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Cross country
skiing and snowshoeing easy
Still, there's a certain appeal to stepping onto two skinny boards and walking off, through the snow, into nowhere. Snow-covered mountains in the winter are beautiful and wild. Mostly, it's the quiet people like. It's an unpolluted kind of quiet, made so by the way the snow grabs hold and doesn't let go of sound. Even the groan of aspens waving in the breeze and the very breeze itself are muted. It can even be quieter, if that's possible, on snowshoes. Scott Nielson, director of the Solitude Nordic Center at the top of Big Cottonwood Canyon, believes so. The Solitude Center offers 15 kilometers of groomed cross country track and six kilometers of snowshoe trails. Building a Nordic track involves packing down a 16-foot swath in the snow and then cutting two parallel grooves off to one side. The flat is for freestyle or skating; the grooves are for the classical cross country. "Nowadays," said Nielson, "most people are into skating. It's easier, faster and they don't need to mess with waxes. With classical, you need to know how to wax." Classical cross country is the old-style skiing - left, right, left, with skis side by side and arms swinging in cadence with the skis. Skating is the newest style, made popular by competitive skiers. The skis are put in a "V" with the tails nearly touching, then the skier steps off in a skating rhythm and glides. Skating is possible on a groomed track but impossible in the untouched powder. That's where classical and snowshoeing have the edge. Any one of the three, though, is easy to learn. "If you can walk, you can cross country ski. It's the same with snowshoeing. Again, if you can walk, you can snowshoe," he noted. The Solitude Center has made it easy for skiers and snowshoers. The groomed trails thread through the pines and aspens like a web. A walk in the forest can be as comfortable or as exhilarating as a person chooses. An hour can be enough for some but way too little for others. "The nicest part is that even on days when there are a lot of people, it's seldom you get bunched up in a group. There's enough track you can always get away, be off by yourself and really enjoy the peace and quiet," he added. "Usually, we'll go out and stomp out snowshoe trails. If it snows and we don't have the opportunity, there are signs you can follow throughout the area." The center is open daily from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. There are rentals available for snowshoes and classical and skating skis. A daylong adult ski package is $12. Snowshoes for a day are $10. A trail pass for a day of skiing or snowshoeing on the Solitude system is $10. Nielson recommends those learning either sport, especially skiing, take a lesson. "At least you are shown the right things to do. But then when you go out, don't think so much about technique all the time. Go out and have fun. That's the important thing," he noted. "Over time it will come. And the better you get the easier it becomes, just like with any sport." There are, he continued, new people stepping onto cross country skis all the time. After the Olympics next year, he expects numbers to increase even more. "They did after the '98 Games, and I expect the same thing next year," he said. "People see it on TV or see it in stories in papers and magazines, and they say to themselves that it looks fun and they want to try it - so they do." And, as countless others have discovered at the Solitude Center, if they can walk, they can ski and snowshoe . . . and it's only a short walk from the center to that absolute quiet found in snow-covered forests. |
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