Let the games begin Glacier 2022. (Part 1)

Stayed over in Missoula the night before Xanterra onboarding, but didn’t seem to sleep very well. After a two-hour drive in the rain, I’m doubting that I’ll be able to get in a hike after orientation. Then just as I come into Columbia Falls, the sky literally cracks a great big old smile.

And reminds me to kick my speed down to 25, because the cops in Columbia Falls love to write tickets to tourist for anything over five miles per hour. What a money maker.

This onboarding with Xanterra. It’s a really weird vibe of many different types of people from very different backgrounds, all converging on Glacier Park for something but they don’t know what it is yet. But I’m a numbers guy, so let’s have some fun with figures.

Every year (well, normal year) Xanterra tries to hire 750 seasonal employees. The season really begins this week, as most of the lodges and all of the food places will be opening. They claim to have 87% of the target hired, but I think that is a moving target. Apparently, some people just don’t work out. Like the four people who were fired last week for ‘behavioral’ issues (all dealing with alcohol). Unfortunately for these employees, they didn’t come in by private auto, so they got dropped off at the trains station and just had to deal with it.

There are also those who go ghost mode. Basically, they leave in the night and all Xanterra finds is an empty room and no signs the employee or their belongings. Kind of tough tracking them down to get the employee badge and uniform back.

This year the foreign students with the J1 visa are back. Xanterra hired about 150 of them, all mainly from Thailand, Japan, and Ecuador. There were some from the Russian republics, but, well, we all know why that didn’t happen. These students are hired in waves, where they give their first six weeks of the 90 day work visa to Xanterra, and the balance they can spending travelling in the US. They all had their suitcases in the hallway in which was all they had for the next 90 days.

Onboarding is done Monday/Wednesday/Friday for about six weeks, usually 50-60 people at a time. Today I was with the full 60. What a melting pot.

You have your foreign students, of course. Then the 20-something crowd that slept in their vans in the parking lot, just waiting to get a badge so they can take a free shower at where they are working. There was a 30ish bunch as well. Lots of people who punched out of the IT or corporate world and decided to take a three-month adventure instead of sitting behind a computer for 10 hours a day.

It was fun to sit an observe this mass of humanity. Watch, listen, the fly on the wall. I am apparantly a very boring looking and forgettable person. But there was this one bunch of old guys. Slowing came in, started mingling, and suddenly stories about dumb tourist in red buses were flying. Yep, the Jammer crowd. Very distinct. And I think I am going to be the youngest of the batch this year.

So after a nose swab, signing my life away, the issuing of a badge (same photo and employee number from last year), we all got about an hour plus of very boring outdated videos about being nice to tourist and don’t drink in your uniform. The one on sexual harassment seemed a little vague and open ended. If it would have been on a Beta Max tape it would have truly been awesome.

AND they had a BIG file on me. A PERMAMNET file? How to I always find myself trapped in middle school again? I told them they could keep the swag bag (lanyard/water bottle/mesh laundry bad). I’m a seasoned parkie now. After a lot of sit around and weight, they brought in pizza. That’s when I took my leave.

I drove straight to Lake McDonald to find the housing director to get me assigned a room. The day was getting long and there would be plenty of time to socialized later. However, first I had to meet the other new Jammers.

These guys were talking all around me and I didn’t say a thing for three hours. Then it dawned on me when we started class Monday, they would recognized me and wonder why I was such a dick. Most of them have hearing aids. One guy first drove a Jammer in 1961 in college and has come back thru the last half plus century over 30 times. Yeah, do the math. He HAS to be over 80. Not sure if he would be my first choice for a personal tour. Just saying, the end HAS to be near and I DON’T want to be there.

The drive down the lake was kind of surreal. So much snow. So cold and cloudy. So many memories of the 10,000 miles I drove over this stretch of road last season. It was like coming home in a strange Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe kind of way. Yeah, not quite sure what I meant there.

Once at LMD I parked and was running into the lodge to find my contact for housing. There was this girl walking towards me. Closer. Closer. Closer. Then a big smile on both our faces. It was Lorraine (Glinda the Good Witch)! Gave her a big hug and caught up for a little bit. Yeah, I didn’t think I got that attached to those kids from last summer. It was really great to see her again.

Then while getting my key and a dorm tour, I see the head of security. GORDON! A retired banker in his 70’s that I gave many rides to in the RV Park Shuttle last year. He said in his rough mock serious voice “Don’t let that guy in. He’s banned from the park for hiking too many miles last year.”

Got my key to my dorm. Met my roommate Allen, a 70-year-old retired lawyer and head of the front desk staff. Some many rich stories to remember. So many more to come.

Random fact: Did you know a Jammer is 8’2 wide, 24 feet long?