Stratton Mountain, VT

Stratton Mountain is a resort community spread across two Vermont counties and two town jurisdictions. The southern half, including the ski-area base, lies in the Town of Stratton in Windham County; the northern half, with the golf course and residential development, is in Winhall in Bennington County. The community grew around Stratton Mountain Resort, which opened on December 29, 1961, and now organizes the local rhythm around lifts, trails, lodges, and a slopeside village. Stratton Mountain Access Road runs north to Vermont Route 30 at Bondville, while Pikes Falls Road heads southeast toward Jamaica.

Winter gets the headlines, but the place is built for a full year of mountain seasons. Stratton Mountain School, founded in 1972, trains student athletes in alpine, Nordic, freestyle, and freeski programs at the foot of the mountain. The Chapel of the Snows and the Carlos Otis Clinic are two more pieces of the resort community's everyday fabric, serving people who live, work, study, or return here each season. By summer, the golf course, mountain roads, and Green Mountain setting change the pace without changing the basic arrangement: a compact high-country community organized around one prominent peak.