January 5th was my first day of my internship at Nashoba Valley Ski Area. It was Wednesday and I took the day off from school to head to the mountain and start my new "job." I walked up to the office, where I met Chris, who works with my mentor Jon. The office is pretty small, one little room with three other little rooms branched off of it. Filing cabinets, desks, and boxes cover most of the floor space. I walked into the back office, where Jon works. The room has a long desk along the wall with three computers and three chairs. People constantly run through the cramped room into the office or through the back door to the kitchen. Everybody seemed very laid back for working in an "office" environment.
Jon offered me a seat and asked me if I had ever seen the "Daily Snow Report" on their website. We watched a few, and he told me the basics of what I had to do to make one: get people to say the date, the base depth, number of open trails, number of lifts, and number of terrain park features. I also had to go around getting random footage of people skiing and enjoying themselves at Nashoba. He handed me a Sony Handycam on a pole mount, so I could get low angles (it has a fisheye, so I can hold the camera at a lower angle and still get good shots). Then he handed me a still shot camera and told me to get pictures of each feature in the terrain park, so that he could update the website with pictures of the current state of the park. He gave me my complimentary lift ticket, and I was off.
I skied around with no poles, waddling around, cameras dangling about. I made my way up to the lift, and as I came out to sit down on the chairlift, the lifty came up to me and immediately made conversation, asking where the "other guy" was. It's remarkable how friendly the people in every aspect of the ski industry are, so far. I got to the top and started skiing up to random people at the top of the mountain, about to ski down, or at the bottom, and asking them if they could recite the mountain information, and that day's date. I also just went around skiing and filming people as they skied down. While taking pictures of the features in the park, I stopped by the park shack to talk to one of the park crew workers. He recited the mountain information, and then we talked about the park. He told me about how they were planning on setting up the park for the rest of the season, and how they had just gotten 30 new rails and boxes.
After getting enough footage, I went back to the office to return the gear and check in with Jon. He took back the cameras and told me to go skiing for the rest of the day. I asked if anything else needed to be done, and he told me not to worry and just to go ski. It was a great first day.
