Rotary Log: April 28, 2011 (Gunstock)

Rotary Log  April 28, 2011

By:  Jonathan M. Flagg

            The meeting began with a prayer from Brother Gene who stopped his prayer when he realized that the microphone was not working but then quite correctly pointed out that “I guess it doesn’t matter since God can hear me”.  Amen!  Tenley gave a happy buck because she has been asked to sing at the Vietnam Wall in Washington, DC on Memorial Day and Jim Rini gave a happy buck because his computer virus has been cured (in case you were wondering about weird emails from Jim).  Fine Master Neal asked who had watched the Royal Wedding and very few people admitted to it so Neal fined everyone who did not raise their hand for not being patriotic to the homeland.

            John Pratt made a plea for more Rotarians to assist with the golf tournament and announced that the club is in need of auction and raffle items for the tournament.  John thanked the following sponsors:  Underwood Engineering, Springer’s Jewelers, Living Innovations, Redhook Brewery, The Comfort Inn, First Colebrook Bank, Piscataqua Savings Bank, Kennebunk Savings Bank, and New England Credit Union. 

Our featured speaker was Gunstock Ski Area General Manager Greg Goddard who announced that he comes from a long family line of Rotarians with a combined 150 years of perfect attendance.  Greg is the past president and Paul Harris Fellow from the Laconia Rotary Club.

            Other then activities directly on the water, the Lakes Region suffers from a lack of outdoor summer activities, despite the fact that there are 3.5 times more visitors in the summer months than in the winter.  Gunstock decided to capitalize on the summer population and to do some multi-year planning.  Gunstock has reinvested twelve million dollars in the ski area in the last ten years and has developed a master plan based on a multi-season use of the ski area.  At the same time that Gunstock began to think about its multi-season use, Ski Area Manager Magazine put on a camp about what other ski areas do for multi-season use and, separately, a convention was held in Orlando on the possibilities for summer attractions.  Armed with this information, management at Gunstock went to its owner, Belknap County, for approval for summer expansion. 

            Although there are a lot things planned for Gunstock, the three immediate improvements are: 

• The biggest aerial treetop adventure which includes things like swinging bridges across the tops of trees, rope ladders, rope walks, etc.
• The longest zip tour in the continental United States which will go 1.6 miles down the mountain, across the parking lot, across the pond and into a landing area.
• The only Segway mountain and woods tour in New England.

            Long range plans include hotel sites with tennis, swimming, night club, shops, spa and even a brewery; a camp ground with basketball, horseshoes, volleyball, pool side bar and other amenities; water front activities including boating, fishing and water play.  Gunstock envisions a 275 site camp ground, wedding functions, motorcycle races, a mountain rollercoaster and all sorts of other activities for all seasons.

            In case you want to know, you have to be 14 years old and less than 275 pounds to ride the zipline.   The tree top adventure and Segway tours will open on Memorial Day and the zipline will open on the 4^th of July.

            A few issues back, we posted the following trivia question:

Q: Why do men's clothes have buttons on the right while women's

clothes have buttons on the left?

And the answer is: 

When buttons were invented, they were very expensive and worn primarily by the rich. Because wealthy women were dressed by maids, dressmakers put the buttons on the maid's right! Since most people are right-handed, it is easier to push buttons on the right through holes on the left. And that's where women's buttons have remained since.

Try this one on for size:

Why do X's at the end of a letter signify kisses?