WATERTOWN â The Dry Hill Ski Area is enjoying a stretch of excellent conditions and the slopes are busy with skiers, snowboarders and tubers in this, its 60th year.
The facility has had its ups and downs with issues like the weather and ownership in the six decades since skiers first took to its slopes, but it has maintained a determination to survive and to remain a local treasure, if only because of it being a novelty â a ski center in the back yard, a brief leap, from a metropolitan area.
âI donât think people realize that there arenât too many communities that have skiing 15, 20, 30 minutes away,â said Dry Hill Ski Area owner Timothy L. McAtee. âAnd you can go there for three hours and spend $20. Most peopleâs skiing experience is, you wake up at 4 in the morning, you drive for two or three hours, you ski all day, and youâre tired and get back in the car and drive two or three hours. Thatâs what a lot of people put up with to be
WATERTOWN â Timothy L. McAtee says going downhill on skis or a snowboard at Dry Hill Ski Area might be the safest place to be this weekend amid the continuing pandemic.
Social distancing is something that just happens when someoneâs on a pair of skis or on a snowboard.
âYou have to be six feet away,â Mr. McAtee said.
Dry Hill opens for the season Saturday and Snow Ridge in Turin hopes to be open by Wednesday, both with a series of COVID-19 precautions in place.
The Watertown ski area will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on both Saturday and Sunday this weekend.