"How I long for the life of a caretaker": Further reflections on a season at Garfield Ridge Campsite

Just over two months have passed since my departure from the White Mountains. I’ve now fully adjusted to late night library sessions and never-ending term papers. How I long for the life of a caretaker. Going to bed when the sunsets and rising just as it crests over South Twin Mountain, a nonpareil. My day would usually begin with a cup of coffee before assembling the radio to make the 6:45 call down to 13 Falls. 13 Falls is tucked too far into the Pemi-Valley to broadcast out on the Mt. Washington repeater. Therefore, the Garfield caretaker has to radio down via line of sight on channel two and see if 13 Falls has any messages for the outside world. In addition to having the same days off, Steph and I did a lot of trail work together, so I always looked forward to our brief morning conversations. After checking in with Steph, I would head back to the tent and complete the campsite finance sheet from the night before and listen to the weather forecast.

During the weather forecast I would try and guess all the variables: peak gust, yesterday’s high and low, current temperature, and check to see if there was an inversion on Washington. Between my observations of changing cloud formations, books on weather, and details obtained from the weather discussion, I would try to predict the local Garfield forecast. I was notoriously inaccurate. After weather I would head back to radio rock and bask in the sunlight-overlooking South Twin Mountain, Galehead Hut, and the Bonds. On a clear day, from the Garfield overlook you can even see the Tri-Pyramids. Anyone who has been to the Garfield Ridge Campsite is familiar with this special spot. I know of many guests who would spend the majority of their time at the campsite basking in the rock’s awe-inspiring view. After a few moments on the rock my Motorola radio would spring to life, “WYF711 this is 6-0 Sally (or Mike, Ryan, Beau) with shelters morning radio call.” From here the caretakers would radio back west to east starting with 6-2 Kinsman Pond and ending with 6-9 Speck Pond. Hearing the voices of my fellow caretakers always put a smile on my face.

A caretaker’s day is traditionally filled with composting, performing campsite maintenance, or trail maintenance. Caretakers are afforded an extreme amount of individual responsibility to plan their work schedule. 13 Falls and Garfield also have the additional responsibility of carrying composting bark from Galehead hut down to the 13 Falls campsite. This task is unique to 13 Falls because of its location in “wilderness,” the highest level of protection afforded to a piece of land by the federal government. Motorized transportation is not allowed in wilderness and this includes helicopters. Thus when the composting bark is delivered to the various campsites it cannot be directly dropped at 13 Falls, instead it is deposited at Galehead Hut and carried from there. On a bark carrying day I would take off on the Garfield Ridge Trail towards Galehead to meet Steph. The Galehead crew was always nice enough to offer me some delicious lemonade and/or breakfast leftovers. After a quick snack, Steph and I would begin loading up the 50 pound bark bags. Steph has a pack board upon which the sacks are easy to attach. I however use my Osprey Crescent backpack. The thing is a monster and after a few humorous minutes of punching, slamming, pulling, prying, whatever we can think of, we would be able to maneuver the bag into my 85-liter pack. From there it was a quick jaunt down to 13 Falls and a refreshing dip in the river. Then back up to Garfield for dinner and registration.

A major part of the backcountry caretaker’s job is education. We are a vast source of knowledge on topics from trails recommendations/descriptions to the seven principle of leave no trace (LNT), and everything in between. I’ve also been known to teach a few classes on knot tying and pass along a few good backcountry dinner recipes. When the college orientation groups come through in late August I would challenge the groups to see who could rig the best tarp. Some of the platforms at Garfield are a bit tricky for tarping as well. It was cool to see the strategies the groups would use to attack the challenge. I was always happy to offer my advice and fix a few rain inviting mistakes. There is one educational moment in particular I remember quite vividly. A father who was taking his son and friends backpacking for the first time asked me to deliver a talk to them on LNT. I thought it was really special to see a father taking the initiative to open a discussion for his son and his friends on wilderness ethics and was especially impressed with the kid’s openness to participate. We all gathered around the caretaker’s tent one evening and had a great back and fourth discussion on the seven principles over some tea. It was incredible to see these kids showing that even on their first backpacking trip they could make an intimate connection with the land and offer profound insights on the importance of the seven principles.

-Eli Lieberman

Garfield Caretaker ‘10

Closing the caretaker season

The only thing that really closes the field season is two feet of snow. Right now, although the majority of seasonal employees have dispersed, leaving behind a string of campsites prepared for winter and a glorious new shelter constructed at Eliza Brook, the gears are set in motion for projects for 2011, 2012, and beyond. Priorities need to be set, proposals drawn together. Repair? Rehabilitate? Or, sometimes, replace? Or, even rarer, construct anew? The only way to answer these questions is in the field, before the snow obscures the ground, the platforms, and the lower sill logs of shelters.

At this time in the year, snowpack can accumulate rapidly and without warning. October and November so far have been mild, light dustings. As a result, in the past three weeks I managed to visit half of the 14 sites in the Whites and Mahoosucs, as well as return to the Grafton Loop Trail. In the next week I have three more. The field season is most definitely still in swing.

While the purposes of these visits were to look ahead, I was most inspired and impressed by the work done in the past season by this season’s caretakers. I saw strong sturdy cairns on Bond, I saw flocks of saplings transplanted at all sites from Garfield to Carlo Col, I saw newly stabilized tent platforms at Nauman, and I saw rock after rock after rock placed in the ground. The work is evidence of a dedicated crew, caretakers driven by protection of the resources they rely on: water, soil, flora and fauna.

Resource protection is the essence of the work we do here at the Trails Department in general, and in the caretaker program in particular. Our AMC campsites are proof of the benefits of the caretaker program, as trees regenerate in areas that had been heavily impacted by tents and fires and rocks stabilize fragile eroded banks and soils. The end result are campsites that blend effortlessly into the surrounding environment.

To pick one site out of the fleet, Ethan Pond is a testament to the accomplishments of the caretaker program: trees have grown around platforms, the shelter is hidden from the trail, and, most importantly, the sensitive bank around the pond has undergone incredible regeneration. Prior to caretaker work, the fragile bank was trampled bare from hikers wandering to the pond as well as camping directly alongside it. The majority of the work done at Ethan is invisible to the untrained eye, but one can pick out the flocks of transplanted trees, the long lines of scree walls, and the rock path that crosses the outflow of the pond. Ethan Pond today is a quiet, secluded site, offering opportunities for solitude and wildlife (rather than human life) viewing.

One project in particular stands out at Ethan, fresh from the 2010 season: a redesigned and reconstructed kitchen area. Ethan, along with 13 Falls and now Eliza Brook, has a designated kitchen area to consolidate food odor and storage to protect the site from black bears and other wildlife. The kitchen area at Ethan was muddy, sloppy, and severely eroded around the edges. The area was uninviting to cook at.

This is not the case any more.

Visitors to Ethan are now greeted by a tiled path to the kitchen area, which is resplendent with benches to sit on, stable rocks to cook on, and dry compact stretches of mineral soil. Beds of transplanted trees ring the area, and sticks of brush bolster them from behind. The design achieves the purpose of resource protection through managing recreational impacts. Or, in other words, give a visitor a good, dry hardened place to put their stove, and you will protect the vulnerable unhardened place where they might otherwise put their stove.

The kitchen area displays the full array of technical skills caretakers employ in resource protection: technical rockwork, revegetation, woodwork, and intelligent design of a space used by hikers, with the intelligence derived from hands-on experience in managing campsites. Use of native materials such as rough boulders promotes a primitive aesthetic. This particular project was designed and implemented by Ethan Pond caretaker Ryan Wilford with Field Coordinator Mike Foster, both in their third year with the Campsite Program.

It is a project that speaks to both their individual skills, as well as the dedication caretakers show in resource protection. It is an exemplary project, and is just one among many that caretakers quietly accomplish every year.

(Photos: Ian Fitzmorris (Cairn construction) and Ryan Wilford (Ethan Kitchen Area))

Volunteer Profile: Hannah Krieger

Dodge, Dodge, Dodge, Trails, Trails, Trails, I never wanted to leave. The relationships and connections I built with staff and volunteers is something that will always be a part of me and who I am when I walk the streets of my home town or am hiking through the woods.

Each leader I worked with on the trails or in the kitchen at Camp Dodge taught me something different about leadership. Lessons in optimism, patience, worldly thinking, caring of oneself other and the woods, not to mention some killer axing muscles were part of my life everyday during my experience on the Leadership crew. And they weren't lessons that I had to sit at a desk to learn. I learned them by seeing my leaders in action; and when it came time for me to have some responsibility around camp and on the trails I had stellar leaders to model my leadership style off of.

To anyone who wants to learn about themselves, how to positively interact with others and of course the woods, trail work is where its at. It takes mental and physical strength, flexibility and grace, a combination of things that most volunteer and job positions can't boast.

What I took away from my 4 weeks is a set of skills that I will use on future adventures in life and in the many future summers at Dodge and on the trails.

Read about Hannah in the Boston Globe: Here to Help - October 10, 2010

Photos: Hannah Krieger