Every community has stories that deserve to be told — and in Waterville Valley, two residents have decided to start telling them. Charlie Pike and Ken Ackley launched Waterville Unwrapped with a simple premise: sit down with the people who live, work, and play in this White Mountains valley and find out what brought them here, what keeps them here, and what makes the place tick. In the first episode, the hosts turn the microphone on themselves.
The result is a warm, unpolished, genuinely entertaining conversation that doubles as an honest origin story for the podcast itself.
Two Paths to the Valley
Charlie and Ken arrived in Waterville Valley by different routes, though their stories share a familiar shape. Charlie bought a vacation home at the end of 2019, converted it to an Airbnb, and — almost despite himself — fell in love with the community. “I’m new to the valley,” he admits, “and just fell in love with the community.” He also took up skiing at fifty, which he offers as encouragement to anyone who thinks they’ve missed their window.
Ken’s path was a little longer. He moved to New Hampshire from Massachusetts in 2004 and discovered Waterville Valley the following year on a weekend drive north from southern New Hampshire. “It was nature,” he says. “Just getting out into the woods. Going for the hike. Having a drink on the weekend. Avoiding yard work on the weekend.” He bought a condo, spent a decade coming and going, and eventually made the move permanent in 2015 — drawn in part by the Waterville Valley Elementary School, which his son attended. “It was a great experience for them,” Ken says.
What’s on Their Minds Right Now
The hosts don’t wait long before getting into the texture of valley life. The Loft, a new entertainment venue, gets an enthusiastic review. Charlie and Ken compare notes on axe throwing, golf simulators, and the various leagues — darts, golf, bowling — either underway or in the works. Charlie mentions he’s already in talks with the manager about organizing bowling leagues, including a co-ed option. His team name? The Pinheads. Ken’s team, for its part, goes by something involving the Wig Wag — the town newsletter — which Ken diplomatically calls “an original name.”
The World Cup freestyle skiing event also comes up, with Charlie noting that Waterville Valley is known as the birthplace of freestyle skiing. He’s candid that, as a recent convert to the sport, he’s still working out exactly what that history means — which leads to one of the episode’s more charming moments: both hosts agreeing that inviting expert skiers onto the podcast is exactly the kind of thing that will make it worth doing.
Learning as They Go
One of the most appealing things about this inaugural episode is how openly Charlie and Ken discuss the learning curve they’re on. Charlie confesses that hearing his own recorded voice for the first time was “eye-opening” — he drops consonants, adds letters where they don’t belong, and had no idea until he heard the playback. Ken, who handles the technical side of production, is more enthusiastic about the process, describing the enjoyment of working out levels, editing, and using AI tools to summarize audio into readable text.
That last point connects to Ken’s other local project: watervilleai.news, a website that uses AI to summarize Select Board and Planning Board meetings and will eventually host write-ups of the podcast episodes themselves — with links that point directly to relevant moments in the audio.
A Platform Still Taking Shape
Charlie and Ken are refreshingly honest that they’re figuring this out as they go. Ken invokes the first episode of Seinfeld as a reference point — you can see the potential, but the rhythm takes time to find. Their guest list is already taking shape: school system representatives, longtime residents with memories of the valley’s early days, skiers who can explain what makes the mountain special. They’re even half-joking about setting up a hotline for guest suggestions.
The goal, as Charlie puts it, is to “advertise for Waterville Valley without making it feel like an advertisement.” On the evidence of this first conversation, they’re off to a good start.