New film chronicles journey along Catamount Trail to raise awareness about warming winters in Vermont

Torey Lee Brooks’ quest to ski the 317- mile Catamount Trail is the subject of the new short film “300 Miles Melting.(Ansel Dickey)

Torey Lee Brooks’ résumé stands on its own. The New Hampshire native has conquered some of the steepest, most technical lines in the White Mountains, accomplished a single-day Presidential Range traverse, and has more than 12 years experience as a competitive ski racer, coach and program director. 

But tackling Vermont’s Catamount Trail might be the toughest thing the athlete has ever experienced. 

“There was a part of my brain that was like, ‘Maybe I’ll wait.’ ” Brooks said. “But a lot of the Catamount Trail is at lower elevation, and with how the winters have been going of late, it felt risky to keep trying to push (off) this big objective that I wanted to do.”

Brooks’ quest to ski the 317-mile trail, from Massachusetts to Canada, became the basis for a new short film from New England creative agency Eastern Adventure. Sponsored in part by Protect Our Winters, Fischer Skis and the Trust for Public Land, “300 Miles Melting,” takes a look at how the unique nature of the Catamount Trail, conceived in 1984 and fully linked in 2008, is impacted by changing winters. The film, available at 300milesmelting.com, follows Brooks along the route and details her struggles. 

“I think the hardest moments were when you have to make those hard decisions, whether it be safety because of conditions or just the reality of pace,” Brooks said. “Having the confidence to make those decisions is the hardest. But then once you make them, being able to just have that moment of resolve; some of the best moments came from the hardest decisions.”

As one voice in the film says, the Catamount Trail is skiing’s answer to the Long Trail in Vermont. According to the Catamount Trail Association, it began as an idea in the minds of Vermonters Steve Bushey, Paul Jarris and Ben Rose. The CTA was incorporated in 1984 with the purpose of building, administering and maintaining the Catamount Trail as a public resource.

Brooks grew up on alpine skis but has been playing on “skinny skis” the past few years, outings that helped prepare for her Catamount adventure. “I’m a big believer that skiing is skiing and that’s fun,” she said. “There was part of me that felt like there was a story to tell there. That’s why we made a film about it, but also wanted to show that you don’t have to be perfect to go out and do these things. And you’re never really going to be fully ready anyways. So it was a bit of a leap of faith for me.”  

The initial days of the project were spent wondering if it would actually get done. New England was suffering through a snow drought to begin the winter of 2022-23, which meant Brooks didn’t get onto the trail until March. 

“We were really worried,” she said. “The resorts were struggling a ton, even with snowmaking, to have enough on the ground, let alone the backcountry. We were really worried me and my project team (wouldn’t) be able to launch to start; that the whole trail wasn’t even necessarily going to be covered enough.” 

Once March hit, Brooks experienced some pretty extreme storms on the trail. “We had a pretty bad nor’easter and it was constant swings,” she said. “We would get a big storm and then it would get really warm and it would melt out. It was just this roller coaster, back and forth, which says a lot about what our climate is doing as well. We had to make some serious adjustments and some hard calls just (because) of safety and the reality of what we were dealt.” 

In all, Brooks spent 18 days skiing the Catamount Trail. A lack of snow forced some walking here or there, but Brooks said that she was lucky to be able to ski 95 to 98 percent of the route. 

“With the year that we were given, it was pretty surprising that we were able to get it all done,” she said. “Every morning you try to just put in a little bit more and eventually you’ll get there. I approach my career and I view climate action the same way. We’re not going to solve everything tomorrow. But if we just keep chipping away at — reducing our impact and talking about it openly — we’re going to get somewhere. It’s a little bit less overwhelming if you think about it that way, than if you think about it like, ‘Oh my gosh, we need to solve this whole thing 10 years ago, right?’ Which, that can be true and we can still be chipping away.”