Cross-country skiers at Dartmouth can now enjoy both the abundance of snow and the expansion of Nordic trail grooming to the Hanover Country Club this winter.
Outdoor Programs Facilities Manager David Hooke said there has been an "amazing response" from Dartmouth students to the expanded grooming. More than 100 season passes have already been sold to students, many of them at registration, Hooke said..
For the first time in its 10-year existence, the Occom Ski Touring Center will sell ski passes for the groomed cross-country skiing trails on the College's golf course, he said.
The Occom Ski Touring Center is based in the Dartmouth Outing Club house at Occom Pond.
Since 1990, Dartmouth has only groomed trails at the Oak Hill ski area at the Storr's Pond Recreation Area in Hanover, Hooke said.
Hooke said that the expansion is primarily the result of increased interest in cross-country skiing physical education classes and that it is easier to teach cross-country skiing on set groomed tracks.
Over the last two years, the number of students enrolled in cross-country skiing physical education classes has increased from zero to around 74, Hooke said.
"The last several years we've been grooming tracks on Oak Hill ...We couldn't use them for instructional programs," though, due to their distance from campus, Hooke said.
Dartmouth students, faculty and administrators, including Senior Associate Dean of the College Dan Nelson, will serve as courtesy monitors on the tracks to inform skiers of the new policy and to check for passes, Hooke said.
Jed Eliades, who works at the Occom Ski Center, said the snow this year has been great and has allowed the grooming to proceed as planned.
