Small’s first exposure to the food and hospitality business had come 23 years earlier from working in his uncle’s butcher shop in Tarrytown, N.Y. During college, he had worked summers at various resorts in the Catskills, a popular mountain resort area in central New York State. From the very beginning, he told a visitor as they walked into the cool of the hotel lobby, he had planned his career to get exposure to all facets of the food and lodging industry. After college, he had worked for Restaurant Associates in New York City, then for the El San Juan Hotel in Puerto Rico. He also worked for Fairmont Hotels and the Arizona Biltmore before joining Marriott in 1973 as resident manager at the Essex House in Manhattan. Next, he became general manager of the Saddlebrook Marriott in New Jersey, from which he went to the Netherlands for three years as general manager of the Amsterdam Marriott. He had taken up his appointment as general manager of Rancho Las Palmas seven months prior to opening.

太字部分

he told a visitor as they walked into the cool of the hotel lobby,

キャリアの初期からホテル業界に足を踏み入れていた。
という意訳だろうと思うんですが、何かそんな言い回しあるんですか？