Bretton Woods Nordic Marathon.

For our second week at Bretton Woods were to be working at the the nordic center, located down the road from the ski resort at the hotel. This weekend was the annual nordic maration so there was a lot of work to be done. On friday, we showed up at the mountain at bright and early and were directed to head over the the nordic center. Once at the nordic center we propmptly met up with Pete, the nordic director. Pete asked us if we brought our snow shovels. We laughed. He was serious. We were in for a day of serious snow shoveling. The problem was the lack of snow on the nordic trails. the warm weather and rain just before the event was really causing problems. There were many parts of the trails with very thin or almost no cover and we needed to move snow around in order to properly cover the trails. A lot of snow was built up on the other side of the fencing from the wind blowing it around so we were to get that snow back on the course. we shoveled and shoveled and shoveled and then after that, we did some more shoveling. After the few section we worked on looked absolutely beautiful, we took a break for lunch. Matt owes me two dollars. After our much needed break from shoveling, we headed back over to the nordic center to hangout ant watch tv. Just kidding, we went back to shovel. We headed out to a long straightaway just after the start of the course that was in much need of some snow. it was about a half mile long. i looked at it and died a little inside. We got to work and had this section done in under an hour. After shoveling we headed back to the nordic building and help retail set up for a gear sale.

Saturday was a bit of an easier day with a lot less shoveling. today was the day of the nordic marathon. In the morning, we set up fencing at the starting line, got everything up for the timing and scoring crew, and got the PA system set up. I can still hear the announcer lady in my sleep. she was persistant. When the race was ready to start we headed over to the starting line to check it out. once the race had started, we set up a food station at the finish and provided refreshment for racers at the finish line. i was shocked at hoe the the full marathon actually took. skiing for 4 hours straight seems pretty crazy to me. Nordic people are crazy. Saturday turned out to be a pretty fun day and it was cool to see a great nordic program at work.

Bretton Woods Guest Services

This past weekend i was working at Bretton Woods resort in their guest services department. I was a little skeptical at first, but it turned out to be a really cool learning experience. On friday we arrived at the mountain at 8am and met up with James where he old us our assignments for the day. From there i met up with Tim Fluery. Tim is in charge of group sales and does a lot with the events crew coordinating and organizing events. This weekend turned out to be pretty busy for tim as he had a Large group 150 people coming in with The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Early Friday morning we headed over to the Mount Washington Hotel to meet with Lisa, the president of CFF. Before we headed over to the meeting, we printed out their lift tickets and figured out their bill from the ski resort end. Next we hopped on the shuttle and headed accross the street. At the meeting with CFF we discussed any accommodations that the group might need such as a clean air environment, we needed to make sure to put up no smoking signs and block off areas for them as CF is a lung disease. Also they were to have a silent auction on saturday so we needed to set up and make space for that in the base lodge. Tim made sure to do his hair and look nice for the meeting because Lisa was a "cutie". After the meeting Tim showed me around the hotel a bit and introduced me to some staff that he regularly deals with while doing his job. Upon leaving the hotel, we scored the keys to one of the Volvo's to cruise around in and run errands in for the day. a station wagon, but still pretty sweet. We headed back over to the resort and next on the agenda was the morning Mountain ops meeting. Tim put together a spread sheet of what group sales has going on for the week in preparation for the meeting. At the meeting each department went around and explained what they have going on and voiced their concerns or events they have going. Tim Spoke of out large group for CFF and explained the events that they have such as their silent auction and BBQ. Promptly after the meeting we hopped in the volvo and headed back over to the hotel in search for linens to cover the tables for CFF's silent auction. This turned into quite the adventure, but eventually we acquired our linens. Somewhere in there i was introduced to the wonderful $2.00 lunch and free sketchy blue soda. After hours of running around, i was set free to check out some of Bretton Woods gnarly extreme terrain, so steep that i got a nose bleed. we met back at the van at 3:00 and rolled back to LSC in style with our beautiful toyota sienna. Saturday was spent setting up for the CFF crew for the silent auction, in the morning we set up some fencing outside to block off an area for their BBQ and also put up some no smoking signs. The weather did not cooperate and forced us to improvise. BBQ on the top deck and they served there food inside. which later cause more problems with smoke getting into the lodge. briefly there was a little scare that the smoke alarms might go off so we had to open some doors in order to create a draft in an effort to clear the air. in between the chaos that was CFF, we met buses from school groups that were also buying group tickets this weekend. overall this was a cool learning experience and i saw a whole to part of the industry.

Burke Febuary 3-4

I arrived at Burke bright and early on friday and met up with Brian, the Lift manager at the maintenance shop. Here Brian instructed me to head over to the Mid-Burke express to start my day. Once i got down to the lift i met up with Zollie, one of Burke's fine lift operators. Zollie went through the whole system with me and showed me how to operate the lift. Someone needs to be at the pedestal at all times weather it be inside the shack or at the one outside. someone needs to be in reach of the stop button. Before the lift opened i set up some fencing to make the lift lines and keep everyone in order. Also we pushed some snow around and put a nice base on the loading area which we did periodically throughout the day as it got skied off. I spent most of the morning scanning tickets and running the lift a little bit. at around noon i headed up to to check things out where i hung out with kyle the lifty. there is not a whole lot to do up there unless something happens. This lift is a top drive and you can only speed it up from the top. This lift is pretty effortless to run, there is no need to bump chairs or anything like that so the job can get pretty boring, but it is always important to pay attention just in case something happens.

On saturday, we were all on the events crew beacuse the Dashney Mile Style slopestyle event was going on this day. in the morning, we prepped the park like we usually would on park crew which took a little more work than usual beacuse of the new snow we got overnight. it was important to pack down all the lips to keep them firm for the compettition. we did a lot of slide sliping in the morning in order to fix the quickly forming ruts in the new snow. we also set everything up for the jam including roping off the park and bringing up all the sound equipment as well as tables an chairs and a tent. durring the jam some of us judged and made sure the features were holding up. At the end of the day we tore everything down brought it all back down the mountain. also we did the final prize ceremony which concluded the contest.

Burke Practicum Saturday 1/28

For this day of practicum, I spent my last day with the park crew. We started off with the usual routine and met at the mid-burke patrol station at 8am. We gathered the park rakes and hiked up to the top of the park. upon inspection the morning prep today proved to be a lot more difficult than than what i had seen before. Because of the freezing rain the night before, all of the rails and boxes had a layer of ice on them that needed to be scraped off. Sam and i went to work on scraping all the features while Steve mahon and Connor Osullivan tented to the lips and landing. Scraping the ice took alot of elbow greese and took a little longer than i would have expected. Sam and I broke out quite a sweat. we finished up prepping the park just after the lift started spinning so we had to work fast in order to get everything ready before guests started coming through. Once the morning prep was over, Sam and I went on park patrol and kept on eye on everything making sure it was holding up. Since this day was particulalry busy, we saw a lot of bombholes on landings that need to be fixed throughut the day. at around 1:00 we did a rake run and smoothed out all th lips making sure to fll in the ruts that were created throughout the day. From now untill the end of the day, we went back on park patrol untill it came time to wrap everything up and close the park for the day. Today the park took quite a bit of maintenence to rebuild the lips because of all of the skiing and riding the park saw on this busy day.

First Week of Spring Practicum at Burke.



Matteo, Connor and i rake the park at the end of the day while the sunsets.

The first rotation of our spring practicum, i am stationed at Burke Mountain. The department that i chose for this week was Terrain Parks. I arrived at the mountain bright and early at 8:00am, where i met with Steve Mahon and the park crew at the ski patrol mid station near the mid-burke lodge. Here we collected the park tools and were breifed on what our day would entail. from the ski patrol shack, we headed up to the top of Dashney mile (Burke's premier terrain park). First, we took a run through the park inspecting the jumps and features in order to figure out what needed to be fine-tuned and tweaked to offer the best product for the customers. The groomers often miss a few things that need to be raked out by hand in the morning. Also sometimes, small lips and bumpes appear on landings that need to be raked smooth. on saturday morning, we needed to replace a barrel jib that had been smashed the night before by a groomer, so we ran downm grabbed a new barrel and rushed to replace it before lifts started turning. Once the park was all fine tuned, we took a lap through to test the features and we approved of the conditions. Next we called in the park report while on the lift. the next few hours we were on "park patrol" which entailed keep an eye out for incidents and make sure skiers and riders are protected in case of a fall. We were to ride down to the guest to make sure they were ok, while another person stood in front of the feature in order to protect them. Also we were instructed to call ski patrol inf need be and give them the proper information of the person involved. luckily everyone was safe and we never had to call patrol. Our duties also included making sure lips and landings remained in good condition. if a lip was rutted we would "side slip" the lip in order to smooth it back out. In the case of spots becoming icy, we would ride to snow cashes (where excess snow builds up) and spray snow back into the icy areas. this proved to be tricky at first, but eventually i got the hang of it. At around 1:00 we went through and raked the features again to last the rest of the day. After the mid day raking, we were back on park patrol untill the end of the day, where we groomed the features for the last time once the park was closed. I really enjoyed the end of the day. raking out features while the sun set and groomers ran was a really cool experience.
         As far as sustainability in the park, they try their best to recycle the snow that gets pushed around and pull it back where it belongs in order to lesson the amount of snoemaking that needs to be done.
        Terrain Parks provide a great service to guest by bring something new and exciting to the customer. creative jibs and features are created to provide the most fun possible. This season, Burke has been changing their park more regularly and providing  a lot of variety to their guests. this year an entry level progression park has also been put in to offer terrain park features to lower skill level guests.
       There are a lot of safety aspects involved in terrain parks. features are regularly groomeed and looked after to insure that they are safe for guests. signage and reminders are placed to warn guests of what in front of them.
       

i think you will find the remainder of the questions in the body of this blog post.