DRESSER, Wis. — It's early October and the pumpkins have barely made their debut. However, in Dresser, Wisc., snow's already on the ground.
Technically, the snow never left. And on Sunday, snowboarders and skiers eager for winter made their way there to get their first few runs in for the season.
"It just feels so odd and actually like really disgusting," seven-year-old snowboarder Lucy said, carrying up her snowboard to the top of the partial hill. Lucy may be used to fresh powder, but after a six-month-long hiatus from all things winter sports, she said she'd take last year's snow any day.
Which is precisely what was happening at Trollhaugen.
"People really don't believe us that the snow is from last year, they think there is something afoot or there's some conspiracy," Marsha Hovey, Trollhaugen's marketing director said. "But it works there's a lot of ski areas in Europe that do the same thing."
There's a reason why the snow has a strange tint to it.
"All of this snow is saved from the trails at the ski area, so we take our big snow cats, and we push it into a massive pile in a shaded area behind where all the action is," Hovey explained. "We put two feet of straw on top of it, and we have a giant white tarp that goes on top of it to reflect the sun and keep everything insulated."
Previously, Trollhaugen did this with ice shavings from local ice arenas.
"It was a lot of work we would have to drive all around, we had a spreadsheet with ice arenas, when we should go pick it up," Hovey said. "[It was] a lot of gas money and a lot of man hours so this has definitely saved us a lot of time, and has proven to be way more productive."
And having done this now for the third year, they know it works well enough to have a mini hill, a play pile for children and another truckload for refills throughout the day.
The event was a part of Trollhaugen's annual Open Haugen Fall Fest, and the snow was there for one day only. Trollhaugen said it will be keeping its eyes on the temperatures before opening officially for Winter in the next few weeks.
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