Sunshine Ski & Snowboard School Sales Somebody (from SameSun!). Oh dear...

I'm not going to enjoy answering the phone fast.... Too many Ss. At least I'm not Shannon (my boss)!

Today, on arrival to Bourgeau, we were given a tour of the local area and where we will be working when we're at the bottom. The SSSSSSDs are both at the top and bottom of the Gondola, and perform slightly different duties- we'll be rotating between them once we start properly. There's also a cafe, rentals shop and hotel checkin at the bottom, but after we'd seen all those we headed up the Gondola to see Sunshine Village for real.

There's a lot more happening at the top, with a hotel, staff accommodation, more rentals, plenty of bars, the main base for ski patrol, an underground warehouse, and our second SSSSSSD (SunShine Ski & Snowboard School Sales Desk). There's also Human Resources, where we checked ourselves in as new employees, signed our lives away in return for a staff pass and uniform, and I was allocated accommodation at Banff Springs. We also headed over to Ski Patrol for some guidance on how to use the radio system.

Next; lunch. A great big tortilla, chips, a huge salad, a drink and all for less than $5. Most people eat there every day, but you can bring a packed lunch if you'd like. Not sure you'd catch me doing that when you can eat hot at that price...

After lunch, we had a sit-down in a main conference room where the heirarchy of the SSSSS was explained to us, and we met with some of the more senior team members. The products that we'll be selling were also explained to us, with everyone making plenty of notes with the suspicion that we'd be tested on them later. That suspicion came true, but it was only a matching up of coloured cards with titles, descriptions and prices. My 3-person team won, of course, even though the 2-person team had a 15 second head start...

There is a very cool GPS tracking system explained to us, which monitors a person's performance as they travel round the mountain, to get a print out of what runs were ridden, how many calories were burnt and what level the skier is at the end of the day- we'll be responsible for this and have been encouranged to take it out as often as possible for 'calibration purposes'. We were also warned that during the first week that the resort opens, we might be required to take some free skiing and/or snowboarding lessons so that we might understand the system and sympathise with the guests better. This was very disappointing news.

I found out that I was the only person in the SSSSSSDS who can speak French, and would be called upon to speak to francophones in the event that one of them phoned us. After this, I was consoled with chocolate cake as prepared by a couple of instructors, and we went to try and fathom the bookings software. Dad, you are booked into a beginner's course next Friday starting at 10:00am, and David you have a private advanced snowboarding lesson the same day. Don't be late.




By that time, we needed to catch the gondola back to Bourgeau. The blizzard didn't stop us getting to the lift, but it did make the ground whiter (which is what we want, of course), and hopefully Sunshine will be opening officially next Thursday, a week later than anticipated.

This is the original Old Sunshine Lodge (OSL) celebrating its 80 year anniversary later this season- this is where we'll be based when we're up the hill. The steps out front are normally completely covered, and you have to step down to get onto the decking. Although there was about 20cm there yesterday (and another 5 fell as we watched), they're looking at over 9 metres for the whole season, which ends at the Slush Cup on the 16th May next year.



Commuting by gondola is great fun (even if we're told they occasionally fall off...)



Back in Banff, it was raining, and work on the roof was progressing nicely.