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Sunday, February 24, 2002
Toast winter at the 'Loaf'
Copyright © 2002 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc. | ||||||
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Where is winter? The winter we knew as kids, where the snow banks were so high we could build jumps, and we would ski and sled outside until Mom called to remind us of lunch and hot cocoa? Where is the snow that makes winter in Maine bearable, fun even? One place to look is the Sugarloaf Outdoor Center. Everyone knows of Sugarloaf/USA, the alpine area. But few people know that at the base of the mountain is the Sugarloaf Outdoor Center for other outdoor sports.
Staff members there will help you choose your adventure, equipment and clothing, and suggest trails or provide a lesson. Many families make a base camp at one of the tables in front of the windows. They set up games for those who want to stay inside, or for when they come back inside to warm up. The lodge is large, but cozy. The fireplace crackles in the morning, until the afternoon sun hits the three-story-tall windows. Many days you will look up through those windows and see the wind whipping around the mountain trails, while down amid the trees, cross-country skiers enjoy a calm day of skiing. Others can rent skates and play on the hockey rink. Snowshoers have the 'shoes and trail map to help plan an adventure. Sugarloaf's instructors are accomplished skiers, certified by the Professional Ski Instructors of America. They enjoy making skiing easy and fun. If you are a ski racer, you have been to Sugarloaf many times, or you will. College teams and Olympians past and present come to train here. There are easy trails or difficult, as the training schedule demands, and with more than 100 kilometers, they can ski for hours and never be bored. The Sugarloaf Outdoor Center has long been known by avid cross-country ski racers as the area with the first snow, and, whatever the weather, the best snow and the best grooming in New England. The area is always called upon to host the first ski clinics and races of the season. The Outdoor Center annually hosts the Volvo/ New England Nordic Ski Association Eastern Cup Opener in December. And even if Mother Nature doesn't come through, the mother-of-all-generators powers snow-making machines to make a mountain of snow to cover the trails by the pond. There is more than six weeks of winter left, according to the Sugarloaf Outdoor Center's calendar of events. Spectators are always welcome. Sue Foster, director of the Outdoor Center, oversees these events, and always adds her special touch, like music and fun disc jockeys announcing the racers, and prizes from local artisans and businesses. The trail system covers both public and private land parcels, including the public reserve land of the state of Maine, the town of Carrabassett Valley, Sugarloaf/USA and the Penobscot Indian Nation. Until just a few years ago, the Outdoor Center's trails were generically numbered, 1-50, to help skiers identify where they were. In keeping with the spirit of the people who originally used and protected these lands so that the public can now enjoy it, former Outdoor Center manager Buzz Davis renamed the trails with appropriate Penobscot names. At first I found that trying to tell my husband I was going for a tour on the Seeboosis trail seemed more difficult than just telling him I'd carry a cell phone. But once I paid attention to what the names meant, I not only remembered but enjoyed using them to describe where I was going. Seeboosis, the trail from the touring center to the alpine area, means "small river," and it indeed is a gentle trail that follows a stream and crosses over several bridges along the way. The race trail, Wezinauks, means "go fast." My favorite trail rolls through the woods over streams and around trees as if following an animal, not the terrain. It is called Molsum, meaning "wolf." Sugarloaf is one of the few touring centers that has a Nordic ski patrol. Patrollers are trained in winter emergency care just as alpine ski patrols are. In covering 100 kilometers of trail and overseeing races, it has been helpful in preventing small problems from becoming unhappy big ones. Almost invisible, compared to the wide, smooth cross-country ski trails, the snowshoe trails thread in and out of the trees and meadows and cross the ski trails like rabbit tracks out of nowhere. The Outdoor Center is an official Tubbs Snowshoe Rental Center. It has snowshoes of all sizes. With a trail guide in hand, you scan skip the wax worries and disappear into the great Maine woods, looking for peace, animal tracks, bird songs, and surprise vistas of the Bigelows or the mountain. On Wednesdays the staff offers Women's Shoe and Stew, a snowshoe tour followed by a hearty lunch back at the Lodge's Klister Kitchen. The center also hosts Saturday afternoon Snowshoe Safaris — guided tours around the trails, and a Moonlight Snowshoe, in which a head lamp comes with your rental and trail pass. A great destination to ski or snowshoe is the log hut on trail 5 (Damakguay). Fifteen or 20 minutes from the Outdoor Center's lodge, the hut is warmed by a gas heater and wood stove, and has a picnic bench where you can sit and plan your next trail while you sip on the self-serve cocoa and tea. On a clear day the view to the north is a sweeping vista of the Bigelow mountain range, from Cranberry Peak to the west to Avery Peak in the east. In a separate hut beside the lodge is the wax building, with form benches to set your skis while you rub on or scrape off wax, electrical outlets for waxing irons and heat guns. There is even a digital thermometer reading out the snow and air temperatures, so you can pick the ideal wax of the day. Skiers often find they need more wax, a better pair of gloves, or a chance to try a new pair of skis. The Outdoor Center has a complete ski and wax retail shop. They are also a Rossignol Demo Center, which means you can try some of the best skis on the market and compare them with your own. Everyone has a winter memory of ice-skating or perhaps a pick-up game of hockey. The Olympic-size skating rink at Sugarloaf is just a quick board-walk from the lodge. Rent skates for everyone and head outside to the lighted rink, for a wobbly, first glide of the season, or a raucous family game of hockey. Wednesday, Friday and Saturday nights are Family Skating Nights at the Outdoor Center. Tuesday and Thursdays are Youth and Adult Hockey nights. After a ski, skate or snowshoe, you're certain to be hungry. Delicious, homemade food is what the Klister Kitchen is all about. There is coffee, cocoa, or tea to warm you up, soft drinks and sports drinks to get you going, huge, and made-to-order sandwiches, soups or chili, and muffins and cookies. "Wait!" says Rose, "There's a fresh batch of lemon-poppyseed muffins coming out of the oven!" Not every family is made up of dedicated alpine or sworn cross-country skiers. It's usually a mix, so family time brings a set of unhappy compromises. The Valley Shuttle bus serves the Outdoor Center and points on the mountain, so alpine skiers can head back to the mountain after skating while Nordic skiers finish a run and then curl up by the fireplace to finish a book. On my favorite family day, my husband and I drive up with our 2 1/2-year-old son, Max. I get dropped off at the Outdoor Center where I can cross-country ski for an hour, and end up following Trail 1 — Seeboosis — to the Snubber alpine trail, where I can ski up to the Base Lodge. In the meantime, Max and Paul continue up to the mountain, put on their alpine gear, and ski the Sawduster and Snubber lifts, waving at Blueberry Bear and Amos the Moose, until I arrive. Then I take over baby-sitting duties, and Max and I sled on the snow banks and explore the shops while Paul skis a few runs. We meet for lunch, take few more runs with Max, and head home. Everyone is happy. Soon, the Sugarloaf Outdoor Center could be a part of Larry Warren's proposed "Moosehead to the Mahoosucs" hut and trail system. This recreational, year-round trail system would cross western Maine, from Newry to Rockwood, and have a dozen chalet-style log huts along the way. The proposal asks that the cross-country touring center expand to provide a hut system headquarters and office space. The hut and trail system is modeled after the well-known hut systems of Europe, would extend the winter ski touring and the summer across Maine, and the Outdoor Center would be the center for this network, making New England's largest trail system even larger. Global warming threatens to take winter away from us, and leave us with an even longer season of bad sledding between fall and bug season. But the Sugarloaf Outdoor Center is keeping winter alive and well. Dorcas D. Wonsavage lives in Farmington and has skied at Sugarloaf Outdoor Center since 1984 — almost continuously, because she still gets lost on its 105 kilometers of trails.
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