On The Road To Isle of Palms, SC
When the month of May started I couldn’t believe how many days of training were on the books, which just about tied my record month from my entire 17 year career. But as the month progressed two more got added on top of that, for a total of 15 days of training for 11 hotels/companies in 8 cities. What a whirlwind.
The first trip was relatively easy, as I was headed back to the Charleston airport, where I’d been on my very last trip, with only a short drive to follow to train the staff of the Isle of Palms Resort vacations. Being my only trip of the week, I headed out early and arrived just after lunch time and after my introductory meeting I found myself checking into a beach condo unit with 4 hours of daylight ahead! Too bad I didn’t anticipate this and packed the jogging shoes, but I did at least bring some sports sandals and got to take a power walk on the beautiful beaches there. After scoring an awesome take-out dinner from a great little French bistro that just opened up, I returned to my unit to work a couple more hours. Thankfully, at the end of the night I took pause to enjoy the view from my balcony, as just about that time I saw the most incredible, blood-red moon-rise I’ve ever seen in my life. Due to the forest fires far away in southern Georgia, the moon was showing itself in a hue rarely seen to the human eye. I grabbed my camera and headed out to the fishing pier to snap the picture below, which doesn’t even begin to capture it. The other is of the view from my beach condo.
Next morning I only had to walk right next door to the conference center, and before long my group started arriving for the day. Since this was a first-time client for once I didn’t see any familiar faces, and many of them had just started their hospitality careers in the weeks prior, as this is a highly seasonal destination. Yet with the enthusiastic and talented young people I met that day I’m certain many will have stellar careers in this industry. Here’s a picture of me with the two groups that day.
After having two more office days during which I was able to go in early enough to get caught up and also still pick the kids up at school at 2pm Friday and Monday, I was soon boarding yet another USAirways flight for my third trip in a row to the Carolina coast. This time I was once again visiting Topsail Island Vacations and my good friend Scott Erickson. As frequent readers of this blog might note, it was my second trip there in three months. But Scott had added some great new staff members and was willing to invest once again in getting me back up to train them in reservation selling. After my introductory meeting, I soon found myself much like the week before, working away at e-mail while looking out the window at a beautiful view.
The next day I was back in action, conducting a full-day workshop for the newest members of the team, and was so impressed that even the seasoned veterans wanted to attend, despite that they’d already completed the same course, some of them multiple times. Here’s a picture of me with the group that day.
After the workshop I was off and racing to grab the last flight back to Florida, but instead of heading home there was another stop this week, which was to speak at the Choice International Hotels conference, which was in Orlando at the Gaylord Palms conference resort. This was probably my 8th time in the past 11 years speaking to this audience, and since I had to miss speaking at the last one due to my wedding, it was good to be back. Having arrived well after midnight and being able to sweet-talk the night auditor, I once again found myself with too much space and not enough time, sitting on my balcony overlooking the huge, expansive atrium of Gaylord Palms listening to the soft and relaxing sound of water fountains.
Good thing that my start time the next day wasn’t until the afternoon, as I was able to sleep in late for the first time in many weeks. How interesting to be at a convention hotel to be awakened in your own room by the sound of the lounge singer who was already wailing-out “Brown Eyed Girl” from the bar area at Gaylord’s version “Key West” not long after Noon.
At the Choice conference I was honored and amazed at the huge turnout for my four sessions, especially since I ended up with both the very last time slot on day one and the very first one on day two, which started at 8:30am the morning after the theme party at House of Blues. Most of my programs were filled to capacity and I was especially honored to see so many seasoned hotel veterans stop by to see me in action, including legendary hoteliers such as Gary Williams from Williams Hospitality Management and also Chuck Marshall from Marshall Management. It was also great to share a couple of beers with my editor – Jeff Highly – who is Senior Editor of Hotel & Motel Management. Here’s a picture of me presenting at one of the break-out sessions on the last day.
Fortunately for me with May being a record month, 5 of the 15 days of training were in Orlando, which is only a 55 minute “bus ride” on Southwest Airlines. So soon thereafter I was being greeted at the airport by my lovely wife Cathy on a Friday night, and we headed out to a local pub to enjoy some live music on the way home for the weekend with the family.
