It’s the busy season for PCTA volunteer and corps crews all along the PCT, as they cut back overgrown brush, retread eroding trail and remove fallen logs. While this work is happening in all three states, I was lucky enough to catch a lot of the action in Northern California, where earlier this month I visited with PCTA Regional Representative Ian Nelson. We spent a night each with Lyons’ Pride and the NorCal crew as they worked different spots in need along the trail. Here’s the first of two intallments.

NorCal Crew

We met the crew in time for beers around the campfire at Castle Crags State Park, where they staged for a maintenance operation in the nearby Castle Crags Wilderness, just west of the park. We hiked in past their work from the day before, where they had repaired eroding tread and cut back thick chaparral.

Crew leader Janette Storer and 10 volunteers worked about three miles of the trail over two days, from about mile 1,505 to 1,508. They’ve done a project in the crags for the last three years. “It’s one of my favorite places to work,” she said.

Janette is a marketing executive for 10 radio stations in Redding and Chico. She lives in Redding and started the NorCal Crew in 2011 after meeting Ian at a National Trails Day event at Burney Falls State Park in 2009. She volunteered on the PCT for a day at that event, got hooked on the work and the fun people, and dove in full bore, taking classes at PCTA’s Trail Skills College until she acquired the skills to lead her own trips.

She does about six maintenance trips a season with the NorCal Crew. She also leads a Redding-based Boy Scout troop in a project every year and often takes weekend time to scout the trail for places that might need attention, often bringing tools in to do a little work. She’s a self-described maintenance junkie.

“I’m an avid backpacker and love the wilderness areas,” she said. “I pretty much love to do anything outdoors.”

Thru-hikers passed us as the crew worked the tread. Some had joined the campfire the night before and found the hospitality a nice relief from freeze dried food. Ben Scarberry, the crew’s cook, made a huge pot of stew (two pots actually) and served up a fine pile of homemade bread.

While the crew worked, Ian, Janette and I climbed higher, about six miles from the trailhead, to scout an area where heavy brush has all but taken over. It’s still passable, but there were a few trees across the trail.

This is a section that’s just out of reach for crews camping in the front country to reach on foot. It takes so long to walk in and out that there’s little time left for the actual work, Ian said.

“There’s about a one-mile stretch in need of attention and TLC,” Ian said. “You can approach it from the a trailhead at the top, but that’s also a long hike in.”

Despite rugged terrain, there’s a good campsite about a mile from where the brush gets thick. In fact, Ian and I camped there with Lyons’ Pride in 2005 when I was researching the PCT for a newspaper series. Ian was a less than a year on the job at PCTA. We had a good time reminiscing about the walk into that camp – the crew had been packed in by mules – because the rain was falling and the streams were swollen. By the time we arrived we were soaked.

Anyway, Janette and her sister Erin Gilbert, a regular volunteer, went back to the area the weekend after the project to scout the trail from the top and start the work. Janette hoped that a small crew with packs could hike in and camp a couple of nights to tackle the brush. But they discovered that might be too difficult and she’s now considering a pack-supported trip for next season.

Erin, a Sacramento lobbyist, said she likes working the trail, not only to support her sister. “I appreciate good trail and I figure that if I reap the benefit I should give back and help out a bit.”

The crew on this project was a mix of new volunteers and veterans. John Michels of San Francisco is considering a 2016 thru-hike after reading about a triple crowner, and he found PCTA while doing research.

“I immediately donated some money and became a member,” he said. “I remembered seeing the volunteer tab and just a month ago I went back and I signed up to volunteer.”

John works in marketing in the Bay Area and served three tours with the U.S. Army in Iraq and Afghanistan between 2008 and 2012. He said he felt a sense that he should serve his country rather than letting others do the heavy lifting.

He’s already signed up to volunteer with PCTA in August.

“I love it,” he said. “It’s hard work but you’re surrounded by really good people and everyone has a lot of the same reasons for being our here. I just love being out in nature ad I love having the opportunity to give back and take care of the places I like to trek.”

Javier Nieves has been working on the PCT since June 2014. He was part of a California Conservation Corps crew for about a year ending in May, and sought volunteer opportunities soon after settling in Yreka, California.

He’s 23, a native of Puerto Rico and said he’s hiked most of the trails on his home island. Trails are in the family blood. Javier is a triplet, and his brothers, Miguel and Nelson, are still working with the CCC.

“Since I found out about PCT and that there’s 2,650 miles of it I’m like wow,” he said. That’s pretty much a challenge. It’s an exercise and pretty much everything I want.”

Allyson Earl, 21, was a first-time volunteer. She is a U.C. Davis senior studying environmental horticulture and urban forestry. She said she’d like to volunteer again with PCTA.

“I really enjoyed it,” she said. “It’s definitely a good group of people that I want to spend a lot of time around. I showed up the first day and kind of felt a little awkward and about 20 minutes later I felt right at home.”

Want to volunteer? Find a project on the schedule and sign up! If you can’t get out on the trail this year to volunteer, you can still support our work by joining or renewing your membership.