 This is Dennis McMahon and welcome to Positively Vermont. And today for our first show of 2021, I have with me Greg Mano, the communications manager of the Catamount Trail Association. And the subtitle of that organization is the length of Vermont on speed. And given this time of the year, I think it's an appropriate way to begin 2021. Welcome, Greg. Thanks for having me. And just tell us a little bit about yourself before we get into the Catamount Trail Association. Sure. I mean, myself personally, I grew up in Michigan. I moved to Vermont about 10 years ago. I've been back in the back country skiing right before I moved to Vermont. I was a snowboarder. And at the time getting around in the woods was a little bit more challenging on a snowboard than it was on skis. And so I made the switch to skiing right as I was moving to Vermont. So personally, I'm not a very good skier at this point in time. And that's kind of why I like that country skiing because you're spending most of your time hiking around in the woods and the technical descending parts aren't as prevalent as you would at a resort or something like that. So I've been working with the Catamount Trail Association now for just over eight years. And I think the work we do here is really important, getting people outside and making it possible for people to recreate here in Vermont. And yeah, I don't know. I wish winter was off to a better start this year, but other than that, things are okay. Well, it says in your website, we'll get into the website in a few minutes, but the Catamount Trail is one of Vermont's most treasured gems. And it's really a great- I like to think so. Yeah, it's a very interesting thing. So tell us about what the Catamount Trail is and where it goes and what it consists of. For sure, yeah. I mean, the Catamount Trail itself is a 300 mile long backcountry ski trail. We like to think of it as the cooler long distance trail in Vermont, but it's basically like the winter version of the Long Trail. More people are familiar with the Long Trail. So it runs from the Massachusetts border all the way continuously to the Canadian border. It was first skied in 1984. And since then, the Catamount Trail Association was created to kind of protect that corridor so that people could use, it would exist into the future. It was completely connected in 2007. And since then, things have changed a little bit. I'd say in the last eight years, since I've been here, when I first started, the Catamount Trail Association was solely focused on maintaining the Catamount Trail and protecting the final stretches of that corridor. Since I've been here, we've also kind of expanded a little bit. So now we actually partner, we have chapter partners throughout the state that maintain backcountry zones. So the Catamount Trail is, if you can think of it as like backcountry Nordic skiing, so it's usually in a free hillbinding and you're kicking and gliding over across down the trail. Whereas the backcountry zones are more for like somebody on a splitboard or somebody on alpine touring skis where you're gonna hike up and then ski down. And so now we have a number of chapters throughout the state that manage a number of zones for people to kind of get out and do that type of skiing. So at this point in time, we really are, we're not just the length of Vermont on skis, we're kind of, we like to think of ourselves as the powder portal to Vermont's, the gateway to Vermont's backcountry, just in the sense that anything backcountry skiing related or snowboarding related, we have our hand in and we're helping to facilitate. Right, well, this program goes statewide and sometimes other parts of the country. And to give us a little idea of the geography, maybe by city or a county or other markers that the trail goes to. I mean, the trail was originally laid out to try and connect a lot of Nordic centers. The idea was to try and, in the winter time, winter camping is can be, for extended periods of time can be pretty challenging. So the idea of the people that the guys that originally laid out the trail wanted to try and connect to as many ins and Nordic centers as possible to provide themselves with these kind of layovers that with warm beds, warm food and other stuff. So while there are some stretches that's hard to go in the end along this trail, really we do connect a lot of the great Nordic centers like Mountaintop, Trap Family Lodge, Edson Hill, down south, we're going through, we're following, some of the southern sections are great for beginners. They run right past the Harriman Reservoir and they're right on the edge of the reservoir. There's these beautiful stretches and not a lot of challenging terrain yet. As you get further north, you get into kind of more, the terrain gets a little more difficult. And so having some more, being a little bit more proficient on your skis comes in handy, but generally speaking, it's kind of a, it's an experience like just about anyone can go out and enjoy this Cadmont Trail itself is. So yeah, we go through J. I'm not, I guess I'm, you know, it goes through a lot of places. It passes through like nice little towns, all along the way. And the mileage, how many miles is it all together? Just over 310 miles from end end. It's like 311 in change, I think, is the last number we had. What's the northernmost and southernmost border? Well, the Canadian border and the Massachusetts border. That's quite a challenge in a way. We're gonna be publishing a lot of information along with this. And one of the things you wanted to talk about is the new website. Tell us what that website is about and how people could use it. Yeah, for sure. I mean, our website's pretty easy. It's CadmontTrail.org, O-R-G. And we just this last summer, end of the summer, we launched a new website. And with the idea of being our previous website focused more or less specifically on that kind of Nordic and cross-country aspects of backcountry skiing. And we wanted to make it a little bit easier for people to find information about our chapters and the zones they manage. And we just wanted to structure it in a way so that with the idea that people are looking for someplace to ski, they don't necessarily need to know about our history. That stuff's on there, but we really wanted to do a better job of connecting people with the skiing resources. And so it's set up in a way to kind of make it quick, like help people quickly find some place to get out on their skis. And so I definitely recommend people check it out if they're looking for a backcountry zone to kind of explore. We have a number of chapters that manage a number of zones and there's a lot of great information on there to help you get outside. Is there anything along the trail that tells people where they are and that kind of information? Tell us about that. There is, yeah. I mean, we manage on our website, the trail itself is broken into 31 sections. And so we have PDF maps of every section of the trail available for free, in descriptions. Many of our zones have maps and those maps are PDF maps are downloadable on our website as well. When you're on the trail, there are trail markers, the trail's marked with a blue blaze that says Catamount Trail on it. And occasionally there'll be, we have like a trailhead signage so that'll show you a map of that section and it has some additional information. Usually at the trail, I had so. That's great. Now, what about safety? We'll get into the COVID situation later on. What about safety in general during our regular times? Ideas of being out there in the wilderness. Any aspects about safety? For sure, yeah. Just like any time you head out into the woods, you need to be prepared. There are certain things you wanna take with you, extra clothing, food, water. You wanna check your gear before you head out to make sure it's in good working order to minimize the risk of equipment failure. If you're gonna be out in a pretty remote area, you wanna have backup plans. So it's whether that's for a parakeet for your gear or packing a pair of snowshoes in case something fails in your forest to kind of like hike out. Doing stuff like that really kind of makes sure that helps ensure that you're self-sufficient. And especially this year with the pandemic, like we're saying like being self-sufficient is really important this year because our healthcare providers and medical professionals have more than enough to worry about right now. They don't need to worry about unprepared back country explorers, kind of like making poor choices or not being adequately prepared for a day out in the woods. What's about this weekly winter farm series that you've done? For sure, yeah. I mean, so we just wrapped up the second week of our weekly winter challenge series which is a series that runs all winter long. This year is particularly, usually in a normal year, we would be hosting a number of events. We'd be all winter long to engage with people and get out and let people know about the Cadmont Trail and kind of encourage people to get outside. But this year with the pandemic, all of that stuff, all of those events have kind of been shut down. And so we were looking for other ways that we could engage with the public, but at the same time, give them a reason to kind of get outside. I mean, especially with everybody being kind of trapped either at home and not traveling, everybody's looking for, everybody needs to get outside. It's just good for our mental health. And so it's easy after a while to kind of like get stuck and just like, I'm just gonna sit here and watch Netflix or do whatever. And we wanted to give people away. So we teamed up with some of our partners. And every week we have a new challenge. And those challenges aren't, they're designed not to be location specific or discipline specific. So you don't need to be a skier, you don't need to be, you can do it on a bike. If you live someplace where there's not any snow, you can do it on, you can hike or do whatever. But the idea is just to get outside. So our first week was, I don't remember what our first week's challenge was. It was a catch of sunrise, basically just get up early, get outside and watch the sunrise. And then you share that on social media and submit it on our entry form and you get your entry. And you could win a $250 gift certificate to that door gear exchange and a subscription to Backcountry Magazine. This last week, we did a visit a summit or viewpoint. So again, you could do it on skis if you want to, but it could be, you could hike to the edge of a lake or stop in your backyard. And if you have a pretty spot there, that's a micro view, if you will. It doesn't really, we're not too particular in the rules. We just want people to get outside and then have fun, especially in like explore their backyards. This week, it's go for a picnic. And again, this week's prizes is again, a $250 gift certificate to the outdoor gear exchange in Burlington, which can be redeemed online and then a subscription to Backcountry Magazine. But we have later this year, we're gonna be, or later this winter, we're gonna be giving away skis. We've got, we're partnered with Black Diamond in Western Backcountry to give away some stuff. Dina fits another one of our partners and they're gonna be giving away a bunch of packages. So some really, you know, we've got thousands of dollars of stuff we're giving away this winter. So hopefully it should be fun and hopefully we get some people outside because of it. That's wonderful. But how many people per year participate will go on the Catamount Trail? What's it been like this year in terms of the numbers? Or do you have an ability to judge that? We don't, we're working on that. We used to have a long time ago, we used to have log books at Trail Heads. But that proved, I mean, it had its own issues and they haven't been an active use since I've been here. We've been working with local municipalities and some other groups to put out trail counters. We purchased, a few years ago, we purchased our own trail counters so that we can start collecting data on trail use to better understand like how people use the trail. I mean, with 300 miles of trail you have to understand like there are sections that are really popular and then there are sections that aren't popular, just don't get as much use because they're more remote or they're in areas where the population is smaller. And so one of the things that we've been trying to do is characterize the different sections of trail so that we won for us so we can better allocate resources, make sure that we're investing in areas where it's gonna make a difference. But at the same time, just better understanding like how people are using the trail and how many people are using the trail. Sections like, I don't have the numbers off the top of my head, but sections like the, one of the more popular sections is from Bolton Valley Resort to the Trap Family Lodge. That would be section 22 of the Catamount Trail, a creative name I know, but. And that sees, I mean, there are people on that every day of the season people are skiing that section either skiing from one end to the other or they're utilizing the trail as an out and back from either from Nebraska Valley or from the Bolton Valley side. And so we see thousands of uses over the course of the winter there. We're also going to be adopting some side trails this year, the Sterling Valley, there's a number of trails that we're gonna be taking over responsibility for. And so those again are in a pretty high use area those we'll also see. So I mean, people definitely, there are sections people are out on every day. And then there are sections we have where, they might clock 20 uses over the course of the season. So it kind of varies widely, but. How long is this effort going to continue? Is it a point that you kind of shut down for the spring or something like that? The trail counting? Yeah, well, the trail activities itself. Yeah, I mean, we have our, the trail officially is winter use only. So there are sections of the trail that are co-located with other trails that are used year-round. But for the most part, yeah, March, once the snow goes away, officially along the length of the Catamount Trail is closed. There are a lot of sections that aren't where the tread has not been updated or improved and is not durable enough to handle regular foot or bike traffic. That said, there are sections that can handle that kind of traffic and are approved for that type of use. So if anybody's wondering what can be used year-round, they can just get in touch with our office and we can help them, direct them to where they can go bike or go hike as well. Right. One thing that struck me is, what about wildlife? Opportunities to see wildlife or how about effects on wildlife or wildlife affecting, affecting the trail? Tell us a little bit about that. Wildlife, yeah, I don't know. I mean, I know there are definitely some of the stretches like down south where they go along the reservoirs are some great places to see some wildlife. Some places in the woods, I mean, if you're quiet and you're moving along, you never know what you're going to stumble upon out there. I don't know of any particular areas that are especially good for wildlife sightings, but it's one of those things when you're moving along through the woods on skis, you're pretty quiet and it's really easy to kind of like sneak up on something. And so you see a lot of stuff out there, especially if you're out there alone or what, you know, one or two other people and you're moving along quietly and not chat, not chattering a lot and making a lot of noise. Yeah. Tell us a little about this Vermont Backcountry Challenge fundraiser. Obviously, this thing, you do need support financially to maintain your activities but tell us about this particular aspect. For sure. Yeah, I mean, lots of challenges this year. So the Vermont Backcountry Challenge is separate from our weekly winter challenge series. Probably could have come up with more unique names, but the Vermont Backcountry Challenge is a fundraiser for the Catmount Trail Association. And it's kind of a, it's a social fundraiser. So what we're doing is we're asking people that are existing supporters of the Catmount Trail to kind of sign up as a fundraiser. And what they would do is then kind of like set some sort of fundraising target. And then over the course of the winter, our challenge, the challenge series runs from today, Monday, January 11th until March 14th. So during that challenge period, we're asking supporters of ours to consider signing up as a fundraiser, setting a fundraising target, and then taking on some sort of challenge over the course of the season to kind of show that they've got some skin in the game, but also just kind of like, get themselves outside, get them motivated to get out there. So I myself, I'm gonna be doing my fundraising targets $2,000. And then sometime in March, I'm hoping to ski 30,000, I guess I'm gonna ski for 24 hours. And I'm hoping to get in 30,000 feet of climbing inside of that window. Last year I did $1,000 and 20,000 feet. And I think I was definitely erect at the end of that, but I think I can do another, that took me 15 hours. So this time I have about, I have nine more hours to go. So I think I can get it done. Is this akin to those types of fundraises where someone will get extra mile or extra challenge and people will sponsor them? How does it work? Exactly, yeah. I mean, that's kind of the idea. We've tried, we tried, because winter events are so, winter is so erratic and it's really hard to kind of like, you know, as we're not, this isn't happening on a track or someplace where you can go and you're like, you know, I'm gonna, in this, at this event, I'm gonna go walk 100 laps and I want you to donate a dollar for every lap that I walk. Because it's happening during the winter and there isn't a set course. You know, we felt like we needed to be a little bit more flexible with this. So the challenge aspect of it is kind of, is optional, but we do think that people should take that on. And you're right. Like it could be, you know, we have people that are gonna be doing, we have somebody that's gonna be doing 100 miles on the Cadmont Trail, you know, over the course of the season. And you know, like I'm doing a single day challenge. I'm gonna see how much I can do in one day. Other people have, you know, are gonna, other ideas that have been tossed around are, you know, like, I'm gonna, I wanna see 30 sunrises between now and March. Or, you know, and the thing is we've tried, we've tried to leave it open because, again, depending on your locale and what you have available to you and the way winter kind of plays out, if that's gonna affect the type of things you can do. So we tried to make it flexible. But the idea is that it's a social fundraiser. So people sign up as a fundraiser and then reach out to their friends, family and colleagues to kind of like to support them in some sort of effort. And then that individual fundraiser's contribution is the challenge, you know, they're doing some sort of challenge, they're challenging themselves to do something that's hard for them. And in turn, they're asking for support. That's great. Tell us a little bit about the guidelines. One of the things we wanted to speak about was this COVID guidelines for outdoor recreation. Tell us a little bit about what that involves. Yeah, we've been, I mean, earlier this year, we worked with the state of Vermont to kind of develop a set of recreation guidelines for backcountry skiing. You know, they're pretty similar to the recreation guidelines the state put out otherwise. The things that I would like to highlight for backcountry skiing purposes are kind of, there's one called know before you go, but realistically what we want everybody to know is that parking is a big issue in the winter. I don't know if anybody tried to go hiking this summer and trailheads were overrun and cars are parked on the street. In the winter, parking lots are even smaller. Backcountry skiing parking lots aren't as big as summer trailhead parking lots anyway. And then we can't have people parking on the roads as well because it's not just inconvenient as it is in the summer. It's dangerous because clouds have to get through, emergency personnel have to get through. It can cause, there are landowner issues. Some landowners don't like people parking in front of their house and that can cause issues for the trail groups nearby. And might, you know, lead to access issues. So we really need to be people to be conscientious of parking and like not in parking where it's legal. And so what we want people to know is that they should have a backup plan, like have a plan B and a plan C, you show up and there's a parking lot school, have a backup plan, have a second place that you're gonna go to. Also just think about use trends, you know, like between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday, that's a high use area. You should probably avoid going during, on Saturday midday, like it's gonna be busy. You're likely to run into a full lot with a lot of people being able to work from home this year. You know, consider going during the week, go really early, go late, you know, get ahead and get a light and go out and go at night. It's just that we need to help, we need people's help spreading now these, you know, it's always been concentrated on the weekends, but there are a lot of opportunities now to kind of like get out during the week and if you can get out during the week, you're gonna have a much more enjoyable experience and you're gonna run into less kind of like obstacles to enjoying the backcountry here in Vermont, if you can do so. The other point I wanted to bring up is, again, I just wanna reiterate that we need to take it easy out there. This year especially, the snow, we haven't gotten a lot of snow, so there are a lot of things hiding in the woods underneath the surface of the snow, waiting to take you out. And this year with such a low snowpack, the chance of getting injured is much higher. And so we need people to take it easy because again, our medical professionals and our healthcare workers are, they've got a lot on their plate right now. And I mean, you don't wanna, most people as a backcountry skier, they don't wanna go to the hospital if they don't have to, like they're gonna get exposed, you don't wanna get injured, you don't wanna get exposed at the hospital. This year is not the year to kind of like push yourself or challenge yourself to find the terrain. It's a good year just to kind of like get out there, enjoy it, take it easy and like, you know, and be safe. One of the things we'd like to do here on positivity models is to get information to people how they can get involved. What do you need? What kind of volunteer opportunities you have? And tell us a little bit about that. For sure. Yeah, I mean, every fall, I mean, generally we have a variety about volunteer opportunities throughout the season. The largest, the most significant one is usually in the fall when a trail work comes up. Throughout the fall, our chapters are gonna be doing trail work on the zones and they need assistance. We have trail chiefs spread throughout the state that have adopted sections of trail, all fall, all throughout the fall, we're doing, we're constantly doing trail work. During the summer, their projects will pop up like bridge replacements and other more substantial projects and we often need extra hands for those to kind of stay apprised of that stuff to get, if people wanna get involved, I would say, you know, check out the Catamount Trail website. We do have a weekly newsletter that goes out that you can send it for on our site. We send out emails only on Mondays. We see one a week, tends to have information about upcoming events, community events and then trail work and tour opportunities. As they come up, we try not to clutter people with lots of spammy emails and then get involved with our chapters. I mean, that's the thing, like we have, I mean, depending on what type of scheme, back into scheme people are interested in, if they live near, if you live near a chapter of ours, like that's the place to get involved. Like they're gonna need your help. If you become a chapter member, you're also a Catamount Trail Association member and so you get all the benefits of being a Catamount Trail Association member, but you can know that a portion of your membership dues goes directly to the chapter to support their efforts. Otherwise, other ways to get involved beyond volunteering would be to become a member. If you're a back country skier here in Vermont, like we don't, you know, it's free to use the trail. You know, we don't have our money, the money that we get our money to do the work that we do through members, you know, membership dues, charitable contributions, people working with us that support us through efforts, like the Vermont Back Country Challenge. This year, the Vermont Back Country Challenge is especially important because we have a big summer fundraiser, the race to the top of Vermont, which is a run bike or hike up Mt. Vansfield. But again, with the pandemic that were, that the future of that event is uncertain at this point in time, you know. And so that puts a lot more pressure on this hard winter fundraiser since it's a more socially distant effort. One thing I wanted to note is the website lists a lot of sponsors, businesses, organizations, and I found that very interesting because not only did it explain how people can support you, but a lot of businesses really involved in improving things for Vermonters. It's a very great community activity. I don't know if you want to mention any of them right now, but tell us about the role of those corporate and business type sponsors. For sure, yeah, I mean, I would say go to our website and check them out. I don't want to forget anybody. We have a lot of different people that help in a variety of ways. Some of our sponsors, some of our corporate sponsors are involved with our events. They support events like the race to the top of Vermont. A lot of our larger sponsors are involved in the race to the top of Vermont. Organizations, we have some other sponsors that sponsor our winter events. We have people that sponsor our ski cubs program. One of the things that we do here at the Cadmant Trail Association is we, every winter we run a series of youth programs. So we run after-school programs and in-school programs at schools throughout the state. Or at least right now, they're within driving distance of Chittenden County. We do have a couple of satellite programs. And then we also do a Saturday, well, we do a set, we generally do a Saturday program at Bolton Valley that's for a kind of underserved youth where we transport them from the Burlington area and out to provide them with access to outdoor recreation in the winter. And so these programs are all 100% free to all the everybody involved. We provide all the equipment and we provide the instruction and everything. So, but again, some of our partners, partner help support that. There's a variety of ways to get involved. And we're thankful for everybody that enjoys, appreciates the work that we do and is willing to kind of support us. Great. And it is a very impressive list in terms of the scope of the businesses that are involved. Well, that's very excellent. And I wanna thank you for giving us such a picture of what the Catamount Trail Association does. And I would urge people to look at the website and contact the organization for further information. I wanna thank you, Greg, for appearing on Positively Vermont. This is Dennis McMahon. Our guest today has been Greg Mano, the communications manager for the Catamount Trail Association. Thank you for watching.