Mountain Livin'

Since I have been told by about a dozen people now to do an update on this thing I guess I’ll go ahead and do one. The mountain is closed today because of a blizzard so I guess I have some spare time for a change.

We have all been extremely busy on the mountain (or volcano) the past few weeks. There is a café at the top of our ski field called Knoll Ridge. Last year an arsonist set fire to the building and it burned down to the ground. They have a very good idea who did the crime but at this stage they still don’t have enough evidence to pin it to the person. In the meantime, they are building a temporary building to stand in it’s place until next summer when they can make a brand new facility. This has really set back everyone on the mountain. They are basically running three weeks late getting things done. It has been a real challenge for Andy and myself to get prepared with our new staff since everyone is a little bit lost right now. Nonetheless, we put in a lot of hours the past few weeks and we officially opened the mountain two days ago.

So far working on Mt. Ruapehu has been great. We work with some really nice people from all over the world. I love spending time and socializing with people from all different cultures. It enriches your life to hear some of the stories they share with you. We work with people from England, Germany, Argentina, Chile, Australia, Latvia, Slovenia, Sweden, Canada, Spain, Finland, Ireland, and a ton more. It’s really cool to talk with people that a from a country that wasn’t even a country when we were born. It makes you realize how fortunate you really are sometimes.

Living on a mountain is also an experience in itself. Mountain culture is like none other. Everyone is laid back and just gets along with each other. Everyone is here to have fun and enjoy their lives. It’s much different that St. Louis. Instead of hearing about the daily murders the news report consists of the weather forecast and the freezing altitude. That’s about it.

It’s really crazy when 4WD road restrictions are put on the mountain. The morning bus will get to the base of the mountain and pull over to the side of the road. Everyone will jump off the bus and prop it up on wood planks and throw snow chains on it and go. It’s crazy how fast they can do it. It’s like a NASCAR team changing a tire in the pits - except they don’t have hillbilly accents and chew tobacco.

The staff quarters is also a good time. Everyone gets down the mountain by around 6:00 pm and has dinner. Then it’s down by the fireplace for some drinks. Everyone parties a bit and heads to bed by around 10:00 to get early the next day. It works out really well. There are card games from all over the world with different rules to all of them. Once again, it’s nice to get to see how other cultures do things.

We all seem to like it here and really enjoy ourselves. It’s going to be a good four more months.

Oh, and just so you fellow Americans know…. We’ve already placed an order for three 12 packs of Budweiser and we’ve arranged to have the cook here make us beef burgers for 4th of July. We may be wearing snow boots on a volcano thousands of miles away but we’ll still fly the flag here and celebrate proudly.

Miss you and love you all!

Until next time…..keep on keepin’ on.

Ryan