for dawn patrol turns before work or to get the very first tracks after the latest storm.

Over the past few years, uphill and backcountry skiing have seen dramatic growth, with skins

The next big thing in skiing and riding this winter isn’t the ride down— it’s going up. BY EVAN JOHNSON

4 WINTER 2016 vtskiandride.com

FIRSTTRACKS

HEADEDUPHILL, FAST

The next big thing in skiing and riding this winter isn’t the ride down— it’s going up. BY EVAN JOHNSON


Thursday mornings are dawn patrol days at Bolton Valley. Skin up with buddies for fresh tracks.

and alpine touring bindings fl ying off shelves and more people looking to ex-plore off piste. Ski resorts have responded with uphill travel policies that allow ambitious skiers and riders to get the goods early, while not interfering with snowmaking and grooming operations.

And this winter, even more new events, races and clinics are bringing backcountry skills to the front side ski experience.

NO TICKET REQUIRED? It used to be that ski patrollers would wag a fi nger at those who chose not to use the lifts. Skiers and split boarders would duck into the woods and sneak their way up. No longer. At Sugarbush, if you already have a season pass, for the cost of sign-ing a waiver you receive an uphill travel pass valid for the season. At Killington and Pico, if you are not a pass holder, there is a $20 charge. So as to not confl ict with snowmaking and grooming, travelers are expected to follow designated uphill and downhill routes before or after regular mountain operations. Bolton Valley’s uphill policy, released last year, designates routes up two of its three peaks, routes that also access 100K of Nordic trails and backcountry terrain.

At Magic Mountain, every skier who climbs the 1,700 vertical feet to the summit is rewarded with a token valid for one ride up the Red Chair. At Mad River Glen, skiers can earn their turns when the area is closed. At Smugglers’ Notch, uphill travel is allowed between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. Mount Snow permits uphill travel from dawn to dusk for skiers and split boarders who purchase an uphill travel ticket (free for passholders). Some resorts still discourage all uphill travel so it’s best to check the policies before heading up.

JOINING THE CROWDIf you’ve just had your fi rst pair of AT bindings mounted or you’re a veteran, there’s a host of options for learning new skills, competing with friends or simply fi nding more people who enjoy the uphill journey as much as you do.

On four Saturdays in February, Sugarbush offers an introduction to alpine touring skills and equipment on black diamond terrain as part of its Essen- Ph

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Night skinning series are held at Stowe, Bolton Valley and several other resorts.


In an era when the ski industry is becoming increasingly consolidated and homogenized, America’s only skier-owned mountain bucks the trend by remaining independent and preserving a brand of skiing that exists nowhere else. The Mad River Glen Cooperative was started in 1996 and in the Co-op’s first two decades overcame many big challenges. The mortgage was paid off; the Co-op has proven its ability to manage the ski area; and nearly $5 million was invested in capital projects, including the historic restoration of the iconic Single Chair. Many skiers have commented that the ski area is in the best shape it has been in years, but our work is far from over.

Becoming an owner truly makes a difference in the effort to ensure the preservation and protection of Mad River Glen’s unique ski experience. All of us who have already committed ourselves to this goal invite you to join us in our mission.

Sincerely,

The Skier-owners of Mad River Glen

www.madriverglen.com/coop

Celebrating 20 Years of Skier-Ownership

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vtskiandride.com Holiday 2015 7

tials lesson series. The Catamount Trail Association holds a series of clinics at Bolton Valley as well as regular dawn patrol skins every second Thursday until April. If you can’t make Thursday mornings, sign up for one of the Wednesday Night Uphill Series, a friendly race series on two alternating routes up Vista Peak. Instead of a simple up-and-down race, the nighttime series requires ski-ers to transition from “hike” to “ski” mode as quickly as possible.

Stowe is also repeating its successful Saturday Night Lights program. Or-ganized in cooperation with the CTA, Stowe opens the lights on the Gondolier trails on three Saturdays: Jan. 23, Feb. 6, and Feb. 27. The series culminates on March 26 with the Topsy Turvy Uphill Race, a nighttime race up the Gon-dolier trail under the lights.

RACE TO THE TOP With more people going uphill, the “rando” (randonnée) and “skimo” (ski mountaineering) competitions have grown fierce with many races combin-ing skinning, downhill skiing and sometimes simply running or snowshoeing.

If you want to compete against the best in the East (or just watch), Magic Mountain hosts the one eastern event in the U.S. Ski Mountaineering Nation-als (a weekend series with criteriums, vertical and sprint races) March 14.

One of the oldest and most challenging of ski mountaineering races in Vermont, the Mad River Valley Mountaineering Race has, historically, sent skiers up Mad River Glen and then across the Long Trail to Sugarbush’s Mt. Ellen. This year, Sugarbush is hosting the race on March 20 and running it from Lincoln Peak through the Slide Brook Wilderness to Mt. Ellen and down.

If that’s not tough enough for you, that same weekend Bolton Valley part-ners with outdoor adventure company Native Endurance to host New Eng-land’s first 24-hour backcountry race, March 19-20. Teams will attempt to log the most vertical feet possible as they test their legs and lungs on a course that is split: 12 hours in the backcountry and 12 hours on alpine ski trails.

Jonathan Schefftz, who has began organizing events for the New England Rando Race Series since 2009, has seen participation in his events rise, with races attracting not only die-hard skiers but also endurance athletes like mara-thoners and triathletes.

“Some people stop skiing because they spend all their time standing in lift lines or skiing crowded trails,” he says. “This is something different. It’s aerobic and athletic that can really get people interested.”

At the Mount Greylock rando race, participation increased by 53-percent last season with more than 100 skiers showing up to register the day of the race. This year, the NE Rando Series includes new races at Q Burke (Jan. 30) and Pico (March 27).

Schefftz says the momentum behind the uphill travel movement is just getting started. “Right now, the stars are aligned,” he says. “You have the gear manufacturers producing the gear, the resorts are on board with their up-hill policies and the competitive aspect has gone from complete obscurity to strong. I think it’s only going to get bigger.”

For a list of uphill events, clinics and competitions see Calendar, pages 56-60. Head to vtskiandride.com for videos, an extended event calendar and lists of some of Vermont’s best new backcountry terrain. n

00 September 2015 vtskiandride.com


You don’t have to be a kid to act like one. When your ski legs are shot (or if you just want to try something new), consider one of these six adventures. Details and links

to each company’s website are at vtskiandride.com

1.SLED OR SKIJOR WITH THE DOGSIn the last few years, the number of dog sledding and skijoring (you’re on cross country skis and two dogs pull you) operations has grown around the state. Guides drive the sled (or carts, if there is no snow), powered by powerful, playful and people-friendly huskies, while you curl up under blankets and watch the white trails whiz by. In Southern Vermont, look up the Husky-Works Mushing Co. in Wardsboro or Burning Bush Adventures in Bennington. October Siberian Sled Dog Adventures operate out of Waterbury, and farther north, Peace Pup and Eden Dog-sledding also host sled tours. Prices start at about $275 for two.

2. RIDE A FAT BIKERemember riding a Big Wheels as a kid? That’s what riding a fat bike feels like. You can literally cruise over any terrain and the fat knobby tires grip like Spiderman on snow. There’s a place to rent bikes in most mountain towns. Near Killington and Woodstock, Fatbike Vermont has rentals from two hours ($30) to full-days ($65). You can also rent at the Catmount Outdoor Family Center in Williston, the Rikert Nordic Center in Ripton, Grafton Ponds Outdoor Cen-ter in Grafton and more. In Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom, look to the Darling Hill headquarters of Kingdom Trails—just fi ve minutes away from Q Burke—for trail passes ($15) and rentals from East Burke Sports, the Village Sports Shop and the Village Bike Shop.

3. GO EXTREME SLEDDINGVermont’s parks, hills and closed roads make for some of the best sledding around. Grab a sled and head for downhill hotspots like the closed roads at Mount Philo in Charlotte or the Lincoln Gap Road between Lincoln and Warren. Both are steep, downhill treats that challenge cyclists in the summer and become sledding hotspots when the snow falls. For a guided high-speed experi-ence, Clearwater Sports in Waitsfi eld hosts a thrilling, four-hour tour on a Vermont-designed Mad River Rocket sled ($95 for two people). Or if you’re in the Stowe area, sign up with Umiak to

ride down the closed road in Smugglers’ Notch on a Hammer-head Sled—also designed in Vermont ($79 per person).

4. FLY THROUGH THE TREES Experience Vermont from a new perspective – fl ying 40 feet above the ground. At Smugglers’ Notch, the ArborTrek Canopy Adventure runs year-round, sending visitors zipping through the snow-covered treetops. You’ll be outfi tted with harnesses, helmet and heavy work gloves and receive instruction from a guide before fl ying down eight ziplines, crossing two suspension bridges and rappelling from trees. ($99.95 per person).

5. HORSE AROUNDThis winter, take an easy-going trek through the Mad River Val-ley on the back of an Icelandic Horse. The Vermont Icelandic Horse Farm in Waitsfi eld offers horseback treks through pas-tures and on dirt roads throughout the year. With a guide leading the way, you’ll learn about the area as well as the characteristics and history of these work animals. Rides range from one hour ($60) to a full day ($220, includes lunch).

6. SURF INDOORSYes, you read correctly; you can surf in Vermont. Jay Peak’s Pump House Water Park has a standing wave and surfboards, a free-fall called La Chute and an indoor river. If the mountain’s got you beat, spend an afternoon or an entire day fl oating the river around the East’s largest indoor waterpark, zip down some scary-fun slides, or try the surf simulator. Or just head to the balcony bar and watch the kids ($39 for an adult day pass). ■

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For something di� erent

spend a day on a fat bike,

surf, slip and slide at Jay

Peak’s indoor water park

or fly along trails behind a

team of Huskies.

THE WINTER FUN LISTHere are 6 ways to break out of your usual winter routine and play with your inner kid (or your children).

The List

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Get the Hometown DiscountDeal Days at Bolton Valley

boltonvalley.com · 1.877.9BOLTON

Mondays: 50/50 Mondays50% Off All Access Lift Tickets

(and more) for folks ages 50 and over

Wednesdays: College Nights$19 All Access Lift Tickets for college

students starting at noon

Fridays: Late Night At Bolton ValleyLifts run until 10pm with $19 lift tickets

starting at 7pm. Late night food and entertainment in the Tavern.

Saturdays: Bolton After Dark$19 Night Skiing, $2 flatbread slices,

$2 sodas and nightly beer specials

Every Day: Buy In Advance and SavePurchase tickets in advance at boltonvalley.com

and save over the retail rate even if you only plan ahead by one day

*Some restrictions apply, see boltonvalley.com for details.

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It’s a Tuesday night at the Homestyle Hostel in Ludlow, Vt. A few guests, back from a day on the slopes, are cooking up their dinner in the chef’s kitchen while kids are playing Twister in the reception area.

Behind the bar, owner/snowboarder/bartender Jus-tin Hyjek stirs up a Good Ol’ Boy with hot brown butter bour-bon, habanero liqueur, simple syrup and pear nectar—all made in-house. It’s one of the many concoctions that are gaining Hyjek a local following and recently earned him the title “the best bar-tender I’ve ever met,” by a reviewer on TripAdvisor.

It’s been a year since Vermont natives Hyjek, 28, and his partner, Eliza Green, 26, returned from traveling around South America and opened the 24-bed hostel in a 200-year-old renovated Victorian in the heart of Ludlow. Already, the Homestyle Hostel (www.homestyle-hostel.com) is getting rave reviews for everything from its memory-foam mattresses, to the homemade granola breakfasts, to the Thurs-day-through-Sunday dinners (open to the public as well).

While dinner is “cook your own” on Monday and Tuesday (and the kitchen is open to guests when the chef is not busy), the rest of the week something local is served up every night. In

January, Alyssa Prouty, the former sous-chef at The Downtown Grocery, joined the hostel as chef. The limited dinner menu changes often and includes special prix-fi xe pop up dinners (about $40). Locals try not to miss Wednesday night: that’s sushi (or tapas) and game night, MC’ed by tuxedo-clad funmeister Steve Kelly (his day job is at the Surf the Earth shop in Killing-

Lodges

VERMONT’S POSHTELS With live music, game nights, gourmet meals and dorm rooms that start at $35 a night, these posh hostels are hard to beat.

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ton), who might give away local brews as prizes. After dinner and drinks, you can roll upstairs

to crash in a clean, dorm-style bunkroom ($35 a night) that might sleep two to six or upgrade to a private queen (starting at $100) or book a family suite ($200)—all with shared bath.

“It’s not the college crowd we fi rst expected,” says Green, who got the idea to open a hostel after the couple traveled around South America, stay-ing and working in hostels. “The parking lot might have a beater car, but also the latest Mercedes.”

Homestyle is just one of several of Vermont’s

hip hostels, or “poshtels” as the World Travel Mar-ket has dubbed the trend.

If not the fi rst, certainly one of the most nota-ble of Vermont poshtels is Hotel Tevere, started by Giles Smith and Sarah Wright in 2009 in an 1860s farmhouse. “We’d traveled all over Italy and we love to cook and wanted to bring the European hostel idea here to Vermont,” says Wright, a former archi-tect, as she balances her toddler on her hip.

Located just south of Sugarbush on Route 100, Hostel Tevere (www.hosteltevere.com) has a fresh contemporary fl air with walls painted

with bold colors and bright artwork. This sea-son, the hostel has cut back its delicious dinners (think mushroom and leak lasagna or chicken and root vegetable pot pie) to just guests on Friday and Saturday nights (with Hostel Burgers every Thursday). But the hostel bar still rocks for the public on weekends with local craft brews on tap, mean dart games, a well-stocked bar and live music such as jazz/rock band Talking Doctor and local favorite, The Grift.

The dorm rooms are decked out with plump duvets and crisp sheets and bright, contemporary colors. Fresh fl owers decorate the tables and produce from the garden shows up in the menu all season long.

“We have entire families that book our dorm rooms,” says Wright. Rates start at $40 a night for adults on weekends for a dorm room.

Of course, there are also a number of other clas-sic hostels and old-style lodges such as Killington’s Turn of the River Lodge, the Warren Falls Inn and Hostel (with a communal kitchen) and the dorm rooms at The Round Hearth at Stowe. These all take large groups and offer some of the best values in the state when it comes to a bed and breakfast.

For a list of these and other hostels in Ver-mont, visit vtskiandride.com/hostels/. ■

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WIN A HOMESTYLE HOSTEL/OKEMO WEEKENDTo help celebrate Okemo’s 60th birthday Ver-mont Ski + Ride, the Homestyle Hostel and Okemo Mountain Resort are giving away four lift tickets to Okemo and an overnight at Home-style Hostel’s private queen bedroom.To enter, visit vtskiandride.com/contests/.

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Fresh flowers and free breakfast (including homemade granola) greet guests in the morning at Homestyle Hostel.

Down the road from Sugarbush, Hostel Tevere’s hip rooms, fun dinners and live music have made Sarah Wright and Giles Smith some of the most popular hosts in town.

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You can follow the path of least resistance, but you’ll usually find everyone else there. Instead, come to a place that’s as uncommon as you. FOR DETAILS & TO BOOK jaypeakresort.com/stay

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Rikert Nordic Center is located on VT Route 125 just down the road from the Snow Bowl. The 5km snowmaking system allows for a jump on early season skiing on a certified FIS trail. Season passes and multi-day passes available.

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Scot Emerson recently spent $8,000 on one steer. It’s not just any steer, but one of a small herd of Vermont Wagyu, carefully bred from a strain of Japanese beef cattle, grass-fed and raised on Springfi eld, Vt.’s 350-acre Spring Rock Farm.

“It’s incredible meat,” Emerson says. “I now have 14 tender-loins, each about 3 inches thick, that I’m probably going to put on the menu for about $140 a plate at Coleman Brook Tavern.”

Really? $140 for a steak? “Yup,” says Emerson, “and I think they’ll go fast.” And under his new “whole animal” pro-gram, Emerson plans to use nearly every piece of the animals he buys across the resort’s 11 restaurants.

Oxtail might be used in broth for a delicate noodle soup, while ground beef from the steer might show up in burgers. “Our goal is to let skiers have a wide variety of dining experi-ences across the resort,” he says.

As executive chef at Okemo Mountain Resort and a for-mer chef at The Greenbrier Resort in West Virgina, Emerson knows where to fi nd the best ingredients and what customers want. And he tries to keep it local and sustainable.

Emerson sources his lamb and honey from Smokeshire Hilltop Farm in Chester. The farm not only raises lamb, ber-ries, turkeys and honey, but does so on a minimal footprint.

Apres Ski

GOING WHOLE-HOG LOCAL Around Vermont, ski resort chefs are taking farm-to-table dining to a new level.

Okemo Resort executive

chef Scot Emerson (top

right) focuses on using

local ingredients—from

whole sides of meats to

his baked Lillé (top le� .)

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Coleman Brook Tavern’s Baked LilléScot Emerson’s recipe, a variation on baked brie is an easy and elegant local appetizer. Lillé is a thicker form of Brie produced locally in small batches by Vermont Farmstead Cheese. The sauce uses local Vermont ingredients and products.

INGREDIENTS:7 oz. Vermont Farmstead Lillé cheese2 oz. Vermont-made Fox Meadow Maple Pumpkin Butter3 sheets of phyllo dough2 oz. Cabot butter2 graham crackers, crumbled

SAUCE INGREDIENTS: 1 lb. of butternut squash2 cups apple cider1 teaspoon cinnamon1 teaspoon cardamom 1. Preheat oven at 400 degrees and melt butter.2. For the sauce, dice the butternut squash and put it in a pan with the cider, cinnamon and cardamom. Let simmer until squash is soft enough to puree in a blender. Set aside. 3. Lay one sheet of phyllo on a cutting board and brush with melted butter. Add a second sheet and brush with but-ter. Sprinkle with crumbled graham crackers. Add a third sheet of phyllo and brush with butter. 4. Cut Lillé in half, horizontally. Place in the middle of the phyl-lo with the cut side up and top with Fox Meadow Maple Pump-kin butter. Close the phyllo around the cheese. 5. Place in a baking dish. Bake for 10 minutes at 400 degrees F.6. Drizzle sauce on a serving plate, place the baked Lillé in the center. Garnish with arugula and serve with toast or crackers.

A video of how to make this dish is at vtskiandride.com

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Energy comes from solar, wind, biodiesel and wood. Draft horses are used for logging and plowing.

“I was an early member of the Vermont Fresh Network,” Emerson says of the non-profit that has been linking local chefs with farms for more than 20 years. “I really believe in the small farms we have in Vermont and what they can produce.”

The Vermont Fresh Network (VFN) not only links farms with chefs, but certifies restaurants that source a certain percentage of their food locally with the VFN logo. “A lot of people say they buy local,” says VFN executive director Meghan Sheridan. “We actually go out and audit restaurants and make sure they are practicing what we preach.”

Okemo’s Coleman Brook Tavern is one of an elite hand-ful that have earned VFN’s “Gold Barn” status for purchasing more than 30 percent of its food from Vermont producers.

In the past year, Vermont Fresh Network chefs invested $25 million in local food. Sugarbush’s executive chef Gerry Noonan is one of them. This past fall Noonan put away more than 2,000 pounds of produce grown at the Mad River Val-ley’s Gaylord Farm, which raises certified organic vegetables and natural meats, to use at Sugarbush’s The Timbers and Allyn’s Lodge. “Last year, we had enough tomatoes to make local tomato soup all year and served it with a grilled cheese sandwich made with Cabot’s Legacy collection Alpine Ched-dar.” Noonan will also get a Misty Knoll chicken from Ad-dison County or a side of beef raised in Shelburne to roast

over the open fire at the spe-cial on-mountain dinners he puts on at Allyn’s Lodge. He uses Nitty Gritty Grain from Addison County for his wood-fired pizzas.

Stowe’s mountaintop res-taurant, the Cliff House, is also a Vermont Fresh Network member and has made a prac-tice of hosting special farm-to-table dinners through the season. While the restaurant at the top of the gondola serves locally-sourced dishes, such as grass-fed Vermont burger and cider-brined pork chops for lunch, its special farm-to-ta-ble dinners are worth signing up for months in advance and often pair local fare with local ciders, beers or wines.

“It’s obviously easier for smaller and specialty restau-rants to buy and serve lo-

cal food,” says VFN’s Sheridan, noting that at the large ski resorts, it’s usually just a few of the restaurants, not all of them, that have VFN status.

At cross-country resorts, though, the eateries are smaller and more intimate. VFN member Trapp Family Lodge, for instance, not only buys much of its food locally, it also raises it. Sheep and cattle help keep the grasses on the cross-country trails cut short in the summer and become part of the menu in the fall and winter. Trapp’s gardens supply berries and veg-etables and the sugarhouse and new on-site brewery provide Vermont’s two best-known elixirs: maple syrup and craft beer.

At the Strafford Nordic Center, the base lodge and trail head are at Rockbottom Farm, which also happen to be head-quarters for the Strafford Organic Creamery—makers of ex-ceptional ice cream and other dairy products. Montpelier’s Morse Farm is not only a sweet place to cross-country ski, it’s an even sweeter place in the spring when the sugarhouse is running. Other resorts that are VFN members include Red Clover Inn, Blueberry Hill, Craftsbury Outdoor Center, the Mountain Top Inn and The Woodstock Inn.

“Increasingly,” says Emerson, “all mountains are offering great skiing. Skiers are going to choose where they go based on who has good food. And Vermont is someplace they will find it. ” —Lisa Lynn

To find a Vermont Fresh Network member restaurant, look for the VFN logo (at left) or visit www.vermontfresh.net

At the Trapp Family

Lodge (above), Straf-

ford and a few other XC

ski centers, skiing and

gathering maple sap for

sugaring happen on the

same trails.

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VSAC

Take advantage of your Vermont connection.

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VSAC

Take advantage of your Vermont connection.

Vermont students and families have access to low-cost educationfinancing that others don’t have.

Take advantage of the rates and service of the state’s nonprofit Vermont StudentAssistance Corporation (VSAC).

VSAC’s Vermont Advantage student loan for the 2015-2016 academic year offers:

• a fixed interest rate as low as 5.50% APR

• your choice of three repaymentoptions

• no or low origination fee, based on the cosigner’s credit rating

• no penalty for prepayment• local Vermont service

Any Vermont student can apply.• Vermont residents attending college

in the U.S. or abroad• Out-of-state students attending

college in Vermont

To learn more and apply online:www.vsac.org/VTconnection

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10 Holiday 2015 vtskiandride.com

SAVE THEIR SNOW!

Protect skiing for our children and grandchildren. Visit our website to learn how to reduce your carbon footprint in your home or ski home. Join one of our community solar parks. Our land, your solar.

ACT NOW for $6,750 in first-year savings• 5% stable, tax-free, inflation protected return possible• Second homes are eligible for 30% federal solar tax credit• Green Mountain Power is expected to reach solar “cap” in

early 2016• Help Vermont lead the way towards clean energy with

community solar parks• Lock in Vermont’s solar incentive, expiring in 2016

Vermont’s climate is moving south at an alarming rate. Tomorrow’s ski seasons depend upon today’s sustainability actions. Vermont is not alone; the Sierra had the lowest snowfall in 500 years (confirmed from tree ring analysis) in 2014-2015.

Sad, but True

www.solaflect.com • (802)649-3700

Higher-Emissions Scenario

Lower-Emissions Scenario

2070–2090

2010–2039

2070–2090

2040–20692040–2069

1961–1990

2010–2039

GO SOLAR TODAY

(and some money)

Participating in this project involves risk of loss that an investor should be prepared to bear. Please contact [email protected] for the disclosure documents containing a full description of such risk.

Solafleck Save their Snow2.indd 1 1/13/16 11:05 PM

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W hen people ask where I’m from, I frequently say southern Vermont. But to be more specifi c, I grew up in the Deerfi eld Valley, and when it comes to a classic Vermont skiing experience, it still one of my favorite places. Set between the Connecticut River and the southern-most range of the Green Mountain National Forest, the Deerfi eld Valley is a

shallow trough that stretches from the southern limit of Vermont’s Route 100 north to Wilmington, West Dover and Wardsboro. For years, the valley has been a starting point for skiers heading to Mount Snow or Haystack. It’s also home recently become home to one of the swankiest new private clubs in ski country. And it has a few of my favorite backcountry stashes. But more on that later.

While in many Vermont towns, things never change, the Deerfi eld Valley has seen some dramatic growth in the past few years. After the 2011 Tropical Storm Irene brought massive devastation, the valley has made a rebound. Here’s our local’s guide of what’s new and not-to-miss.

REVAMPED RESORTSRising 3,586 feet, Mount Snow, Vermont’s southern-most ski area, was where I learned to ski. My father worked in the marketing department and after I mastered my driveway ski trail, I made my fi rst turns on the mountain’s green circle trails.

A lot has changed since then, especially in the past two years. For one, Mount Snow now has one of the most expansive snowmaking systems in the country, not to mention New England’s only all-park mountain face, Carinthia. Olympic medalists, including snowboarder Kelly Clark and skier Devin Logan made their names here. Today, Carinthia’s park features giant gas tanks, suspended wrecking balls, staircases and a host of other imaginative features inspired by the Vermont landscape (think sap buckets, barns and fences). No wonder Transworld Snowboarding magazine readers recently named it the best park in the East.

For a very different experience and if you want a mountain all to yourself and your closest (wealthy) friends, the Hermitage Club, one of Vermont’s few private ski clubs, is the place for you. Located on neighboring 3,200-foot Haystack Mountain, the club offers 194 skiable acres and 45 trails, plus an impressive 80,000 square-foot post-and-beam clubhouse with restaurants, locker rooms, spa, retail shops and a recreation center for kids and teens – all members only. In addition to the mountain, the club has also purchased the Deerfi eld

WHAT’SNEW IN THE DEERFIELD VALLEY?

ANSWER? PLENTY! WITH NEW RESTAURANTS, ONE OF THE SWANKIEST PRIVATE CLUBS IN SKI COUNTRY AND REVAMPED RESORTS, THE DEERFIELD VALLEY IS MAKING A COMEBACK. BY EVAN JOHNSON

◆

Mount Snow lives up to

its name with powder-

packed cruisers. The

resort’s Carinthia terrain

park has also become

a breeding ground for

some of the best freeski-

ers in the East.

Phot

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f Mou

nt S

now

SAVE THEIR SNOW!

Protect skiing for our children and grandchildren. Visit our website to learn how to reduce your carbon footprint in your home or ski home. Join one of our community solar parks. Our land, your solar.

ACT NOW for $6,750 in first-year savings• 5% stable, tax-free, inflation protected return possible• Second homes are eligible for 30% federal solar tax credit• Green Mountain Power is expected to reach solar “cap” in

early 2016• Help Vermont lead the way towards clean energy with

community solar parks• Lock in Vermont’s solar incentive, expiring in 2016

Vermont’s climate is moving south at an alarming rate. Tomorrow’s ski seasons depend upon today’s sustainability actions. Vermont is not alone; the Sierra had the lowest snowfall in 500 years (confirmed from tree ring analysis) in 2014-2015.

Sad, but True

www.solaflect.com • (802)649-3700

Higher-Emissions Scenario

Lower-Emissions Scenario

2070–2090

2010–2039

2070–2090

2040–20692040–2069

1961–1990

2010–2039

GO SOLAR TODAY

(and some money)

Participating in this project involves risk of loss that an investor should be prepared to bear. Please contact [email protected] for the disclosure documents containing a full description of such risk.

Solafleck Save their Snow2.indd 1 1/13/16 11:05 PM

Valley Airport. Starting in 2016, the club has partnered with Tradewind Aviation to provide shuttle service for members and guests between the Deerfield Valley and the Westchester County Airport for $321.13 each way.

All of this can be yours for the private ski club price tag that comes with it. Initiation fee is $75,000 and is increasing to $85,000 after Feb. 15.

A little farther north, Stratton recently made elegant renovations to its historic base lodge and the Grizzly Bear Pub this winter. The resort also offers weekend bus service, new this season, from Manhattan via the Hampton Jitney.

SECRET TRAILS & BACKCOUNTRY STASHESFor a morning showshoe or a headlamp-lit kick and glide, Wilmington and Dover have a number of connected trails. My favorite snowshoe trail is behind the Chimney Hill development just off of Route 9 in Wilmington. The trail leaves Upper Dam Road for a moderate 2.4-mile hike to the summit of Haystack Mountain, gaining some 1,200 feet and culminating with views across the Deerfield Valley to Mount Snow to the north and the Harriman Reservoir to the south.

The area also has plenty of Nordic skiing, thanks to the classic and skate trails at Timber Creek, across the road from Mount Snow’s north entrance. For a guided experience, Zoar Adventure Center, located in downtown Wilmington, offers a six-mile out-and-back snowshoe tour that follows a branch of the Deerfield River past the Searsburg Dam, as well as a cross country ski trip on the Hoot, Toot & Whistle Trail to the Harriman Reservoir.

For some sweet backcountry turns, head east on Route 9 to Hogback Mountain in neighboring Marlboro. This tiny ski area closed in the 1980s but group of locals has begun to reclaim some of the 14 original trails for backcountry skiing. Meaning when the snow gets deep, you’ll be able to find some powder within hiking distance of your car.

(REALLY) FINE DININGFor breakfast, the locals’ choice is Dots, right in the middle of Wilmington. Since 1980, every Vermont governor has posed for a photo-op there and Gourmet magazine once described the pancakes as “a national treasure.” My father had breakfast there the day I was born and got his meal for free.

In the past couple of years, the Deerfield Valley has become one of the culinary hotspots in the state, with several new restaurants opening this year. In August, Mangia e Beve opened in Wilmington with Italian fare including homemade breads, pasta and gelato. In May, Cask & Kiln Kitchen set up in the restored Parmalee & Howe Building at the intersection of Route 9 and Route

100, serving dishes-to-share downstairs like Maine mussels in beer butter. The upstairs area features a more relaxed lounge and bar area, serving winter squash pappardelle or venison stew. Another newcomer, the Village Roost specializes in non-GMO foods and serves up soups, sandwiches and burgers and doubles as a retail market.

The Hermitage Club’s latest contribution to the Valley dining experience was unveiled in December: Piacenza at the Inn at Sawmill Farm features seasonal Italian-inspired dishes designed by culinary consultant and Michelin-starred chef Terrance Brennan. And you don’t have to be a Hermitage member to get a table.

Located within walking distance from downtown Wilmington, Pizzapalooza serves hand-tossed pizza with local ingredients and more than 14 rotating taps pouring Vermont beers including Hermit Thrush from Brattleboro and brews from Bennington’s Madison Brewing Co. In June, the owners plan to open the Beer Naked Brewery, which will brew small batches for pouring right next door.

Up Route 100 in Dover, the Dover Forge offers fresh salads and house-smoked meats in a comfortable space. If you’re waiting for a table or not quite ready for the night to end, head next door to One More Time, a low-key spot for a game of pool and a pint.

CLASSIC LODGESThe Valley’s lodging options range from refined bed and breakfasts to comfortable inns. In addition to a critically acclaimed restaurant, the Hermitage Inn offers 15 individually-decorated rooms ($229 - $492) with access to the nearby Hermitage Club’s alpine and Nordic trails, snowshoeing and horse-drawn sleigh rides (no need to be a club member to stay at this inn).

Wilmington’s Old Red Mill Inn, which dates to 1828 when the building served as a sawmill, has rooms for $65 - $110. You’ll find plenty of vintage décor in a clean and comfortable setting that’s not far from cross country or alpine skiing. The Nutmeg Inn, also close to the center of Wilmington, is a restored 1777 farmhouse with ten rooms and four suites, each individually appointed ($140 - $245).

While I get to travel and ski throughout much of the state, the Deerfield Valley remains one of my favorite places in Vermont. It still feels like home. n

Cask & Kiln Kitchen (left) serves amuse bouches and nationally-acclaimed chef

Terrance Brennan is consulting at the Hermitage Club’s Inn at Sawmill Farm, below.


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SLICES • CREATIVE ENTRÉES • GLUTEN-FREE MENU • HEALTHY KIDS MENUCRAFT BEERS • GAME ROOM • DELIVERY

1899 M O U N T A I NR O A D

STOWE VT 05672 • 802.253.4411

P I E C A S S O . C O M

ORDERONLINE

“A feast for the senses in an idyllic setting” - Boston Globe

Red Clover InnThe & RESTAURANT

Red Clover Inn

Stylish, secluded lodging. Exquisite Vermont food.

Just minutes from Killington & Pico.

7 Woodward Road, Mendon, Vermont 1/4 mile off Route 4 between Killington & Rutland

802.775.2290 • 800.752.0571 • www.redcloverinn.com

Restaurant open for dinnerThursday through Monday 5:30 to 9 p.m.

RC-VT Ski and Ride-Winter 2016.indd 1 1/12/16 2:37 PM

BURLINGTON, VERMONT ECHOVERMONT.ORG 877.324.6386

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NORTHERN VERMONT

Trapp Family Lodge XC Center, Stowe

Rikert Nordic Center, RiptonBolton Valley, Bolton

NORDICcenters of vermont

Ski AreaTotal Terrain

Machine Tracked

Skating Terrain

Typical Season Town Phone Website

Blueberry Lake 31 km 31 km 31 km Dec-March Warren 802-496-6687 blueberrylakeskivt.com

Bolton Valley XC 100 km 15 km 15 km Dec-April Bolton Valley 802-434-3444 boltonvalley.com

Catamount Family Center 35 km 35 km 35 km Dec-March Williston 802-879-6001 catamountoutdoor.com

Craftsbury Outdoor Center 105 km 105 km 105 km Dec-March Craftsbury Common 802-586-7767 craftsbury.com

Hazen’s Notch 65 km 60 km 60 km Dec-April Montgomery Center 802-326-4799 hazensnotch.org

Highland Lodge & XC Center 40 km 40 km 40 km Dec-March Greensboro 802-533-2647 highlandlodge.com

Jay Peak Nordic & Snowshoe Center 20 km -- -- Nov-April Jay 802-988-2611 jaypeakresort.com

Kingdom Trails 45 km 20 km 20 km Dec-April East Burke 802-626-0737 kingdomtrails.org

Memphremagog Ski Touring Foundation 35 km 35 km 35 km Dec-March Derby 802-334-1357 mstf.net

Morse Farm Ski Center 28 km 20 km 15 km Dec-March Montpelier 802-223-0560 skimorsefarm.com

Ole’s Cross Country Center 48 km 50 km 45 km Nov-April Warren 802-496-3430 olesxc.com

Rikert Nordic Center 55 km 50 km 40 km Nov-April Ripton 802-443-2744 rikertnordic.com

Sleepy Hollow Inn & Bike Center 35 km 30 km 25 km Dec-March Huntington 802-434-2283 skisleepyhollow.com

Stowe XC Ski Center 75 km 35 km 35 km Dec-April Stowe 802-253-3688 stowe.com

Stoweflake Resort 5 km 5 km -- Dec-April Stowe 802-253-2232 stoweflake.com

Trapp Family Lodge XC Center 160 km 55 km 55 km Dec-April Stowe 802-253-8511 trappfamily.com

700 Trapp Hill Rd • Stowe, VT 05672

Trapp’s XC Center, one of the premier Nordic centers in the East, features 160 km, with

55 km of tracked and skating terrain. Plus:

• Full retail shop and rentals• Professional instruction

Don't miss Slayton Pasture Cabin for a warm lunch and a roaring fire in the hearth.

www.trapfamily.com • 802-253-8511

The Nordic Center is the gateway to Bolton Valley’s legendary backcountry terrain. It offers guided tours, lessons and rental equipment to get you out to enjoy some of the best Nordic

skiing and snowshoeing in New England. Bolton has a 100 km Nordic trail system with

15 kilometers of groomed trails.

www.boltonvalley.com • 802-434-3444

106 College Cross Road • Ripton VT

Rikert's 55 km of trails wind through old forests, farm fields and past Robert Frost's summer cabin. The Center offers a full ser-

vice rental shop and ski school. Jump on early season skiing with 5 km of snowmaking. Open

7 days a week and home to the Middlebury College Panthers.

www.rikertnordic.com • 802-443-27444302 Bolton Valley Access Rd • Bolton, VT

creo

NORTHERN VERMONT

Trapp Family Lodge XC Center, Stowe

Rikert Nordic Center, RiptonBolton Valley, Bolton


Ski AreaTotal Terrain

Machine Tracked

Skating Terrain


Blueberry Lake 31 km 31 km 31 km Dec-March Warren 802-496-6687 blueberrylakeskivt.com

Bolton Valley XC 100 km 15 km 15 km Dec-April Bolton Valley 802-434-3444 boltonvalley.com

Catamount Family Center 35 km 35 km 35 km Dec-March Williston 802-879-6001 catamountoutdoor.com

Craftsbury Outdoor Center 105 km 105 km 105 km Dec-March Craftsbury Common 802-586-7767 craftsbury.com

Hazen’s Notch 65 km 60 km 60 km Dec-April Montgomery Center 802-326-4799 hazensnotch.org

Highland Lodge & XC Center 40 km 40 km 40 km Dec-March Greensboro 802-533-2647 highlandlodge.com

Jay Peak Nordic & Snowshoe Center 20 km -- -- Nov-April Jay 802-988-2611 jaypeakresort.com

Kingdom Trails 45 km 20 km 20 km Dec-April East Burke 802-626-0737 kingdomtrails.org

Memphremagog Ski Touring Foundation 35 km 35 km 35 km Dec-March Derby 802-334-1357 mstf.net

Morse Farm Ski Center 28 km 20 km 15 km Dec-March Montpelier 802-223-0560 skimorsefarm.com

Ole’s Cross Country Center 48 km 50 km 45 km Nov-April Warren 802-496-3430 olesxc.com

Rikert Nordic Center 55 km 50 km 40 km Nov-April Ripton 802-443-2744 rikertnordic.com

Sleepy Hollow Inn & Bike Center 35 km 30 km 25 km Dec-March Huntington 802-434-2283 skisleepyhollow.com

Stowe XC Ski Center 75 km 35 km 35 km Dec-April Stowe 802-253-3688 stowe.com

Stoweflake Resort 5 km 5 km -- Dec-April Stowe 802-253-2232 stoweflake.com

Trapp Family Lodge XC Center 160 km 55 km 55 km Dec-April Stowe 802-253-8511 trappfamily.com

700 Trapp Hill Rd • Stowe, VT 05672

Trapp’s XC Center, one of the premier Nordic centers in the East, features 160 km, with

55 km of tracked and skating terrain. Plus:

• Full retail shop and rentals• Professional instruction

Don't miss Slayton Pasture Cabin for a warm lunch and a roaring fire in the hearth.

www.trapfamily.com • 802-253-8511

The Nordic Center is the gateway to Bolton Valley’s legendary backcountry terrain. It offers guided tours, lessons and rental equipment to get you out to enjoy some of the best Nordic

skiing and snowshoeing in New England. Bolton has a 100 km Nordic trail system with

15 kilometers of groomed trails.

www.boltonvalley.com • 802-434-3444

106 College Cross Road • Ripton VT

Rikert's 55 km of trails wind through old forests, farm fields and past Robert Frost's summer cabin. The Center offers a full ser-

vice rental shop and ski school. Jump on early season skiing with 5 km of snowmaking. Open

7 days a week and home to the Middlebury College Panthers.

www.rikertnordic.com • 802-443-27444302 Bolton Valley Access Rd • Bolton, VT

Timber Creek XC, West Dover

Mountain Top Inn & Resort, Chittenden


SOUTHERN VERMONTSki Area

Total Terrain

Machine Tracked

Skating Terrain


Blueberry Hill 60 km -- -- Dec-March Goshen 802-247-6735 blueberryhillinn.com

Brattleboro Outing Club 33 km 25 km 20 km Dec-March Brattleboro 802-254-8906 brattleborooutingclub.org

Grafton Ponds Outdoor Center 60 km 30 km 30 km Dec-March Grafton 802-843-2400 graftonponds.com

Hildene, The Lincoln Family Home 20 km 14 km -- Dec-March Manchester 802-362-1788 hildene.org

Landgrove Inn 15 km 15 km 15 km Dec-March Landgrove 802-824-6673 landgroveinn.com

Mountain Top Inn & Resort 60 km 40 km 40 km Nov-April Chittenden 802-483-2311 mountaintopinn.com

Okemo Valley Nordic Center 22 km 22 km 8 km Dec-April Ludlow 802-228-1396 okemo.com

Prospect Mountain XC 30 km 30 km 30 km Nov-April Woodford 802-442-2575 prospectmountain.com

Quechee Club 25 km 25 km 12 km Dec-March Quechee 802-295-9356 quecheeclub.com

Strafford Nordic Center 30 km 30 km Dec-March Strafford 802-765-4309 straffordnordicskiing.com

Stratton Mountain Nordic Center 12 km 12 km 12 km Dec-March Stratton Mountain 802-297-4567 stratton.com

Three Stallion Inn Touring Center 35 km 10 km 17 km Dec-March Randolph 802-728-3475 threestallioninn.com

Timber Creek XC 14 km 14 km 14 km Dec-March West Dover 802-464-0999 timbercreekxc.com

Viking Nordic Center 39 km 35 km 30 km Dec-March Londonderry 802-824-3933 vikingnordic.com

Wild Wing’s Ski Touring Center 25 km 25 km -- Dec-March Peru 802-824-6793 wildwingsski.com

Woodstock Inn Nordic Center 50 km 50 km 50 km Dec-March Woodstock 802-457-6674 woodstockinn.com

195 Mountain Top Rd • Chittenden, VT

The Mountain Top Inn & Resort offers 60 km of XC ski trails (40 km groomed, snowmaking on a 2km loop). With terrain of all types, on-site rentals, spectacular views, delicious food and luxury accommodations, the Mountain

Top Inn & Resort is the perfect XC ski destination. A short drive to Killington.

Trails open 8am-4pm.

www.mountaintopinn.com • 802-483-2311

Mount Snow • Rt. 100 North • West Dover, VT

Timber Cre

ek

verm nt

Timber Creek XC is known for our thoughtfully groomed trail system, we have

been called “one of the finest small XC ski areas in the country…bar none.”

TimberCreekXC.com • 802-464-0999

132 Landgrove Rd. • Landgrove, VT

800-824-6673 802-824-6673

www.landgroveinn.com

• Located on 32 acres in a pristine valley

• 19 uniquely decorated rooms

• On-site restaurant open 5-7 nights/week

• 15km of groomed and tracked nordic trails with skating

The Landgrove Inn, Landgrove

Snowmaking


AT 21, PHOTOGRAPHER BROOKS CURRAN AND HIS MERRY BAND OF GREEN MOUNTAIN FREESKIERS ARE PUTTING THE SKI WORLD ON NOTICE.

There is a flash of powder, a huck off an ice fall, then they vanish. They move quietly through the forest, often at dawn when the snow is fresh and the light is good.

They are a band of freeskiers who have taken their park tricks, big airs and ability to snake through the tightest of trees into the East Coast’s gnarliest backcountry lines.

This past December, they took off in a school bus they bought off Craigslist for $2,300. They painted it blue, named it “Notion,” and headed West in pursuit of powder.

University of Vermont Freeskiing Team members Brooks Curran, Tim McClellan and Dylan Dipentima (shown at right) and buddy Noah Ranallo cut their teeth at Mad River Glen chasing each other through the trees. Rounding out the crew are UVM student Marcus Wadlington, a backcoun-try guru from Smuggler’s Notch; Chris Stimpson, also a top-ranked freeskier from UVM; and Evan Booth.

Curran, himself a top skier, couldn’t ask for a better set of action models.

At age 11, Curran began filming, “mainly videos of friends sledding on Mad River Rockets,” he says. His par-ents, Dennis and Ellen Curran are photographers who work out of the Mad River Valley. It was only two years ago, after his mother was hit by a car while running and injured, that Brooks, then 19, picked up a still camera and began helping out with the family business, shooting weddings.

“A lot of us have never really skied the West so this is a discovery trip for us,” says Curran. “We’re also making a web video out of it called ‘Notion.’”

The Notion crew are following in the footsteps of the Jones brothers, Todd and Steve, who grew up skiing Stowe, and then headed to Jackson Hole and started Teton Gravity Research films. They are also picking up where Ryan Hawks and brothers Lars and Silas Chickering-Ayers left off: World Freeride Tour stars raised at Mad River Glen who went on to film and tour the West in a van they called “The General.”

Not long after that first trip in The General, Ryan Hawks, 25, back-flipped off a 50-foot cliff during a competition at Kirkwood. He landed on a hidden rock as his girlfriend, pro skier Angel Collinson, watched. He later died. As she ac-cepted this year’s Powder Magazine award for Best Female Skier, Collinson dedicated her award to “our loved ones who are no longer here but have led by example.”

Set up in Hawks’ memory, the Flyin’ Ryan Foundation has provided scholarships to a number of the Notion crew and also helped fund the trip.

Unlike the skiers and filmmakers who went West before them, Curran and his friends plan to be back in Vermont by the end of January.

They have to be: they still need to graduate. Dylan Dipentima starts the season right, blasting trees at Stowe in November, 2015.


THE NEXT GENERATION

PHOTOGRAPHY BY BROOKS CURRANPHOTOGRAPHY BY BROOKS CURRAN


Top: It was a snowless December when Brooks Curran

(far left) and friends outfitted their 2003 GMC microbus

Notion to hold 14 pairs of skis and sleep seven guys.

They packed it with blocks of cheese from sponsor,

Cabot, and planned a route to hit the best powder. “With

seven guys crammed in a bus for 6,000 miles it was

bound to get a little stinky,” Curran observed.

Opposite page: Curran, (photographed skiing Mad River

Glen last year by his father, Dennis Curran) got the

goods here in Vermont last winter filming “Winter Storm

Marcus.” In it, he has epic footage of buddies Marcus

Wadlington and Noah Ranallo skiing waist-deep powder

in the backcountry near Stowe.

Left: Tim McClellan, a long-time buddy of Curran’s from

Mad River Glen and the captain of the UVM Freeski Team,

had been going stir crazy last summer. The Shelburne,

local persuaded Curran to go ski scree at the Hinesburg

Sand & Gravel Pit, a place they dubbed Mt. Gnar. By

December, McClellan was more than ready for the trip

to find powder. On Jan. 2, during one of the Notion’s

stops to ski and film in Wyoming’s Teton Pass, McClel-

lan launched a cliff and hit a rock. “I caught my ski on

the rock, then tomahawked for about 40 feet before

stopping,” he wrote on his Facebook page. McClellan

ended up with a compound fracture in his forearm and a

broken hand . “While it sucks getting hurt, I’m consider-

ing myself lucky,” he wrote.


Opposite page: If you hike or ski Route 108 from Stowe

to Smuggler’s Notch resort, look up into the cliffs. There,

you might find Marcus Wadlington (opposite page and

above) scouting new lines.

Top: Wadlington has skied Smuggler’s Notch Resort

since he was one and a half and few people know the

backcountry there like he does. A former ski racer, he’s

gravitated toward big mountain skiing in the winter and

river guiding in the summer. One of the Notion crew,

Wadlington is also a Flyin’ Ryan Foundation scholarship

winner and competes on the UVM Freeskiing Team.

Right: Lincoln’s Dylan Dipentima is just as comfortable

airing it out on the trails at Sugarbush as he is launching

waterfalls in the backcountry. Dipentima, also a member

of the UVM Freeskiing Team, is currently ranked 35th

on the World Freeride Tour. Along with Notion skier

Noah Ranallo, Dipentima is probably one of the most

photographed skiers on the East Coast with film credits

in “Winter Storm Marcus,” the “Neo” series, and two of

the latest in the Meathead Films series, “Spectral 6” and

“Spectral 8.” If you want to see how to ski trees, watch

Dipentima.


Top: Tami Razinger, 22, can make skiing in Vermont (shown at top near Mt. Mansfield’s summit) look like it’s

Alaska. Though she hadn’t been a part of the Notion’s traveling bus crew, the UVM grad and Smuggler’s Notch

freeski coach flew out to meet the Notion gang in Jackson Hole. Razinger grew up ski racing in Stratton before

falling in love with freeskiing. In 2014, she won the skiercross event at the Collegiate Nationals and won the Ski

the East Freeride Tour, earning her a top 50 ranking in the World Freeride Tour.

Above: “A big part of getting great images is having great skiers,” says Curran, and proof of it is the shot he took

of Noah Ranallo, 20, shooting through rime-covered trees in November 2015 at Stowe.

“We just set up a kicker on a groomed slope and Noah did his thing.” That ‘thing’ usually

involves sending it. Ranallo, both a pilot and one of the other most-filmed freeskiers in the

state, has no problem li� ing o� .

Opposite: In late February, the Notion crew will be back, making season edits and planning

another spring trip to ski Mount Washington and Tuckerman’s Ravine (le� ).

See more of the Notion

crew in action at

vtskiandride.com


BY LISA LYNN PHOTOS BY OLIVER PARINI

THE NEXT GENERATION

On Jan. 5, Caldwell (shown here at an earlier race)

won her first World Cup race. Three days later team-

mate Jessie Diggins (opposite, at right of Caldwell)

won as well.

BY PEGGY SHINN


ast June, Sophie Caldwell wrote down a goal, then posted a picture of herself holding that goal on Face-book.

It read: “Be on the World Cup podium.”Mission accomplished.

On January 5 in Oberstdorf, Germany, Caldwell, 25, claimed her first World Cup win. The race was the fourth stage of the weeklong Tour de Ski, but each stage is considered its own World Cup race.

“I really surprised myself,” she said, explaining that her forte is freestyle (skate) sprints, not classic (traditional kick-and-glide). “But I’m thrilled.”

Others were not surprised, least of all Caldwell’s father Sverre, the Nordic program director at the Stratton Mountain School. “She has been skiing really well so [a podium finish] seemed likely, but a win was more than expected,” he wrote in an email from the U.S. national championships in Michigan, where he watched his daughter on NBC live stream (“We had five of us watching and screaming at the computer. It was great!”)

“You could see that she was gaining confidence with each race,” he con-tinued, “and it all came together for this one.”

Since mid-December, Caldwell had finished in the top seven in three sprint races. However, Sverre knew the competition was daunting. “There have been two girls from Norway and one from Sweden who have been dominating,” he wrote, “so beating them all seemed like a really tall order.”

With fearless skiing on the sprint course’s treacherous downhills, Caldwell beat them all, becoming the third American woman ever to win a World Cup. (Alison Own Spencer won a race in Telemark, Wisconsin, in the World Cup’s early days, and Kikkan Randall has won 14 World Cup races.)

With Randall on maternity leave, Caldwell has taken over as top for the U.S. this season. But it’s not a stretch; she finished sixth in the classic sprint at the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games, the best finish ever for an American female cross country skier at the Olympics. Then in March 2014, she earned her first World Cup podium.

Caldwell’s growing legacy has deep roots in Vermont. Grandfather John Caldwell, from Putney, competed in the 1952 Olympics in Nordic combined, coached at four Olympic Winter Games, and literally wrote the book on cross-country skiing (The Cross Country Ski Book), while her uncle Tim, who now lives in Hanover, N.H., raced in four Olympics. Sophie’s sister Izzy runs the Frost Mountain Nordic Club’s Bill Koch program in central Vermont for kids in grades 1 through 8.

But perhaps more important than genetics, Caldwell grew up in Peru, Vermont, surrounded by friends and family who loved the outdoors. Thanks to Sverre, who helped develop grass-roots cross-country ski programs, the entire area around Peru and Stratton was (and still is) a cross-country skiing incubator.

Caldwell became serious about racing in seventh grade when she attended Stratton Mountain School, then Dartmouth College, where she competed at NCAAs three times. After graduating in 2012, she considered becoming a teacher, but then decided to give pro skiing a try. She joined the SMS T2

team to train with three-time Olympian Andy Newell and other top skiers.Six months later, in December 2012, Caldwell competed in her first

World Cup races — a freestyle sprint and team sprint in Quebec City. In front of thousands, many dressed in Big Green colors and waving American flags, she finished a remarkable 14th in both races.

A year later, she was named to her first Olympic team and in Sochi, sur-prised everyone when she made the sprint final. Unfortunately, she tangled with another skier in the final and finished sixth.

Since then, Caldwell has rarely finished outside the top 30 in sprint races. And a sprint is not just a three-minute race around a 1.2-kilometer course. Skiers must first qualify—an all-out effort because only the top 30 move on to the quarterfinals. Then the quarterfinals, semis, and finals happen in quick succession. By the finals, the skiers have already sprinted 1.2 kilometers three times within a two-hour period. In comparison, a 15-kilometer race (classic or freestyle) lasts 30-35 minutes for the men, 35-40 minutes for the women.

“[In a sprint race] you’re basically skiing the whole time because you’re warming up, then you’re warming down, then warming back up again,” Andy Newell explained—and sometimes vomiting between rounds. The trick, he added, is to maintain endurance and speed throughout the day.

Sverre has credited his daughter’s success not just to her strength and endurance, but to her level-headedness and happiness.

“She has a great training group, she likes her coaches, she has stayed quite healthy, and she is happy,” he emailed before the 2014 Olympics.

The team environment may be the real key.“Everyone works so hard, and I think the cool thing about it all is that

we wake up each day and know it could be any one of us battling for that podium,” Caldwell said after her victory. “Maybe today was my day, but to-morrow can be someone else’s. At the end of the day, we’re all going to be there supporting each other because it’s the team behind each one of us that gets us here.” n

WITH A WORLD CUP WIN IN JANUARY AND A LONG LINEAGE OF CROSS-COUNTRY SKI STARS IN HER FAMILY, SOPHIE CALDWELL IS POISED TO PODIUM AGAIN.

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BY LISA LYNN PHOTOGRAPHY B Y OLIVER PARINI

Tara Geraghty-Moats’ first jump was

o� this one at Storrs Pond Recre-

ation Area near her home in Fairlee,

Vt. at age 9. Now she’s the leading

American on the World Cup.

vtskiandride.com September 2015 00

THE NEXT GENERATION


sk Tara Geraghty-Moats what it’s like to climb 26 stories to the top of a ski jump—so high people on the ground become ants. Ask how she manages to clench her body into a tuck as she hurtles down

a narrow 36-degree incline at 60 mph. Ask her what goes through her mind when she explodes off the edge into nothingness, flying the length of a football field.

Or how it feels to touch back down on earth.Ask her any of those questions and her eyes light up like blue ice. “There is nothing like ski jumping,” she says without hesitation. “It’s

like putting your hand out the window when you are speeding down a highway: you feel the push of wind against you, holding you up, you’re floating on air,” says Tara. “I was hooked from the first time I jumped.”

That was at age 9, when she launched off the jump at Storrs Pond Recreation Area in Hanover, N.H., just down the road from her home in Fairlee, Vt.

This past December, Tara, now 22, surprised everyone by going a distance of 92 meters on her first jump in the World Cup opener in Lillehammer, Norway. She finished 17th overall, becoming the lead-ing American woman.

It was a surprise for her as well. Last season was Tara’s first time on the World Cup circuit. This past summer, she was suspended from the U.S. Ski Team for failing to make a final payment of her $7,000 contribution toward training and travel. “I’d paid off most of what I owed but didn’t get the last $1,000 or so in on time,” she says. “So I was suspended and couldn’t go to any of the training camps last summer.”

Instead of heading to Slovenia to train with the team, she stayed home in Vermont and worked on a farm, spending 10-hour days pull-ing organic vegetables and weeding the fields to earn the money. Her sponsors—Vermont’s Ibex, Darn Tough, and Mad River Glen—have helped, but the costs of competing are high.

For training, she improvised with her own program: setting up tires to jump over, running and mountain biking.

“Farming was tough work,” she says with a sigh. “But I loved it and in the end, I think it made me stronger.”

Strength is not something Tara is short on. Born with the lung-busting meconian aspiration syndrome, she spent her first four weeks in the intensive care unit. During that time, scar tissue formed in her lungs, leaving her with asthma that’s plagued her all her life.

Her mother, Betsey Geraghty—a bike racer, bike mechanic and outdoor educator—didn’t let that stop her daughter. “I wanted to help her use her lungs as early as I could.” She put Tara on skis at age 2. By age 5, Tara was telemarking at Mad River Glen behind her mom and dad, Alan Moats, a software designer and a former member of the U.S. Telemark Team.

She grew up separately from her older half-sister, Charlotte Moats, who was, at the time, a burgeoning alpine star and Burke Mountain Academy grad. A decade older, Charlotte would go on to earn a gold medal in slalom at the Junior Olympics, win the 2002 World Endurance Ski Championships, log 11 first descents in Alaska and appear in multiple ski films.

At age 8, Tara was competing in Nordic races. At age 9, she did her first Vermont 50 mountain bike race on a tandem with her father. The next year, she did it on her own and has completed the grueling 50-mile cross-country trail race twice since.

Both Tara’s mother and grandmother grew up spending summers at the Aloha Foundation’s camp on Lake Morey, which has been dedicated to help-ing girls discover “their most adventurous selves” for more than a century. Betsey Geraghty went on to become a counselor there, taught outdoor edu-cation and got a job at Omer and Bob’s, the outdoor retailer in Lebanon, N.H. where she still works.

From third grade on, Geraghty home-schooled Tara. She grew up learn-ing in the morning, going out for a ski or a bike then coming back home and picking up the books. “At night, we’d go jump under the lights at Storrs Pond. While I loved cross-country skiing and did well at it, for me that was like meat and potatoes. Ski jumping was dessert.”

Tara started with the small jumps then worked her way up to the 90K “normal hill” mark (so named because the par distance for that jump is 90 meters from the launch ramp) and the “large hill,” with its 120K mark.

By age 15, she was a multi-time medalist in the junior Nordic Nationals and was jumping well enough to be named to the USSA Visa Development Team. At 16, she had done well enough in her studies to enroll in online col-lege classes at Community College of Vermont. “When she took the tests to get in, the people at CCV said they hadn’t seen scores that high in a long time,” says Betsey Geraghty.

Then life fell apart: her parents split up and, at 16, Tara had her first


serious injury. While competing at Lake Placid’s 90K jump she got caught by a gust

of wind, flew past the sloped landing area to the flats and smacked down. “I saw it happen. For a long time after I didn’t want to watch another ski jump,” Betsey Geraghty recalls.

Tara just remembers hearing a ‘crunch.’ “I never crashed but I landed hard, like when you jump off a high place and land with a thud.” She tore three ligaments, including her ACL and broke her tibia. The first surgery didn’t hold so after nearly six months of recovery she went back under the knife. “My doctor said I would never jump or run again,” she remembers.

Tara then did the one thing that seemed to make sense for an injured ski jumper and former cross country ski racer: she picked up a gun.

“Like a lot of Vermont kids, we had guns and I was on crutches when I first began to shoot,” she says. She shot at targets and at wild turkeys. “The shooting taught me to steady my nerves.” As her knee recovered she started cross-country skiing again, this time with an eye toward competing in biathlon. In her third race, she qualified for the 2011 Biathlon Worlds in Czech Republic.

In 2012-13 Tara went to school in Sweden for a year and to train. “All my classes were in Swedish so I picked it up pretty quickly,” she says with a laugh. She also picked up a few things about biathlon: she entered and won the Swedish Nationals in the junior sprint category, beating the current junior world champion.

In April, 2014 Tara turned 21. She could no longer compete as a junior and she had choices to make. “I’ve never had a vision like ‘Oh, I want to be in the Olympics,” she says with quiet confidence, “I’ve just gone from race to race hoping I can do better and doing what I love.” The problem, as Tara

is the first to admit, is that she loves skiing of all types. “My coaches keep telling me I have to focus on one sport,” she says

Tara was training at Lake Placid for biathlon that fall when a friend dared her to enter the ski jumping nationals, which were being held there that same week. “I hadn’t been training since I injured my knee and had jumped maybe three days in the last four years. I told him he was crazy. He said, ‘the worst you can do is finish last.’”

Without telling her biathlon coaches what she was doing, Tara took the day off from her dry land workouts, got out her five-year-old skis, and en-tered the event cold. She finished fifth, behind world champion Lindsay Van, 10-time national champ Jessica Jerome, Alissa Johnson and Nina Lussi. “I felt good on the jump, but had no idea I’d do as well as I did.”

Tara was back. In 2014, she went on to earn a bronze in the Normal Hill (90K jump)

Nationals at Lake Placid and another bronze at the Long Hill (120K jump) at Park City, which earned her a spot on the 2014/15 World Cup. Her best finish there was a 9th at Rasnov, Romania.

Snow is starting to fall. It is the last day of December and it frosts the trees around the Storrs Pond jump. Tara looks up at the platform. “When I first started jumping here as a kid, there were no Olympics for women ski jumpers, and not really much to aim for. My goal was to just keep trying to do better than the last time.”

It was a long struggle to even get women’s ski jumping into the 2014 Sochi Olympics, a battle that America’s top female ski jumpers had to fight on their own. At the time, they were the best in the world, led by the first women’s world champion, Lindsay Van (who, just prior to the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver had the longest jump off the normal hill of any athlete, male or female—105.5 me-ters), and the tiny then-19-year-old Sara Hendrickson—the 2011/12 World Cup winner whom many consider the best woman ski jumper ever. Both Van and Hendrickson are sitting out this season with injuries.

Now, there is a move to establish the event that seems made for Tara Geraghty-Moats: women’s Nordic combined. Nordic combined competitions (where the ski jump earns you seconds off the next leg, the cross-country race) have been around since the 1800s, have an FIS World Cup and are an Olympic sport...but just for men. Until this season the FIS had not sanc-tioned a Women’s Nordic Combined race. Four events will be held this winter, but Tara’s jump-ing calendar precludes her from competing.

In late January, the team heads to Japan: Tara and two girls she’s been friends with since they were kids: Nita Englund (who has six top-10 World Cup finishes and several medals) and Nina Lussi.

A week later, they compete in Germany, then Austria, then Kazakhstan, then Romania. “We handle our own travel, lug all our gear, convince airlines that they can take 250 cm skis and pretty much help each other out,” says Tara.

“But that’s the way it is right now for women ski jumpers,” she says with a shrug, no sign of bitterness. “We just figure it out—we do it be-cause we love to jump.” n

Tara, at left, “is just a Nordic combined athlete,” says her mom, Betsey Geraghty.

Below, Tara jumps in Lillehammer in December’s World Cup, leading the U.S. women. Phot

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3They came to ski, then these families stayed to build their dream homes. Here’s an inside look at three exceptional homes in the Green Mountains and the stories behind them.

DREAM SKI HOMESBY LISA LYNN

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They came to ski, then these families stayed to build their dream homes. Here’s an inside look at three exceptional homes in the Green Mountains and the stories behind them.

DREAM SKI HOMES

Always an art space but never a home, the Bundy stands high on a plateau facing

Sugarbush Resort. The new owners have made it both their home and a museum.


A MOUNTAINEER’S RETREAT Suzanna Derby’s timber-framed home off Stratton Mountain is like a luxurious, five-bedroom tree house. In the living room, a wall of glass rises nearly two stories and looks out at the treetops, the glass itself is inset with wood “branches.” The tree theme is picked up in intricate iron leaves that rim the doors of the two fireplaces and slabs of wood that form the headboards in the master bedroom.

When Derby’s sons feel like “camping out,” they can retreat to a glass-roofed, screened-in gazebo that houses a fire pit with a spiral stone chimney and a spit and grate for grilling over open flames. In the main house, there’s a “swimming hole,” a recirculating current lap pool.

“I wanted my children to grow up with nature: it gives you wholeness in your heart,” says Derby.

Her two boys, Spencer, now 25, and Simon, 16, were passionate about skiing, riding, swimming and anything outdoors. Stratton was an easy drive from Greenwich, Ct,, where they live full-time and that’s where she decided to build her dream home, 10 years ago.

The home sings Derby’s song. “I like timber frames and the fact that they are so organic, they

don’t even use nails,” she explains. “We looked for natural, local stone for the fireplaces, too,” she adds. The fireplace rises two stories in the living room, facing a wall of windows. The chimney backs up to the kitchen where another smaller fireplace crackles brightly just in front of a bar facing the central work area.

The home was also the start of another dream. At age 45, Derby took a trip around the world with her two sons. As they flew over Mount Kilimanjaro, “the man next to me on the plane pointed the mountain out and said, ‘You know, people climb that,“ she recalls.

“I am athletic and I skied and snowshoed, but I never had any dream of climbing,” she continues. But something had struck a chord. When she got home, she Googled ‘climbing, Kilimanjaro.’’’

That year, she not only summited Kilimanjaro but set her sights on climbing the highest mountain on every other continent. Derby trained by running or snowshoeing up and down Stratton and taking avalanche and winter survival courses on Mt. Washington.

In five years she did indeed tick off every summit. “Everest was my 50th birthday present to myself,” she says.

That was four years ago. When she came back from Everest, though, she realized that she was ready for another phase of her life. Her marriage ended and the house, jointly owned, is now on the market, listed with Sotheby’s Four Seasons for $1,895,000.

Derby may look for another place in Vermont. “I have so many good memories from here—playing with boys at this secret swimming hole down by the river, going for Swiss fondue, and there are always festivals here, always something going on.”

LAST DECEMBER, Realtor.com came out with its list of the most affordable ski towns in the country. Of the top 10, three were in Vermont. Based on their median home prices, Killington, West Dover and Ludlow all made the list. And many other Vermont mountain towns could have as well. “In Vermont, you can get some of the best value for your money compared with other ski towns in the U.S.,” says Rich Caplan, the principal broker with Hermitage Deerfield Valley Realtors in West Dover. “Out West, “ he continues, “you can’t touch anything for under $500,000. Here, we have some really nice inventory in that range.”

But what prices alone don’t take into account is just how sweet life is in our mountain towns or how living here can change a person.

“I wanted to be out in nature,” says Suzanna Derby, a Korean-American from Greenwich, Connecticut who built her dream home at Stratton. After living there for five years and hiking, skiing or snowshoeing the mountain, Derby, age 45 at the time, set out to climb Kilimanjaro. By the time she was 50, she’d summited the highest peaks on every continent.

June Anderson grew up in Connecticut and spent weekends skiing at Okemo. After she married, she introduced her husband Wendell to snowboarding. The couple and their two children eventually bought a house near Sugarbush and moved up full time. “We had no idea the schools were so good here,” she says. “And in many ways I’m thankful we are 40 miles from the nearest TJ Maxx. It’s a better environment for children to grow up in.” The Andersons just bought their second Vermont home and are turning it into both their home and a stunning modern art museum, the Bundy Modern.

Joe and Jennifer Garrity met while at St. Michael’s College in Burlington and ended up building their dream ski home just 10 minutes from the slopes of Smuggler’s Notch on a 49-acre parcel of land they bought for $250,000. “Coming from Westchester County, N.Y., it was amazing to see a parcel of land like this that’s so affordable. We have views of Mount Mansfield, trails, meadows and stands of old growth pine. It’s really a three-season playground‚ the only time we are not here is mud season.”

Here’s a peek inside three family’s dream ski homes and the stories behind them.

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Derby built the house to fit into the side of Stratton Mountain. Five years later, she set out

to climb all Seven Summits (here, atop Antarctica’s Mt. Vinson.) The post-and-beam house

brings the outdoors inside: Slabs of tree trunks form a headboard and “branches” are inset

in the windows. Opposite, left: The gazebo houses a fire pit where the family often grills.


THE BUNDY MODERN: LIVING IN A MUSEUM From its start on Route 100 just south of Waitsfield, Bundy Road is a long slog up through a stand of giant pines. At the top of it: a plateau, a few stands of birches, a reflecting pond and a stunning piece of modern architecture known simply as “The Bundy.”

“It kind of makes you gasp when you see it,” says June Anderson. Anderson, her husband Wendell and their two children had been living in another house just off the slopes of Sugarbush when the Bundy came up for sale. “People told us we were crazy to buy it but we knew exactly what we wanted to do,” says the former realtor whose husband, Wendell built high-end homes in Connecticut before the couple moved north full-time.

The 5,000-square-foot steel, brick and glass cube was built in 1962 by Harlow Carpenter, the wealthy Harvard-educated architect. At the time, it was tribute to a new design aesthetic being promoted at Harvard by Le Corbusier (who designed Harvard’s Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts) and Walter Gropius.

Over the years, the building underwent multiple iterations as a gallery, theater, museum and residence. And it saw neglect. The sculptures, which stood on podiums around the yard, were sold for a song. “One person I know bought one for $100,” says June Anderson. “I don’t think people realized the value of what was here.”

The Andersons did. The couple bought the Bundy in 2014 and set about restoring it. “We loved the open space and the light and had an instant idea of what we wanted to do with it.”

A storage room was opened up with a window and, with the addition of some Ikea cabinets, turned into a kitchen. “We didn’t have a lot of money to put into this,” June says, “but we had a vision.” The great room with its 24-foot-tall brick walls and slate floors became a gallery where the couple host exhibits from noted Vermont artists and opens the house to the public on weekends. The current exhibit shows the vibrant nudes and abstract oil paintings on canvas of Blake Larsen (with price tags in the $20,000 range).

The back of the house is divided into living quarters. Everywhere there are views; a giant round skylight over the master bed opens to the stars. A floor-to-ceiling window facing the stairs gives a view of a waterfall that cascades off the flat roof when it rains. The living room looks across the reflecting pool toward stands of birch and the trails of Sugarbush.

The land around the house opens onto the trails of Ole’s Cross Country Center. “We may be the only ski-in, ski-out modern museum in America,” jokes June.

“We kept the exterior as it was—it has just terrific lines” says June An-

derson of the Waitsfield art space she and her husband Wendell turned

into a home. By cutting a wall in a storage room, adding Ikea cabinets

and fitting old shelves in a corner they made a kitchen (opposite top).

Light streams into great room (opposite, right and bottom) where the

couple host exhibits open to the public on Saturdays and Sundays, from

1 pm to 5 pm. The current Blake Larsen exhibit is on display through

January 30. To learn more, visit www.bundymodern.com

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BIRCHWOOD: A TRIBUTE TO LOCAL CRAFTSMANSHIPFor this year’s Super Bowl, Joe and Jennifer Garrity will do what they’ve done nearly every year for the past decade: get a group of college friends together, ski Smuggler’s Notch as hard as they can and then invite everyone back to the house to watch the game in the giant media room/home theater.

The house, known as Birchwood, is not just any house. “We get 35 people watching the game,” Joe says. “And we’ve had probably

as many as 50 people sleeping here, crammed in the bunkroom, four bedrooms and all over.”

When Joe and Jennifer Garrity started talking at a bar in Burlington in the late 1970s, the two St. Michael’s College students had no idea that nearly 30 years later they’d be building their dream home 10 minutes from the trails they skied as students.

The couple were living outside New York where Joe worked for Deloitte Touche when they got a call from a college friend. “He said there’s a piece of land up here you gotta see,” Joe remembers. The Cambridge, Vt. parcel was 49 acres of old pine forests, rolling meadows and three ponds, set high on a knoll with Mt. Mansfield as a backdrop.

“We fell in love with the land instantly,” Joe said. “We could envision trails running through the old growth pine, and views of Mt. Mansfield, and western sunsets.” And when it came time to build, they wanted a house that would feel a part of the landscape.

“Nearly everything about the house is local,” says Garrity, who worked with architect Sam Scofield of Stowe. The timber framing was done by Jeffersonville’s North Woods Joinery, which used fir and spruce that grew near the site for the posts and beams. Thirty-five tons of local fieldstone went into creating the massive Rumford fireplace and chimney. Reclaimed fir from the old Johnson high school gym—some, 150 years old—was used to make the treads on the stairs. Richly colored carpets were woven by Vermont artisans. A local potter threw the lamps in the living room.

Local craftsman Larz Allen molded the wrought-iron chandeliers in the living room and created a copper shade to drop down over the fireplace to prevent drafts. The design on the shade mimics the view of the mountains from the windows opposite. Kim Deetjen, with the Burlington firm Truex Collins, helped with the interior design. “She put us in touch with the best local talent,” says Garrity.

For years, the couple commuted from Westchester, N.Y. Two of their children went to college in Vermont and the house served as a crash pad for them and their friends as well.

“Now that the kids are grown and off on their own, we don’t come up much and we finally decided it was time to put the house on the market,” says Joe. This past December he listed the house with LandVest for $1,795,000. But the Garritys are not in any hurry to sell. “I think we may have a few more Super Bowl parties,” Joe says.

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The Garritys built Birchwood to have views east toward the Green Mountains and to

be able to watch sunsets across the open fields and pond to the west. Light streams

into the living room where windows are set so that you can view Mt. Mansfield’s

summit from within. The chandeliers were hand-crafted by a local artisan to look like

they hold real beeswax candles. Every year the Garritys gather family and many of

their St. Michael’s College friends for a massive Super Bowl party. Part of the ritual:

before watching The Game they drive down the road to ski at Smuggler’s Notch.


Local Vermont timber, stone and fabric are used

throughout the home, from fir and spruce framing

showcased in the cozy bedrooms to the dining

table, custom made by Smuggler’s Notch Antiques.

The chef’s kitchen (with cherry cabinets made by

a local, third-generation Vermont woodworker)

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the chimney on the Rumford fireplace rises 27 feet

to cathedral ceilings. The living room carpets were

woven in Vermont and the side lamps thrown by a

local potter.

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USSA, FIS, and

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Past Women’s Coach

Dartmouth College

2007 NCAA Champions

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THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

Adele Walker used to walk into the offices of The Stowe Reporter with photos of her pre-teen daughter, Ty, and news of her results. “Check out my daughter,” she would say with enthu-siasm, “she’s killing it out there.” Ty Walker

was small, all smiles, and, as her mother predicted, going some-where.

The family moved to Stowe in 2007 and that very winter Ty started turning heads. Four years later, at the age of 14, she joined the U.S. Snowboard Team and began a steady stream of podium appearances at comps across the globe. At 16, she was named to the Olympic team for Sochi, Russia (where a bruised heel held her back from competing at her highest level). Last season, she won the first-ever FIS World Cup Big Air competition in Istanbul.

Ty Walker, who turns 19 in March, is often held up as one of the brightest stars in a sport that’s searching for the next Kelley Clark or Shaun White. On February 11, Walker will be among the headliners competing for $150,000 in prize money at the “Beantown Throwdown,” a U.S. Grand Prix Big Air competition on a snow-covered ramp at Boston’s Fenway Park.

You had a great season last year, winning the World Big Air Cup in Istanbul. What was that like? Istanbul was amazing. I love traveling and when I heard about the World Cup happening in Turkey I really jumped at the chance to go. The first day we were there, we went on an all-day tour to see historical sites in the city. Honestly, that was probably the highlight of the week. Winning the event was just the icing on the cake.

After Istanbul you went on to have a good season, but then you were injured. What happened? I tore my ACL on the second day of training for the U.S. Open on March 2. It had snowed overnight before practice and the

course was really slow. You really needed to keep your speed in order to clear the first jump. I tried a new line through the rail section and I guess I just didn’t come out with the same speed as I’d had before. I crashed really hard and I just felt my knee “pop.” It was disappointing because it was the last event of the season. I had a really busy contest season and was finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and I was so excited for spring free riding before I got hurt.

Where did you get the surgery done and how are you feeling? One of orthopedic surgeons affiliated with the U.S. team, Dr. Brian Huber, is actually from Stowe. I had my surgery done at his clinic (Mansfield Orthopedics) in Morrisville, and Dr. Huber did an awesome job. I feel great going into this season!

You’ve been home in Stowe riding. How did that feel? This fall was my first time on snow since I was injured. It was amazing! I actually couldn’t pick up my season’s pass the first day I was home, but I was so eager that I ended up hiking to get my first run. My knee felt good! Too good, almost. It was hard to keep both feet on the ground.

What do you love most about riding in Vermont?When I’m in Breckenridge, I’m pretty much lapping the park for training. Vermont, and Stowe, specifically, is where I go to enjoy snowboarding as a fun activity or a hobby. I’ll go up to the mountain with my family and friends and explore the mountain. I’m not a professional athlete anymore, just another person who loves snowboarding.

How do you balance an Ivy League education and training?Freshman fall at Brown has been a whirlwind. It’s going to be

COMPETITION

Ty Walker worked out

hard this past season to

get back on her game

this year after an injury.

The Brown Univerity

freshman is now back on

snow and ready to rip.

This February, Stowe’s Ty Walker joins some of the biggest names in skiing and riding at a Big Air con-

test in Boston’s Fenway Park.

BY BIDDLE DUKE

TY WALKERGOESBIG


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tough balancing snowboarding with school, but I’ll be with my team for all of January and will be able to ride during my breaks and on the weekends. Going forward, I’m going to take two se-mesters off before the Olympics so I can train and compete again full-time.

Switching gears a little: There’s been press in the past few years about the decline in the number of people snowboard-ing. Why is this happening? It’s a combination of things. First off, people don’t need to start snowboarding in order to get in the park and do tricks now. Most people start out skiing, and since freeskiing has gained popularity, those people who are interested in doing tricks can do that without having to learn a new sport.

Perhaps the sport could be doing much better if we had a governing body that provided better leadership. Right now, there’s a huge mess with FIS (Federation International Ski) and WST (World Snowboard Tour). There are overlapping events, events with different judging formats. It’s sloppy. It’s not an easy sport to follow.

One of the greatest freestyle skiers of all time, Gus Kenworthy, came out as gay in October. On your Facebook page you said: “You (Gus) have no idea how much this is going to help the ski-ing and snowboarding community.” What do you mean?I think that a lot of times in the snowboarding and skiing world, there are very rigid lines that define what’s cool and what’s not. People are encouraged to conform to this “ideal snowboarder/skier” type. The sports are supposed to emphasize individuality, but there is a very specific type of “individual” that you’re sup-posed to be if you’re a “true” skier/snowboarder. Gus is one of the best freeskiers there is. His coming out shows people that you don’t necessarily need to follow convention or fit into that box in order to be a badass, incredible, true skier.

Some say the decline is due partly to a lack of huge stars, like Shaun White. We’ve heard it said that you have the ideal qualities to be even more of an ambassador than you are now. Thoughts?Thank you, I appreciate that. I’d like to think that I’m a good ambassador and a good role model for girls and kids in snow-boarding. Going back to priorities though—I care about my education, my family, my friends, and doing what I love. I’m ambitious, and I work hard. There’s definitely a big “core” side of snowboarding with an image that I don’t really fit. I’m a little, blonde teenage girl. I’m an Ivy League student. I’m not exactly the ideal representative for the carefree, rambunctious, hard-core side of snowboarding. It’s sometimes tough to be a star am-bassador for the sport when I don’t really represent that “core” aspect at all.

What would you like to see happen in women’s professional snowboarding?I don’t think women get the respect and sponsorship atten-tion they deserve. I know it’s not this black and white, but if a company’s goal is to sell product, then they should promote and support their female athletes (selling women’s product) just as much as they promote male athletes (promoting the men’s product), or at least at a ratio similar to what women spend in the market. Are we doing the same tricks as the guys? No. But we still “sell snowboarding,” take the risks, and devote our time and energy to exercising, competing and training.

What’s next? Can you balance an Ivy League education with your aims to compete in the next Olympics? That’s the plan. This year I’m taking it easy. I want to take a step back from competing to get stronger, progress, and focus on school. After next fall, I’m going to take some time off from school so I can train and compete and go for the 2018 Olympics—which is perfect because I’ll get to postpone Organic Chemistry for a year or so.

Where can we see you compete this winter?The only event that I have big plans for, so far, is the Big Air Fenway event in February. It’s going to be awesome to compete on the East Coast again—especially at such a landmark spot. I can’t wait!

COMPETITION

Walker’s huge airs helped

her to win the World Big

Air Cup in Istanbul made

her a headliner for Febru-

ary’s Big Air contest in

Boston on Feb. 11. There,

she’ll launch a jump with

a 70-foot gap (below).


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T here you are at the dinner table with your spouse and two young children. You’ve just enjoyed a great meal, when out of the blue the unspeakable hap-pens: “Mom, Dad. I want to ride the halfpipe.”

How could this have happened? Since day one you have surrounded your kids with the tools and toys of your be-loved sports. Indeed, some of your best moments together were spent teaching them to throw, hit, shoot, pass, volley, schuss, kick, or cast. Heck, you even got them baseball, football, hockey, tennis, soccer, or lacrosse bed-sheets and pillowcases! What went wrong?

“Calm down”, you tell yourself, “This is just a fad”.Fast-forward to today. You are not a hockey dad or a soccer

mom: you are an action sports parent. All of a sudden you find yourself with a son or daughter who is absolutely determined to go upside down.

As a caring parent you want to help, but the truth is you don’t know anything about hitting a jump big, doing a 1080 in a half-pipe or hucking a cliff. And from what you can see, parents aren’t invited. You’re not alone and now it’s time for you, the parent, to step up.

First of all, don’t freak out. Though action sports differ in some ways from mainstream sports, they actually share many more similarities that will make you feel better about the whole thing. To wit, here are a few things that your kid will learn:

Physical strength and coordination. Jumping up on ob-stacles in a park or launching out of half-pipe or over a jump is as challenging as any gym workout. Strength, coordination, flexibil-ity, quickness are all required. Plus, anything that gets your kid up off of the coach and outside in the fresh air is a good thing.

Life lessons. Kids learn all of the same important life-lessons from action sports such as park riding or skateboarding that you had hoped

they would get from mainstream ones. Things like confidence, hard work and accomplishment, effort vs. reward, persistence, self-re-liance, pride in a job well-done, practice-makes-perfect, account-ability to a goal, you-get-out-of-it-what-you-put-into-it, tenacity, failure and disappointment and self-control.

They may even learn some of these lessons more sharply. One thing that is often overlooked by a parent when their child first gravitates toward action sports is that those kids are not afraid to take total responsibility for their success or failure. Rather than being able to hide away in a mainstream or team environment, they are actually putting themselves out there even more, so add confident individualism to the list.

Teamwork. This of course brings up a common misconcep-tion: that kids are not learning to function as a “team.” The truth is, these kids who hang out in a park actually are part of a team. Not an “us-against-them” team, but rather an “all-for-one-and-one-for-all” team. They hold their sport, and all of its participants, in high regard. If you sit and watch a group of young freeskiers or snowboarders practicing in the same place, you quickly realize that what you assumed would be a bunch of individuals doing their own thing is actually a team working together toward a common goal. They support each other, they go to each other’s aid in case of mishaps, and they celebrate each other’s achievements with gusto.

It’s funny, because the philosophy of action sports participa-tion truly embodies the maxim “It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game.” That phrase gets a lot of lip service in many competitive pursuits, but in action sports it is truly lived. Does it really get any better than that?

Okay you’ve seen the light and have decided to support your kid in the sport of their choice. But what do you do? Do you just stay out of it and let your kid figure it out on their own? Or do you get involved, even though there doesn’t seem to be any roadmap for parent participation? You don’t want to get in their way or embarrass them, but you want to help out—it’s your kid after all! The good news is that you can, just follow these rules of engagement:

COACHBY BUD KEENE


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Bud Keene (far right) works with snowboard legend Shaun White (at his left) and other riders. He also works with their parents to help them help their kids.

How do you help your kid excel at a “dangerous” sport you sim-

ply don’t understand? Here are a top coach’s tips.

SO YOU’RE AN

ACTION SPORTS

PARENT?

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1. GET THE RIGHT EQUIPMENT. Make sure that your kid is on good gear that is reasonably well maintained. Basically this is a money issue, and kids and teen-agers don’t have a lot of it. Ask yourself the question: “If my kid were playing hockey, or football, or (insert mainstream sport here), how much would I be spending on their equipment?” Then spend a similar amount on the sport of their choice. I once had a parent who shopped at garage sales and even bought boots that were too big for his kid because “they were a good deal.” I’ve also seen parents spend thousands on gear that was way above their kid’s ability level. Nei-ther approach was helping the kid’s chances of success. Get your kid gear that properly fits. Don’t cut corners, but don’t mortgage the house either.

2. PROVIDE OPPORTUNITIES. The nature of any sport is such that consistent access to good facilities increases proficiency. Football players need a football field. Hockey players need ice time. Action sports athletes need an arena for doing their thing too, so help them gain access. Give them rides to good parks, pipes, jumps, etc. Organize trips with their friends to cool facilities that will push their progression.

I remember one parent who was so bummed that his kid chose an alterna-tive sport that he said “Fine, if she wants to do that sport then she can figure it out on her own.” That is definitely not the way to be. It took several conversa-tions with him, but I finally convinced that guy that he was taking a danger-ous position: forcing his kid to catch rides in whatever car that she could, with whomever, and giving up the chance to help her make good judgments about her sport, her approach, her equipment and her social scene. He came around, and a few years later his daughter became a champion.

3. DON’T TRY TO BE COOL. More than once I have encountered parents who bought a little too far into the culture of cool that action sports exude. I let it go at first, when they showed up dressed head-to-toe in X- Games garb. But when they started rocking studded belts, and sagging their pants halfway down their butt, I stepped in and counseled them that they may have been undermining their role as a parent and were probably embarrassing their kid. Action sports are well known for influencing modern clothing styles and speech. That’s great of

course, but it’s for them—not for you. Respect the boundaries of youth and culture, and avoid looking silly by dressing and talking too young.

4. LEARN AND LISTEN. Also, I regularly encourage parents to educate themselves about the game that their kid is playing. They will usually be judged events, and an Internet search will clue you in to what is considered good and bad form by the freeski or freeride judges, and when you should be congratulating them for their performance. To further bone-up on it, read the magazines, watch a few videos, and try to think like a 15-year-old: you’ll quickly catch-on.

5. KEEP THEM SAFE. Skiing or riding or racing or jumping can be dangerous. Some recent high-profile accidents have received a lot of exposure and there is no question that falls can take place. However, a recent study found that in 75% of accidents involving action sports in which an injury occurred, no protective gear was being used. The answer to that is easy: provide kids with helmets and lots of padding, and make sure that they use it.

It’s clear that acrobatics play a role in our sports, and for all parents this cre-ates a level of discomfort. The best thing that you can do is to provide your kid with as many opportunities to practice acrobatic movements in a safe situation, before performing them for real. Diving boards, trampolines, foam pits, and other training aids exist to build air-awareness and confidence.

Your kid may not turn into the next Shaun White or Kelley Clark. He or she may fall and break a bone or two. But isn’t that true for any sport? Remember, this is their chance to shine. Let them. n

Coach columnist Bud Keene has been named national Coach of the Year by the U.S. Olympic Team and coaches a number of the top freestyle skiers and snowboarders in the world. He recently launched a free coaching app, BKPRO (available on ITunes) that allows anyone to send in a video to be analyzed by Keene and his coaching staff who then provide pointers.

Yup, one day your kids are going to go upside down. Just get them good helmets.


If you’re headed into the woods, heed these tips from

expert tree skier John Egan

PRO TIPS FOR TREE

SKIING

According to poet Robert Frost, the woods of New England are “lovely, dark and deep. He neglected to mention one important thing: In Vermont, they’re also a ton of fun to ski through—pro-vided you know what you’re doing. John Egan, Vice President and Chief Recreation Officer at Sugarbush Resort, has been fea-

tured in over a dozen Warren Miller ski movies and has skied around the world Today, he calls the Mad River Valley his home, and logs about 100 ski days a year there. Here, are his best tips for tree-skiing (as told to Evan Johnson. )

1. FIND YOUR “FREAK-OUT POINT”When Egan takes out a group, he never heads straight for the woods. “Some-times we’ll take something with a narrow line, but it helps me tell if people are ready,” he says. Before you go in the woods, see what your own “freak-out point” is by skiing tight lines down trails you know. Duck off a trail to see what the conditions are like. Start with venturing into side country, somewhere you can easily get back onto a trail, before heading into the backcountry.

2. KNOW WHERE YOU’RE GOING Nearly every ski area in Vermont has some hidden tree runs and if you want to ex-plore beyond the boundaries, there’s an ever better chance of getting fresh tracks but you need to know where you’re headed. Dozens of skiers have gotten lost in Vermont, some for days, even after setting out from a well-known resort trail.

Spanning six peaks, Sugarbush has 97 acres of glades within its marked boundaries, plus the massive Slide Brook Basin to explore. Having skied these woods for 40 years, Egan is more than familiar with these woods. While you don’t need the expert savvy that he has, it helps to have an idea of what to expect before you venture in. Tip: a hike on the Long Trail between Mount Ellen and Lincoln Peak has views down many choice lines.

Never just follow the crowd or another set of tracks. Know the access and exit points, base depth and recent snowfall. Before you head in, assess the time of day, forecast and the snow conditions. A common rule of thumb is not to venture into the woods until there are at least 50 inches of natural snow at the summits. Remember, too, that every snowfall can eradicate old tracks and waypoints and once you’re in the woods, many features look the same.

3. BE PREPAREDWhen you and your buddies finally duck off the trail, make sure there are at least three of you; in the event of an accident, two can go for help while one stays with an injured person. Groups should also carry a first aid kit, matches, a whistle (to call for help) and a fully charged cell phone. A compass, topo maps or navigation tools are a good idea too. A helmet not only protects your head if you fall and hit

a tree or a rock, in the trees it also thwarts branches and pucker brush. When it comes to picking skis for the woods, Egan is a “quiver-of-one” kind of skier. He says his current setup, a pair of Dynastar Chams with a 107mm waist, is perfect for all kinds of snow conditions all over the mountain. Use a pair of wider skis you’re comfortable on. And take your ski pole straps off. As Egan says: “It’s easier to hike uphill for your pole than it is to hike back up for your arm

5. PICK YOUR LINE Egan keeps it simple: Daunting as they may be, don’t look at the trees—look at the space between them as far down the hill as you can. A good base plus some fresh snowfall will bury many of the deadfall but you can’t count on that and wind can also cause snowpack to seem deeper in some areas than others. Ski the woods before they get tracked out—fresh, deeper snow will be slower than packed pow. Always look forward and if your helmet and arms can fit through the space, your butt and skis will follow. The woods of Vermont are known for being tight, so be-fore you drop in, get some perspective by standing close to the trees and looking at your surroundings. “When you’re not standing in the middle of the line, you’ll see the woods differently,” Egan says. “You’ll notice whatever space you have.”

6. KEEP MOVINGWhen skiing trees, Egan says it helps to just keep going: “If you were running through a crowd on a subway platform, if you stop, the crowd will run you over,” he says. When you keep moving, however, you feel comfortable through the trees and that’s when you’ll make it happen. Focusing on holding an edge or maintaining your best racing form with spruce trees coming at you will not. It’s a different style of skiing than what you might use out on the open slopes, one defined by tighter, faster movements in response to the obstacles in your way. You’ll find yourself dodging and weaving through your environment. Egan’s advice? “To scrub any excess speed, exaggerate your edge pressure in the middle of your turns. Keep a responsive, aggressive stance with your hands forward to brush away branches.”

7. SMILE AND STAY LOOSE“The body works better when it’s happy,” Egan says. “When you’re smiling you tend to be breathing. You can’t work out at the gym if you’re holding your breath.” There are trees, rocks, unpredictable snow depths and drops, but mile, and you’ll feel yourself start to ease up. n

John Egan, dodging the trees at Sugarbush, makes it look easy.

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madriverglen.com

Photo credit: ©Brian Mohr/EmberPhoto

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Acouple of years ago the company that ran the Park City ski area was a little late with a payment on the leased land that made up the majority of its skiing terrain. When it went to make the payment, it found that Vail Resorts

had negotiated a new lease with the landowners. A legal feud ensued (no pun intended), but Vail prevailed (pun intended) and now owns what was the Park City ski area.

It turns out that a similar plot line 80 years ago eventually led to the founding of Suicide Six, the nation’s first ski resort.

In late 1933, Wallace “Bunny” Bertram was living in Wood-stock, Vermont at the White Cupboard Inn owned by Robert and Elizabeth Royce. Winter business at the inn was primarily mem-bers of the Amateur Ski Club of New York who came to ski the nearby hills. There were no lifts so all the skiing had to be “earned” by hiking or skinning up those hills. Bunny Bertram was a ski in-structor who helped coach the less experienced skiers.

As winter started, the Royces, some of their New York guests, and Bunny Bertram began discussing the possibility of some kind of lift that could pull skiers up the hill allowing more runs per day. They had heard about a rope tow powered by a car engine that had been built in Quebec the previous winter. The Royces obtained plans for the rope tow from the Quebec group. The Royces also had a topological expert map out the hills around Woodstock that would be appropriate for such a lift. The expert identified six hills and numbered them on the map from one to six. The Royces chose hill number two for their first ski lift on grazing land owned by dairy farmer Clint Gilbert.

The Royces paid Gilbert $5 to lease the pasture for the season and retained local mechanic Dave Dodd to put together the first ski lift in the United States. Bunny Bertram was heavily involved in building that first lift, a 900-foot long rope tow powered by a Model T engine. The White Cupboard Skiway opened on January 18, 1934, charging

$1 a day for use of the tow or fifty cents for a half day.After a successful first season the Royces were prepared to

offer Gilbert $100 for the 1934-35 lease on his pasture. The story goes that they had wanted to present Gilbert with a crisp, new $100 bill, but by the time they obtained one, Bunny Bertram had already closed a lease-deal with Gilbert for $10 plus a percentage of the ski tow’s income. Bunny Bertram was in the ski business.

Bertram changed the name of the area to the Woodstock Ski Hill. He also made some changes to the original rope tow. The Model T was replaced with a more reliable electric motor provided by the Wood-stock Electric Company—all Bertram had to do was pay for the elec-tricity it used. To make the rope easier to ride, he also improved the pulley mechanism based on a Ferris wheel he had observed.

By the end of the 1934-35 season, the relationship between Bertram and Clint Gilbert had become strained. Worried that he wasn’t getting an accurate percentage of the ski business, Gil-bert had attached Bertram’s bank account. Bertram decided to sever his relation with Gilbert and went looking for a new hill.

This led him to hill #6 on the topo map, only a short dis-tance from Gilbert’s hill. His first target was the south facing side known as the Gully, but how to get access to the land? En-ter the Fisk family and primarily Elizabeth “Muddy” Fisk whose husband, Harvey, was an influential New York banker. The Fisks bought the Gully land, paid to have the power line extended into the location, and let Bunny Bertram use the land rent-free. Bunny’s Ski Tows opened for the 1935-36 season. By the way, the Fisk’s daughters became accomplished ski racers—probably with Bunny’s coaching. They formed the nucleus of the United States Women’s Ski Team for the 1936 Olympics.

Even though the Gully is now part of Suicide Six, it was a year before Bertram could purchase the rest of hill #6, the top of the hill and the land on the northeast side – the steep side. Legend has it that when looking at the steep northeast face of

RETRO VT

Bunny Bertram built the

first ski lift in the U.S., a

rope tow, using a pulley

mechanism inspired by

a Ferris wheel he’d seen.

Later it was upgraded to

a Poma.

Here’s how 80 years ago Woodstock’s Suicide Six started lift-served skiing.

BY GREG MORRILL

THE FIRST SKI RESORT

IN THE U.S.


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hill #6, Bertram said “it would be suicide to ski straight down that face.” Later, in thinking up a name for his new expanded area, he recalled his comment and from his high school English class, the power of alliteration: hence Suicide Six.

Suicide Six opened on Christmas day, 1937. Bunny Bertram was the lift operator, ticket seller, maintenance man, marketing manager, slope groomer, and occasionally a ski instructor and ran Suicide Six for 25 years.

Under his leadership, Suicide Six played a key role in the de-velopment of competitive skiing in the United States. The slope that had inspired the area’s name was called “The Face” and its steepness challenged even top racers. The Dartmouth ski team, which Bertram coached, trained at Suicide Six. The Fisk Trophy Race started in 1937 and is the longest running alpine ski race in the United States. The 79th running will be at Suicide Six on February 7, 2016, and will draw top eastern racers.

Bertram also had regular races that anyone could enter and pioneered a NASTAR-like system where competitors would re-ceive gold, silver, or bronze pins depending on their time ver-sus the hill record. The 1936 Olympian Alex Bright had set the original record of 57.6 seconds. The record was eventually low-ered to 27 seconds by Tom Corcoran, who would fi nish fourth in the 1960 Olympic Slalom in Squaw Valley and go on to found the Waterville Valley ski area.

Bertram and Suicide Six are also credited with starting the fi rst youth racing program in the United States in 1956. The area today still has a strong youth racing program run by the Wood-stock Ski Runners, one of the oldest ski clubs in the United States.

Bertram’s competitive spirit went beyond racing. After reading an article in a magazine about someone in Europe set-ting a record for vertical feet in a day, Bertram contacted a local young skier about trying to break that record. Wendell “Wendy” Cram, now in his 90s, still recalls that day. “We just shattered the European record by quite a bit. I did 130-something trips, and the vertical feet were 750 per trip.” That’s over 100,000 feet of vertical! He did go through four pairs of tow mitts.

In 1961 Bertram sold Suicide Six to Laurance Rockefeller who already owned the nearby Mt. Tom ski area. Rockefeller saw Suicide

Six as a tougher complement to the more laidback Mt. Tom. Even-tually Rockefeller would purchase and rebuild the historic Wood-stock Inn and make the ski areas part of the Inn’s offerings.

Rockefeller would make many enhancements to Suicide Six. Chairlifts replaced most of the old surface lifts; a new base lodge was constructed; snowmaking was added. One of the changes that drew some ire from the locals was to re-grade the upper portion of “The Face” to make it “easier.” A local reportedly quipped that it was like “painting a mustache on the Mona Lisa!”

And even with the changing face of winter sports, Suicide Six continued to make history. The fi rst National Snowboarding Championships were held at Suicide Six in 1982. Suicide Six lo-cal Paul Graves, a champion Snurfer rider, organized the event which received national TV coverage on both the Today show and Good Morning America. In addition to Graves, some of the competitors were Jake Burton Carpenter and Tom Sims.

Suicide Six begins celebrating its 80th birthday this year. If you visit the area today—and you should—you will get more than just an enjoyable day of skiing or riding. You will get a trip back in time to the beginning of lift-served skiing in the United States. ■

CELEBRATING 80 YEARS Suicide Six celebrates its 80th on Jan. 30 with a retro day featuring prizes for the best vintage wear and skis, a Tubb’s Snowshoes “Face Race” (up the Face then down a trail) and free snowshoe demos. This will be followed by '80’s music, dancing and an Austrian-themed bu� et. Then, on March 13, the ski area closes out the season with pond skimming, live music and more. While you’re in Woodstock, stop by the exhibits at Woodstock Historical Soci-ety, pick up some great new or used gear at the Gear Traders (that is housed in the same building (the White Cupboard Inn) where Bunny Bertram lived. And stay at the inn that Laurance Rockefeller revived: the Woodstock Inn will be featuring 80th anniversary lodging and li� ticket pack-ages all season.

RETRO VT

Jake Burton Carpenter

(above, in 1983 at Suicide

Six) was one of the early

riders at Suicide Six.

Laurance Rockefeller (on

le� in group) bought the

ski area in 1961 and built

the Woodstock Inn.


Phot

o co

urte

sy B

urto

n; W

oods

tock

Hist

orica

l Soc

iety

“When looking at the steep northeast face of hill #6, Bunny

Bertram said ‘it

would be suicide to

ski straight down that

face.’”

Go to vtskiandride.com

to watch “The Drunk History of Skiing” and see

more retro photos.

Bolton Valley Offers Over 1200 Acres of Backcountry Terrain.

Backcountry Events Schedule

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Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont’s Snow Day. Free Nordic & Backcountryskiing and snowshoeing for Vermont residents from 11am - 3pm.

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Vermont Land Trust Trail Tours. Ski and snowshoe tours followed by an après-ski gathering.

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24 Hours of Bolton. A 24 hour backcountry race presented by Native Endurance.

Mar 19-Mar 20

Frigid Infliction 10 hour adventure race.

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Splitfest featuring free split-board demos and more.

Mar 12

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Get Out & Backcountry Instructional Series

Feb. 7, 14, 21 & 28

Catamount Trail Express BC Ski Shuttle Shuttle from Nebraska Valley to Bolton. Ski

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Wednesday Night Uphill Race Series Jan. 27, Feb. 3, 10, 17

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Backcountry Events presented by the Catamount Trail AssociationLearn more at catamounttrail.org

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RESORT HAPPENINGS JANUARY 16 Let It Glow Laser Light Show & Fireworks Spectacular at OkemoOkemo hosts a laser show with digital graphics in front of The Sitting Bull restaurant. Fireworks serve as a grand finale. www.okemo.com

22–24 Smuggs Ice BashThe weekend kicks o� with a climbing competition Friday night at Petra Cli� s’ Burlington gym and then heads to Smuggler’s Notch for ice climbing demos, clinics and talks by Nick Bullock and Nick Yardly. www.smuggsicebash.com

23 Saturday Night Lights Uphill EventStowe’s Gondolier trail will be lit with lights for the first of four Saturday eve-nings, allowing skiers and split boarders to earn their turns. www.stowe.com

30 Okemo’s 60th birthdaySkiers and riders at Okemo are invited to sing “Happy Birthday” and enjoy a piece of cake as Okemo celebrates its 60th year. www.okemo.com

30 Co-Op’s 20th Anniversary Grand Soirée at Mad River GlenMRG celebrates 20 years of co-op ownership. www.madriverglen.com.

30 20th Annual Heritage WinterFest at Smuggler’s NotchStart with the Cambridge Rotary pie breakfast, followed by a 5K-snowshoe race at Smugglers’ Notch Nordic Center. End with lasagna at the Cambridge Fire Department and sledding and a bonfire at Quarry Hill Farm. www.smuggs.com

31 Ski for HeatBromley hosts a fundraiser for neighbors in need of heat. www.skiforheat.org

FEBRUARY6 Saturday Night Lights Uphill EventThe Gondolier trail will be lit with lights for the second session in a series of Saturday evenings dedicated to skinng. www.stowe.com

6 Inaugural Winter Fest & Rope Tow Dedication, AscutneyAscutney Mountain marks its comeback with the dedication of a new rope tow, live music, ski, snowshoe and fat bike races, and s’mores . www.mountascut-neyoutdoors.org

6-7 Boy Scout Weekend at BromleyVermont scouts have the opportunity to work on their snow sports merit badge and a race for a ski 2016-2017 pass. www.scoutingvermont.org

6-7 NENSA Eastern Cup Race Weekend #4 at Trapp Family Lodge, Stowe 5K/10K freestyle races and 10K/15K classic races on Sunday. www.nensa.net

13-14 Romance Half Marathon at RikertThe Rikert Nordic Center hosts a half marathon. www.rikertnordic.com

19 Family Fun Day at RikertA day of family friendly Nordic tours, races and scavenger hunts, finished with a bonfire. www.rikertnordic.com

12 Cloud Nine Nuptials at Mount SnowRenew vows or get married at the top of Cloud Nine. www.mountsnow.com

13 February FestivalBromley hosts an annual celebration benefitting the Bromley Outing Club with fireworks, torchlight parade, silent auction and live music. www.bromley.com

MARCH12 Sugar Daze at OkemoJust when the sap starts to run, Okemo o� ers a free concert series in the base area courtyard, grilled food and a beer garden. www.okemo.com

12 Split and Surfest at Bolton ValleyBolton Valley o� ers a backcountry experience for snowboarders with demos, merchandise, food and free rentals. www.boltonvalley.com

19-20 24 Hours of StrattonSki or ride from dawn until dusk to raise money for the Stratton Foundation. Awards for vertical feet skied and most money raised. www.stratton.com

26 March-di Gras at StrattonStratton celebrates Mardi Gras in a style all its own with a block party in the resort village with live music, Creole cuisine and an ice bar. www.stratton.com

26 Bud Light Sink or Skim at Mount SnowMount Snow welcomes spring with its annual pond skim with prizes and plenty of laughs for spectators. www.mountsnow.com

26 Spring Fling at BromleyCome out to play at this annual festival. Enjoy barbeque fare and the annual pond skim. www.bromley.com

27 Bud Light Duct Tape Derby at Mount SnowCompetitors construct cra� s out of cardboard, zipties and duct tape before sending them downhill and on a skim across a pond. www.mountsnow.com

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APRIL2 Hops on Snow at OkemoOkemo welcomes spring with a beer festival and live music. www.okemo.com

2 Q Burke’s Annual Pond Skim CompetitionQ Burke’s pond skim rewards winners with a season’s pass. www.qburke.com

9-10 Spring Fling and Annual Pond Skim at StrattonGoggle tans, t-shirts and any wacky accessories of choice are welcome as Stratton celebrates the soft snow at its annual spring party. www.stratton.com

9 Pond Skimming at Jay PeakJay Peak throws springtime a welcome party with an annual pond skim. Bring your Hawaiian shirt and get ready to get soaked. www.jaypeakresort.com

9 Slush Cup & Splash for Cash at OkemoCostume-clad competitors at Okemo skim across an 80-foot long pond and try not to fall in. Prizes will be awarded based on style, costume and craziest run, with additional prizes for best wipe out. www.okemo.com

23 Dazed and Defrosted at KillingtonAs the spring heats up, Killington keeps on skiing with live music, equipment demos and beverages at the Umbrella bar. www.killington.com

COMPETITIONS: SKI, SNOWBOARD, CROSS COUNTRY

JANUARY18 Mad River Glen Family TournamentGenerations of Mad River Glen skiers go head-to-head in this popular tourna-ment. Siblings, parents, grandparents and entire families compete with the goal of finding the overall family winner. www.madriverglen.com

23 Junior Unconventional Terrain Comp at Mad River GlenSkiers 14 and younger get a shot at freeskiing glory in this competition at Mad River Glen. Top finishers qualify for the Triple Crown Unconventional Challenge as well as Ski the East Freeride Tour events. www.madriverglen.com

23 Mountain Dew Vertical Challenge at Jay PeakAmateur skiers chase their dreams at this dual giant slalom course. Top finish-ers have a chance to advance to the national finals. www.jaypeakresort.com

23-24 USASA Skier and Boarder Cross at StrattonSkiers and riders race down the East Byrneside trail four at a time. The two fastest racers advance to the next round. www.stratton.com24 Mountain Dew Vertical Challenge at OkemoAmateur skiers chase their racing dreams at this dual giant slalom course at Okemo. Top finishers advance to the national finals. www.okemo.com

24 Mansfield Nordic Duathlon at Craftsbury

The Craftsbury Outdoor Center hosts a 12K duathlon skied half on classic skis and half on skate. Divisions for Masters, teens and kids. www.nensa.net

30 Q Burke Backcountry AdventureBring your skins and your tele/AT set up to Q Burke for this rando style race all over the mountain. This race runs 7.5 miles and has 4,000 feet of elevation gain, plus seven transitions to negotiate. www.skimoeast.com

29-31 NASTAR Eastern Championships at OkemoRecreational racers compete to qualify for the Nature Valley NASTAR National Championships at Snowmass, Co. www.okemo.com

30 35th Annual Craftsbury Nordic MarathonSkiers from all over the Northeast head to Craftsbury for this annual race with the option to ski 25K or 50K in a loop. www.craftsbury.com

FEBRUARY6 Neffland Space Jam at KillingtonKillington’s Neffland terrain park lights up the night with a space-themed rail jam for skiers and riders. www.killington.com

6-7 USASA Skier and Boarder Cross at StrattonSkiers and riders race down the trail four at a time. The two fastest racers advance in this exciting USASA-sanctioned race. www.stratton.com

6-7 Stowe Parks Freeride ChallengeStowe’s challenging frontside Lift Line trail is the site of a freeskiing competi-tion organized by UVM’s freeskiing team. www.stowe.com

15 Grommet Jam Finals at Mount Snow The final rail jam of the season for kids under 12. www.mountsnow.com

20 Winter Wild Uphill Race at OkemoRace to the summit of Okemo before then to the bottom. ww.okemo.com

2016 SKI AND SNOWBOARD DEMOS Try new gear for free1/23 RAMP Sports Demo Day at Killington1/24 Rocky Mountain Underground Demo Day at Bolton Valley1/26 RAMP Sports Demo Day at Mad River Glen1/26 Clearwater Sports, G3 Telemark Demo at Mad River Glen2/7 Uphill Demo at Bolton Valley2/6 Smokin’ Snowboards Demo at Jay Peak2/13 Powe. Snowboards Demo at Bolton Valley 3/19 Spring Demo Day at Okemo3/26 Never Summer Snowboard Demo at Jay Peak

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19-21 Canadian Ski Marathon in Buckingham, QuebecNovice and elite-level cross-country skiers head north to Quebec for three days. The marathon follows a point-to-point format as the tour skates, kicks and glides 160K towards Lachute, Quebec. www.csm-mcs.com/en

20-22 Triple Crown Unconventional Competition at Mad River GlenCompetitions over three days help determine the king and queen of the moun-tain. Day 1: Skiers pick their best line under the famed single chair in the first leg of MRG’s Triple Crown Competition Series and the first stop of the Ski the East Freeride Tour. Day 2: bumps challenge competitors on the Chute and Li� Line Trail. Day 3: The final leg sees how many vertical feet competitors can ski in a day. www.madriverglen.com

20-21 Harris Hill Ski JumpSki jumpers from around the world head to Brattleboro to compete on south-ern Vermont’s historic ski jump. www.harrishillskijump.com

27 Slash and Berm Banked Challenge at KillingtonA banked slalom snowboard race on Bear Mountain. www.killington.com

27 Southern Vermont Freeskiing Challenge at Magic MountainFreeskiers head to Magic Mountain to show o� their best skills on the Red Line trail in the second stop on the Ski the East Freeride Tour. www.skitheeast.net

26-27 EISA Championships at the Middlebury College Snow BowlThe Eastern Intercollegiate Ski Association’s championships and Winter Carnival are held on the classic Allen course. Down the road, Rikert Nordic Center hosts Nordic races. www.eisaskiing.blogspot.com

27 Frigus at Bluberry Hill Outdoor Center in GoshenThe Endurance Society holds a combination, snowshoe, cross-country ski and sled race at Blueberry Hill as well as a triathlon. www.endurancesociety.org

28 Stra� ord Nordic Center RelayThe Stra� ord Nordic Center hosts a sprint relay race for teams of two. Skate race in the morning followed by classic races in the a� ernoon. Free Stra� ord Organic Creamery Ice Cream a� er the race. www.stra� ordnordicskiing.com

28 71st Edition of the Stowe DerbyOver 900 cross country skiers race from the top of Stowe to the village center. This historic race is open classic, skate skis and fat bikes. www.stowederby.com

28 Mountain Dew Vertical Challenge at Bolton ValleyBolton Valley hosts a popular eastern race series with a free, fun race open to all ages and abilities. www.boltonvalley.com

MARCH 5 SkiMo Challenge at Jay Peak Two monster randonnée races challenge the advanced ski-mountaineer. The long course is 9 miles with 5,250 feet elevation gain. The second day of compe-tition is across the border at Owl’s Head resort, Quebec. www.skimoeast.com

5 Red Bull All Snow at Mount SnowInspired by skate parks, this series challenges competitors to throw down tricks on snow features focusing on flow and rhythm. www.mountsnow.com

5 Frigid Infliction at Bolton ValleyThis 10-hour obstacle race pits teams against each other. Challenges include snowshoeing, post-holing, skiing and navigating. www.boltonvalley.com

5 Castlerock Extreme Challenge at SugarbushSkiers take on the daunting Li� Line trail under the Castlerock Double as the Ski The East Freeride Tour comes to Sugarbush. www.sugarbush.com

6 Smugglers’ Notch ExtremeAt Smugglers’ Notch, some of the best (or simply bravest) skiers take on some of the most challenging terrain: the Madonna headwall Competitors will be judged on line, control, fluidity, technique and style. www.smuggs.com

6 Jack Jump World Championships at Mount SnowComplete with speed, racing action and great crashes, the Jack Jump World Championships return to Mount Snow’s racecourse.


2016 SKI VERMONT SPECIALTY FOOD DAYSSample some of Vermont’s finest foods, like Cabot cheese and local maple syrup.1/26 Roll Back the Clock Day at Mad River Glen1/29 Farmer Appreciation Day at Jay Peak Resort2/16 Smugglers’ Notch Resort 2/27 Winter Carnival at Middlebury College Snow Bowl2/28 Sugarbush Resort3/5 Pico Mountain 3/12 Killington Resort 3/13 Skier & Rider Appreciation Day at Bolton Valley3/18 Sugarbush Resort3/26 Stratton Mountain Resort4/2 Okemo Mountain Resort

www. [email protected]

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10-13 Vermont Open at StrattonStratton pays homage to the pioneers of snowboarding and welcomes new generations of riders in this annual event. Pros and amateurs compete for a $20,000 cash purse in rail jam, slopestyle, halfpipe and banked slalom catego-ries. www.stratton.com

11-12 Carinthia Freeski OpenMount Snow’s all-park mountain face, Carinthia, hosts its annual AFP-certified competition. with $7,000 up for grabs for the pros, and lots of gear and prizes in the amateur division. www.mountsnow.com

12 Ian Muller Rail Jam at Q BurkeSkiers and riders show off their skills in this rail jam benefitting a scholarship for a Lyndon State College student veteran. www.qburke.com

12 Bread Loaf Citizens Race at RikertThe Rikert Nordic Center hosts its umpteenth running of the 5K cross-country race with the traditional loaf of bread for the winner, plus a lollipop race for the kids. Costumes are highly encouraged. www.rikertnordic.com

12 Relay For Life Nordic Style at Catamount Outdoor CenterThe Catamount Outdoor Family Center hosts eight hours of continuous Nordic skiing while raising funds for the American Cancer Society. Teams camp out on the snow and participate in fun activities while taking turns on Nordic skis and snowshoes around an oval course. www.relayforlife.org/nordicstylevt

13 Mountain Dew Vertical Challenge at BromleyAmateur racers take to a dual giant slalom course at Bromley for a chance to advance to the national competitions. www.bromley.com

12-14 USSMA National Series/N.E. Rando Race Series at Magic MountainThe only Eastern stop on the U.S. Ski Mountaineering Association National Series: a weekend of racing up and down the mountain, a criterium and an uphill-only race. www.nerandorace.blogspot.com

19 The Carinthia Open Mega PlazaCarinthia Parks at Mount Snow hosts a snowboard competition with a plaza-style setup loaded with unique features. Pros will walk away with a cash prize, while amateurs compete for prizes and gear. www.mountsnow.com

20 Sugarbush Mountaineering Race For backcountry skiers and split boarders, the Sugarbush Moutaineering Race heads from Lincoln Peak to Slide Brook and Mt. Ellen with courses for both aspiring amateurs and experts. www.sugarbush.com

19-20 24-Hour Backcountry Skimo and Splitboard Race at Bolton ValleyNative Endurance and Bolton Valley host New England’s first-ever 24-hour backcountry ski and splitboard race. Racers compete for the most laps a day-time backcountry loop and a nighttime groomed route. www.boltonvalley.com

19-20 Ski The East Freeride Tour Championships at Jay PeakSkiers charge some of Jay Peak’s most difficult terrain in pursuit of the series championship. www.jaypeakresort.com

26 Topsy Turvy Derby at StoweThe Catamount Trail Association hosts a 1.5-mile race to the top of Mount Man-sfield on skis, splitboard or snowshoes, gaining 2,000 feet. Some come to win, others just to beat the clock and their friends. www.catamounttrail.org

26 New England Rando Race Series at Bromley “Sun Mountain” gets in on the rando-race action with this annual ski moun-taineering race with 4,793 vertical feet gain. www.nerandorace.blogspot.com

27 Pico Skimo Ski mountaineering action comes to Pico this winter with a new race organized by the Endurance Society, with three laps, gaining 2,000 feet up the mountain. www.endurancesociety.org

28 Bob’s Birthday Bash and Random Relay at RikertThe Rikert Nordic Center celebrates Robert Frost’s birthday with a day of races, a cake and a BBQ. Costumes are encouraged. www.rikertnordic.com

APRIL2-3 Annual Sugar Slalom at Stowe Originating in 1940 and one of the oldest ongoing races in the country, the Mount Mansfield Ski Club’s annual Sugar Slalom celebrates spring with serious racing, serious fun, costumes and sugar on snow. www.teammmsc.org

3 Bud Light Glade-iator at Mount SnowMount Snow’s springtime challenge is one not to be missed, as competitors take on the double black diamond Ripcord in hero snow. www.mountsnow.com

9 Bear Mountain Mogul Challenge at KillingtonKillington’s famous end-of-season bumps contest. See some of the best bump skiers go head to head. Stick around for the party. www.killington.com

30 Killington TriathlonKillington holds the kind of triathlon it knows best: ski, bike and run all over the mountain in this spring event. www.killington.com

The Hobble Inn — in the heart of Stowe From $80 a night | ww w.hobbleinn.com | 802-734-0661

A Classic New England B&B

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CLINICS: LESSONS AND TOURS

Start Fun, Start Free at BromleyFree clinics in the Terrain Based Learning area with a Learning Zone li� ticket, equipment and instruction. When you’re done with your lesson, take your new skills to the hill—your ticket is valid all day. Date: 3/13 www.bromley.com

Essential Elements – Breakthrough, at SugarbushA four-week series of clinics designed to take the novice or intermediate skier and rider to the next level. Dates: 1/23, 1/30 www.sugarbush.com

All Terrain Ski Camp with Dan Egan at KillingtonResident pro at Killington, Dan Egan leads skiers on a daylong clinic, teaching the skills to ski the entire mountain. Dates: 1/23, 2/20, 3/19 www.killington.com

Photography Outback Snowshoe Tour at SugarbushSnowshoers head to the backcountry of the Slide Brook Basin for a guided photography tour. Dates: 2/16, 3/19 www.sugarbush.com

Women’s Ski Camp with Donna Weinbrecht at KillingtonJoin Olympic gold medal mogul skier Donna Weinbrecht and top coaches for a day of skills development. Dates: 1/23, 2/20, 3/12, www.killington.com

Women’s Only Telemark Ski Clinics at Mad River GlenAspiring and experienced telemark skiers alike head to Mad River Glen for a day of free-heel clinics with the MRG sta� . Dates: 2/13 www.madriverglen.com

Girls’ Time Out Specialty Series at Stratton

A Sunday morning group lesson focused on specific skills. Dates: 1/24, 1/29-31, 2/7 www.stratton.com

Women’s Discovery Camp at SugarbushA multi-day ski and ride camp with instruction, demos, video analysis, equip-ment discussion and more. Dates: 1/29-31 www.sugarbush.com

Fresh Tracks Film Camp at SugarbushSugarbush o� ers teenage skiers and riders the opportunity to learn filmmaking on the mountain. Dates: 1/23-24, 2/6 www.sugarbush.com

Kids Cooking Class at SugarbushKids get a turn in the kitchen with specialized cooking classes designed for kids ages 6-12. Dates: 2/6, 2/20 www.sugarbush.com

Catamount Trail Association Backcountry Days at Bolton ValleyA series of clinics for alpine touring and telemark skiing. Dates: 2/1, 2/8, 2/15, 2/22 www.boltonvalley.com

Essential Elements – Ski Mountaineering at Sugarbush An introduction to alpine touring skills and equipment on black diamond ter-rain. Dates: 2/6, 2/13, 2/20, 2/27 www.sugarbush.com

Nordic Touring with the Catamount Trail Association at Bolton Valley Intermediate and expert-level backcountry skiers explore the backcountry. Topics include navigation, what to pack, e� icient travel and skiing skills, including speed control and turning. Dates: 2/7, 2/14, 2/21, 2/28. www.cata-mounttrail.org

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is a sustainable craft distillery that distills all of their small batch spirits completely

in-house from local grains and ingredients. They offer tours, free tastings, a full bar for craft cocktails, retail and free local music 3

times a month. www.silodistillery.com

201 Vt Route 112Jacksonville, VT

802-368-2226A new artisan craft brewery in the heart of the 05342. We have 3 revolving brews on

tap to taste along with selling Growlers and Crowlers. We also have Honora Winery wines

and tastings available.Open Wednesday -Sunday 11-7.

3597 VT-74, Shoreham, VT802-897-2777

www.champlainorchards.comWe offer guided tastings of our locally-made hard cider including our Original

Hard Cider, Mac & Maple, Limited Edition Ginger Spice as well as our Pruner’s Pride and Honeycrisp Ice Cider. All our ciders are made on site with our ecologically grown

apples. 100% of our electricity is generated from our solar orchards. 2015 Winner of

Vermont Cider Classic.Open daily 9-5. July-Nov. Please call ahead.

632 Laporte Road, Route 100Morrisville, VT802-888-9400

www.rockartbrewery.comEnjoy samples of our beers during your visit

and have a growler filled to take home to enjoy later. We have the best selection of our bottled beers. You’ll also find great Rock Art swag, Vermont foods and wonderful items

from local artisans.

4445 Main St, Isle La Motte, VT 802-928-3091

www.hallhomeplace.com We make the most distinctive Hard Cider, Ice

Cider and Apple Wine in the world. Enjoy them around your meals or as wedding

favors & toasts or sitting on your front porch watching a sunset.

622 Keyser Hill, St. Johnsbury, VT802-745-9486

www.duncsmill.comAt Dunc’s Mill, we know that true craft spirits

take time, care and effort. That’s why we try to do everything the right way. We have one goal: to create from scratch the highest quality spirits that can be produced. We do every step of the process by hand, and it’s all done in house. Find our rums at over 50 locations around Vermont,

or call and arrange a time to come visit.

276 Main Street, Jeffersonville, VTBarrel House Tasting Room2657 Waterbury Stowe Rd.

Waterbury Center, VT802-309-3077

www.smugglersnotchdistillery.comDrawing on the alchemy of a father/

son dream, Smugglers’ Notch Distillery creates Vermont inspired, small batch, and

remarkably distinctive vodka, bourbon-barrel aged rum, hopped gin, 802 Blend gin,

bourbon and wheat whiskey.Open daily for tastings at both locations 11 to 5.

716 Pine Street, Burlington, VT802-497-0054

www.zerogravitybeer.comZero Gravity Craft Brewery recently opened a 30-barrel brew house, full canning line, tasting

room, retail shop and a sun-drenched beer garden on Pine Street in Burlington, in addition to the original location in American Flatbread Burlington Hearth. Beers brewed for food are

our main focus; German and Czech-style lagers and a variety of Belgian styles are usually well

represented. Our TLA IPA is a crowd favorite as is our medieval style Gruit ale, released twice a

year on the summer and winter solstices.

316 Pine Street, Suite 114Burlington, VT802-497-1987

www.citizencider.comWe are cider makers who love to take fresh local apples and ferment them into delicious, refreshing, dynamic, clean and fulfilling cider!

We use 100% locally sourced apples and cider for 100% of our products, 100% of the

time. Never made from concentrate, ever! Our goal is bold, yet simple: Make cider for the

people, by the people. Visit us on Pine Street in Burlington for tastings and a great meal.

sponsored content

VERM

ONT B

EER,

WIN

E, CI

DER

+ SP

IRITS

Prohibition Pig23 South Main Street • Waterbury • VT

802-244-4120www.prohibitionpig.comTwo restaurants, one location.

Business in the front. Party in the back.Brewery opens at 11:30 a.m. everyday

for lunch + supper.

4373 VT Route 12Berlin, VT

802-233-1151freshtracksfarm.com

Sample estate-grown wines from our sustainable winery, just outside the capital

city of Montpelier.

5 Bartlett Bay RdSouth Burlington, VT

802-658-BREWMagicHat.Net

Where ancient alchemy meets modern-day science to create the best tasting beer on the planet. Come watch our spores dance and play! Visit the Artifactory for FREE samples, FREE tours and the most unusual shopping

experience!

VERMONTDRINK FIND MAPS AND MORE INFO AT

www.vtskiandride.com/drink-vermont

NORTHERN VERMONTCaledonia Spirits, Hardwick

Dunc’s Mill, St. Johnsbury

Elm Brook Farm, East Fairfield

Eden Specialty Ciders, Newport

Hall Home Place, Isle La Motte

Kingdom Brewing, Newport

Rock Art Brewing, Morrisville

von Trapp Brewery, Stowe

CENTRAL VERMONT

Champlain Orchards, Shoreham

Drop-In Brewing, Middlebury

Fresh Tracks Farm, Berlin

Kingdom Brewing, Burlington

Lawson’s Finest Liquids, Warren

Magic Hat, South Burlington

Prohibition Pig, Waterbury

Smugglers’s Notch Distillery, Waterbury

Zero Gravity, Burlington

SOUTHERN VERMONT

J’Ville Craft Brewery, Jacksonville

Silo Distillery, Windsor

East Fairfield, VT802-782-5999

www.elmbrookfarm.comPremium Sipping Vodka and Barrel Aged

Maple Spirits made from 100% pure Vermont maple. Our products are entirely

fermented, distilled and bottled by hand on our Vermont farm!

RAIL DOG

creo

Call us today. 802-388-4944

Did you miss the

Email us [email protected]

Next issue

Don’t miss the

LAST CALL?

sponsored content

VERM

ONT B

EER,

WIN

E, CI

DER

+ SP

IRITS

3 Artisans Way, Windsor, VT802-674-4220

www.silodistillery.comSILO Distillery, located in Windsor, Vermont,

is a sustainable craft distillery that distills all of their small batch spirits completely

in-house from local grains and ingredients. They offer tours, free tastings, a full bar for craft cocktails, retail and free local music 3

times a month. www.silodistillery.com

201 Vt Route 112Jacksonville, VT

802-368-2226A new artisan craft brewery in the heart of the 05342. We have 3 revolving brews on

tap to taste along with selling Growlers and Crowlers. We also have Honora Winery wines

and tastings available.Open Wednesday -Sunday 11-7.

3597 VT-74, Shoreham, VT802-897-2777

www.champlainorchards.comWe offer guided tastings of our locally-made hard cider including our Original

Hard Cider, Mac & Maple, Limited Edition Ginger Spice as well as our Pruner’s Pride and Honeycrisp Ice Cider. All our ciders are made on site with our ecologically grown

apples. 100% of our electricity is generated from our solar orchards. 2015 Winner of

Vermont Cider Classic.Open daily 9-5. July-Nov. Please call ahead.

632 Laporte Road, Route 100Morrisville, VT802-888-9400

www.rockartbrewery.comEnjoy samples of our beers during your visit

and have a growler filled to take home to enjoy later. We have the best selection of our bottled beers. You’ll also find great Rock Art swag, Vermont foods and wonderful items

from local artisans.

4445 Main St, Isle La Motte, VT 802-928-3091

www.hallhomeplace.com We make the most distinctive Hard Cider, Ice

Cider and Apple Wine in the world. Enjoy them around your meals or as wedding

favors & toasts or sitting on your front porch watching a sunset.

622 Keyser Hill, St. Johnsbury, VT802-745-9486

www.duncsmill.comAt Dunc’s Mill, we know that true craft spirits

take time, care and effort. That’s why we try to do everything the right way. We have one goal: to create from scratch the highest quality spirits that can be produced. We do every step of the process by hand, and it’s all done in house. Find our rums at over 50 locations around Vermont,

or call and arrange a time to come visit.

276 Main Street, Jeffersonville, VTBarrel House Tasting Room2657 Waterbury Stowe Rd.

Waterbury Center, VT802-309-3077

www.smugglersnotchdistillery.comDrawing on the alchemy of a father/

son dream, Smugglers’ Notch Distillery creates Vermont inspired, small batch, and

remarkably distinctive vodka, bourbon-barrel aged rum, hopped gin, 802 Blend gin,

bourbon and wheat whiskey.Open daily for tastings at both locations 11 to 5.

716 Pine Street, Burlington, VT802-497-0054

www.zerogravitybeer.comZero Gravity Craft Brewery recently opened a 30-barrel brew house, full canning line, tasting

room, retail shop and a sun-drenched beer garden on Pine Street in Burlington, in addition to the original location in American Flatbread Burlington Hearth. Beers brewed for food are

our main focus; German and Czech-style lagers and a variety of Belgian styles are usually well

represented. Our TLA IPA is a crowd favorite as is our medieval style Gruit ale, released twice a

year on the summer and winter solstices.

316 Pine Street, Suite 114Burlington, VT802-497-1987

www.citizencider.comWe are cider makers who love to take fresh local apples and ferment them into delicious, refreshing, dynamic, clean and fulfilling cider!

We use 100% locally sourced apples and cider for 100% of our products, 100% of the

time. Never made from concentrate, ever! Our goal is bold, yet simple: Make cider for the

people, by the people. Visit us on Pine Street in Burlington for tastings and a great meal.

sponsored content

VERM

ONT B

EER,

WIN

E, CI

DER

+ SP

IRITS

Prohibition Pig23 South Main Street • Waterbury • VT

802-244-4120www.prohibitionpig.comTwo restaurants, one location.

Business in the front. Party in the back.Brewery opens at 11:30 a.m. everyday

for lunch + supper.

4373 VT Route 12Berlin, VT

802-233-1151freshtracksfarm.com

Sample estate-grown wines from our sustainable winery, just outside the capital

city of Montpelier.

5 Bartlett Bay RdSouth Burlington, VT

802-658-BREWMagicHat.Net

Where ancient alchemy meets modern-day science to create the best tasting beer on the planet. Come watch our spores dance and play! Visit the Artifactory for FREE samples, FREE tours and the most unusual shopping

experience!

VERMONTDRINK FIND MAPS AND MORE INFO AT

www.vtskiandride.com/drink-vermont

NORTHERN VERMONTCaledonia Spirits, Hardwick

Dunc’s Mill, St. Johnsbury

Elm Brook Farm, East Fairfield

Eden Specialty Ciders, Newport

Hall Home Place, Isle La Motte

Kingdom Brewing, Newport

Rock Art Brewing, Morrisville

von Trapp Brewery, Stowe

CENTRAL VERMONT

Champlain Orchards, Shoreham

Drop-In Brewing, Middlebury

Fresh Tracks Farm, Berlin

Kingdom Brewing, Burlington

Lawson’s Finest Liquids, Warren

Magic Hat, South Burlington

Prohibition Pig, Waterbury

Smugglers’s Notch Distillery, Waterbury

Zero Gravity, Burlington

SOUTHERN VERMONT

J’Ville Craft Brewery, Jacksonville

Silo Distillery, Windsor

Caledonia Spirits

Hall Home Place

Rock Art Brewing

Hall Home Place

East Fairfield, VT802-782-5999

www.elmbrookfarm.comPremium Sipping Vodka and Barrel Aged

Maple Spirits made from 100% pure Vermont maple. Our products are entirely

fermented, distilled and bottled by hand on our Vermont farm!

RAIL DOG

The Chairlift Q+A

BILL MCKIBBEN’S FORECASTBY LISA LYNN

In 1986, Bill McKibben, then 26, left his job as staff writer at The New Yorker and moved to the Adirondacks to write the seminal book on climate change, The End of Nature. At 37, he took a year to train as an Olympic

Nordic skier might and wrote Long Distance: A Year of Living Strenuously, a book that Into the Wild author Jon Krakauer called “a wonderful paen to winter.” McKibben has since written numerous books, including Deep Economy, Hundred Dollar Holiday, Maybe One and, most recently, Oil and Honey. Now 55 and a scholar-in-residence at Middlebury College, McKibben is the founder of the climate change activism group 350.org and a world leader in raising awareness of the human impacts on climate change. He and his wife, author Sue Halpern, live in Ripton and teach at Middlebury College.

You’re an avid skier, but not really a chairlift type of guy. Where might we run into you skiing? Whenever I’m home I try to ski, usually at Middlebury College’s Rikert Cross Country Center in Ripton. Since they put in snowmaking in 2013, Rikert has a 5K course you could host the Olympics on tomorrow; it may be the best race trail in America. Beyond that, you can ski from here to Lincoln or Goshen on a combination of groomed and backcountry trails like the Catamount Trail. The Goshen-Ripton-Lincoln plateau, the country between Stowe and Bolton, and Craftsbury, Vermont may be the three best nodes in the state—though of course there’s an awful lot of great Nordic skiing here.

How did training like an Olympian, as you wrote Long Distance, change you? It was nice to take a year off from failing to save the planet to learn about my body and what real Nordic racers go through. I’ve always been disciplined, but I really learned how you have to tune your body to eat right and to train right. I’ve managed to pretty much stay in shape since then—never fast, always dogged.

Early winter was not good to Vermont. Another sign of climate change? My mood is really dependent on the weather, not just locally, but globally. This past Christmas was the first year it was above freezing at the North Pole; there were floods in Mississippi and hurricanes in Iceland. Globally, 2015 looks to be the hottest year on record. El Nino made it worse for Vermont this year but we are already measuring the impacts of climate change here with shorter, milder

winters. A good, objective gauge? The contests that have gone on for decades to see when ice melts on ponds and lakes around the state are noting the ice thaws much earlier each year.

Tell us about 350.org, the organization you and Middlebury College students founded that pro-motes bringing the planet’s C02 levels down from the current 400 parts per million to 350 ppm, the level many scientists believe is the limit for sustaining life as we know it. The first real climate change protest started here in Vermont in 2006 with a march from Ripton to Burlington that I helped organize with friends, Mid-dlebury College students and, by the way, Bernie Sanders. It drew a thousand people. In September 2014, more than 400,000 people turned out for the People’s Climate Change March in New York. So that’s good growth, I guess. Recently, we’ve been

successful in helping block the Keystone XL pipeline and in 2015, we saw di-vestment in fossil fuels increase 50-fold to reach $3.6 trillion. This January, Gov-ernor Shumlin asked the Vermont legislature to divest the state’s stock in Exxon, which may be the next big front in this fight.

You wrote in The New York Times that the climate change talks in Paris last December fell short. Why? Over this century, we’ve already warmed the planet by 1 degree C (or 1.8 de-grees F) and that’s been enough to start polar ice caps melting. But in Paris, though the rhetoric was pretty good, the actual pledges that countries made would put us on on path for a 6- to 8-degree F warm-up. If that happens, we’re not going to be talking about just losing snow and skiing, we’ll be talking about a lot worse things happening: floods, tick and mosquito infestations, crop failures, drought and more.

Is there any good news for skiing and for Vermont? Vermont ski areas have become very good at dealing with climate change: we have some of the best snowmaking in the country. As for natural snow, in the short term we are going to see some strange weather patterns, like a dip in the polar vortexes, that could bring more cold to the state. But overall, we’re going to see shorter and warmer winters. That’s why I never take a snowstorm for granted. If it snows, I’m out there. n

No one wants more winter than Bill McKibben: The climate change activist and author skis 130 days a year.


Phot

o by

Lisa

Lynn

Biil McKibben, January 3, 2016 at Rikert.

EDGEWATER GALLERYMIDDLEBURY, VERMONT

edgewa t e r g a l l e r y - v t . c om | two l o c a t i o n ss i x m e r c h a n t s r o w & o n e m i l l s t r e e t

contemporar y & tradit ional fine ar t | home design boutique | event spacemonth ly exh ib i t ions | establ i shed & emerg ing ar t i s t s f rom vt & beyond

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BILL MCKIBBEN’S FORECAST

EDGEWATER GALLERYMIDDLEBURY, VERMONT

edgewa t e r g a l l e r y - v t . c om | two l o c a t i o n ss i x m e r c h a n t s r o w & o n e m i l l s t r e e t

contemporar y & tradit ional fine ar t | home design boutique | event spacemonth ly exh ib i t ions | establ i shed & emerg ing ar t i s t s f rom vt & beyond

creo


There’s something more to the Sugarbush experience than the legendary terrain variety, the meticulous snowmaking and grooming, the fabled history, and the authentic Vermont mountain setting.

Come discover what makes Sugarbush different.

Community is Better at Sugarbush

Upcoming EvEnts$30 Thursday at MT. EllEnThursdays, non-holiday BasE CaMp at MT. EllEnMoonlit skin & snowshoe w/ pizza, bonfire & drinksSaturdays thru Mar 26

Tour dE MoonGuided skin w/ dinner & night skiJan 17 & Feb 14

Jr. CasTlEroCk ExTrEME ChallEngEFeb 6

TorChlIghT paradE& FIrEworksJan 16 & Feb 13

lawson’s BEEr dInnErat allyn’s lodgEFeb 20

CasTlEroCk ExTrEME ChallEngEMar 5

woMEn’s dIsCovEry CaMpJan 29 - 31; Mar 7 - 9

sugarBush MounTaInEErIng raCEMar 20 sTEIn’s ChallEngEApr 9

For more information on restaurants, activities and events call 800.53.sugar or visit sugarbush.com.

sugarbush.com 800.53.sugar #sBdiSCoVer

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vt ski + ride, jan. 2016

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