Stowe

Today we went to stowe for the second time. This time we were put to work. We cleared all of the leaves out of the water bars along the toll road. We had a few people on backpack blowers and the others operating the rakes. We worked together and got the job done by lunch time. After lunch we hayed the summit around the new dopplemayr lift and patrol building. Then we got a tour of the new lift and patrol building. We saw it during construction earlier in the season so it was pretty cool to see the before and after. The new lift is top drive, has one electric motor and two diesiel motors for back up. It was cool to be able to go under the motors at the summit terminal. We were able to see a lot more of the parts of the lift and how it works. Can't wait to start working at Stowe for one of my practicum mountains. It should be a exciting and eventful winter.

Burke - Willoughby work

Today we went to Burke and put all 328 pads back onto the seats of the willoughby quad. One person would run the lift and then stop it so others could bungee the pads back on. We were able to complete all 164 chairs in an hour and a half which was a new record for the practicum students. Team work was key because it got the job done much faster. The towers for the new lift were looking good. The helicopter for the rest of the towers is scheduled for Monday, so that should be an exciting day.

Bretton Woods

Today we went to bretton woods resort. We were able to meet the general manager, director of guest services, human resource manager, head snowmaker, operations manager, and other important people that work at the resort. It seemed like all the managers had advice about teamwork and the customers. No matter what department you are working in, all of the employees are working bretton woods resort. All of the departments need to work together in order to have a successful business. James, guest serive manager, was saying that you can never yell at a customer, but they are not always right. Don't take any of it personally because they are not mad at you, they are disappointed at the resort. You escort them to what they are looking for, and calling the manager of that department to let him/her know the situation. The customer gets more frustrated the more they have to tell their story. Then we went over to the massive hotel for a tour. It'd be a nice place to stay...if I was rich. After seeing all 4 of the practicum mountains, I know that its gonna be a good winter.

Jay Peak

Today we traveled to Jay Peak and it was probably the best hard hat tour so far. Jay is currently doing a huge expansion with a new ice area, water park, and hotel. The lighting in the buildings are on dimmers so they will dim and save energy when the sunlight is providing enough light to the facilities. It was awesome to get a behind the scene look before everything is done. If I end up going there next semester, which hopefully I do, I'll already of had a good preview of where I am going to be working. Walter showed us Jays master plan and it was great to see what is going to be happening in the future. They are adding a whole new section of terrian called the west bowl. They'll also be building more condos, but they are going to have to change in the location for the condos because they cannot disturb the bear habitats. I really like how Jay staying envirormental safe and sticking with there motto "If you can't hack it, don't hack it." They're adding more glades, but they are barely going to touch the woods...the way glades are supposed to be! The new tram house lode was neat and I liked the theme they had in the bar. They used pieces of the old haul rope and had them up in the beams. It was cool how they could still use parts of the lift. I really hope I go there in the for one of my practicums...it is the place to be.

Burke Mountain

This week we traveled to Burke Mountain. Burke has been very busy with their new wind mill and high speed lift. Dick Andross, vice president of mountain operations, showed us Burke's master plan, which was very impressive. It showed two new areas to add trails. It also showed new lifts and moving chair lifts the willoughby quad near the Cutter Inn. If Tim McGuire, General Manager,  is going to do all of this while he is the GM this would probably take a good ten years, but it shows that there is always some project or expansion happening at Burke every year. I'm sure that Burke will be needing help with this in the future....job oppurtunities? We then went up to the summit to check out the new wind mill. The massive wind mill provides 15-20% of energy annually. Burke will get there money back in 2 years. I am looking forward to riding the new lift and seeing what happens to Burke in the future.

Cannon Mountain 9/29

On Thursday we went to Cannon Mountain in Franconia Notch, NH. We went inside the New England Ski Museum, which was by the base of their tram. The museum had all of Bodi Millers olympic medals. There was a new section to the museum that had the history of the ski industry. It showed pictures of very old surface lifts and groomers. People used to hold on to shovel handles as it hauled them up the hill. Then we went into a room with a projection screen. Jeff Leich, head of the museum, showed pictures of how all the ski areas in the white mountains were developed in the 30's through 50's. He also talked about what ski areas were the first to have snowmaking, ariel lifts, and so on. After that we were able to ride the tram up to the summit. Unfortunately, the weather was cloudy and rainy so we did not have a good view. When we came back down we quickly stopped at the old man of the mountain museum. We saw what it looked like, how big it was, and why it fell down.

LOC and Stowe

On Tuesday we were at the LOC for a cable splice. The state inspector was having us mark the rope and set it up for the splice. Unfortuantly the counter weight needed to be adjusted so he could not do the splice. Thursday we went to Stowe and started off with a nice tour of their brand new detachable quad. They also were building a barn for the chairs and a new summit patrol building. After lunch we got to take apart the old lift that they replaced with the new detach. It was pretty neat seeing all the parts of the lift broken down.

Flying the Concrete & Footings at Burke

2011 Fall NSAA Conference

This years Fall ski industry tradeshow was held at sunday river. We arrived Thursday morning and started walking around to many vendors who were salesmen, trying to sell their products to ski area managers. The Dopplemayr salesmen happened to be the old mountain op manager at my home mountain. It was nice seeing how people move in the industry and seeing many managers from my home mountain. I asked the piston bully salesman, Josh Nelson, what have changed in the grommers recently and what his favorite one was. He said the engines burn cleaner, more maintenance friendly, and some have GPS tracking to work with snowmaking and his favorite one was the 600 winch. Then I went over to the Leitner Poma salesmen, Patty Dykman, and asked what the difference was from Dopplemayr. There wasn't much of a difference, and that was the same answer when I compared HDK snowmaking and Johnson Controls. Everyone seems to be using the same type of technology. The first seminar I went to was "Growing the Sport" with Michael Berry, NSAA president, as the speaker. The main message he was saying was that things are going good in the industry and that this is a powerful, unique sport that always brings joy, and that snowboarding seems to have plateaued. He also said that Janurary is a very important month because it is the learn to ski and ride month. Then I went to a marketing seminar who was spoken by Samantha Rufo from nxtConcepts. She talked about the millennal generation and how they are open, diverse, and technology is their life. 91% of the millennal generation have cell phones. Today in the social economy people are skiing for bragging on facebook. The last interesting seminar that I attended was the Wind Mill seminar. Matt Vanderbrook from sustainable engergy developments was talking about the process and advantages to having a wind mill. He said it would be about an eight year payback return if you added a wind mill. Just the permitting stage of the process takes about 2 years so you can't expect a wind mill to be put in right away. After that seminar it was time to leave. I thought it was a great opportunity for us to attend this conference and I am looking forward to seeing what happens in the industry next.

First Day at L.O.C.

Today was the first class at LOC and it will now be our classroom for the semester. We started off naming all of the departments at a ski area, then we were given scenerios and we learned what departments interact with people most of the time and when all departments are needed to interact with customers. The LOC is letting us learn there so we must do something in return. We are going to clean up the mountain and have a Fall festival. The number of skier visits is going to improve at the LOC this season because it is places like those that keep the pipeline of new business open for us.

Fixed grip triple cable splice