CB Nordic Center opens town trails on The Bench

Concludes grooming at Lily Lake 

By Katherine Nettles

Crested Butte Nordic Center has gotten plenty of material to work with this week, as a couple feet of fresh snow has blanketed the North Valley and helped grooming operations to open trails up on The Bench for the season. 

CB Nordic’s annual Thanksgiving Camp kicks off Friday, and CB Nordic executive director Hedda Peterson said as of Tuesday they were expecting 130 folks coming out to take part in various clinics and lessons. She also said it will take place on the bench above the Nordic Center, which now has enough snow to be groomed with a snowcat rather than a snowmobile.  “It’s always a great year when we can pull Thanksgiving Camp off in town instead of shuttling people up Kebler,” says Peterson. She confirmed they have pulled their equipment from Lily Lake, so that will no longer be groomed this season. 

Peterson said the Nordic Center is now scoping the west side trails to gauge when there might be sufficient coverage to start grooming, but makes no promises. “There’s a lot of variability in those areas with the wetlands,” she notes. 

The Nordic teams started with dryland training earlier this month, and quickly transitioned to snow. It’s their first season operating out of the new Outpost, which was completed in February 2024, and the Nordic team will based out of the Outpost going forward. 

“We have about 50 kids and coaches in the comp and development team so having the space for them and their parents when they come in to collect stuff has been huge,” she said. Meanwhile the upstairs area of the main Nordic Center has now opened up as a public warming house, so people are encouraged to go in, pick up their passes and warm up there between laps.