LEARN MORE
Watch AMC Teen Volunteer Trail Crew members at work in the White Mountains and hear their thoughts on the program in this video. Teens and adults can sign up to participate in 2012 volunteer trail programs at outdoors.org/volunteer.

"Give back to the backcountry" is a popular phrase among AMC's trail volunteers, and anyone looking to do that has several options from which to choose.

Teen Programs
One particularly energetic component of AMC's volunteer trail stewardship is the Teen Volunteer Trail Crew program. The Camp Dodge Teen Volunteer Trail Crew grew from 150 participants in 2005 to a record-setting 407 in 2011, a year in which 496 teens contributed 18,804 hours to trail stewardship in AMC's North Country and Berkshires programs.

With schedules at capacity, a new component has been added for 2012. The new programs will accommodate more teens and provide opportunities to do trail work on AMC's conservation and recreation land in Maine's 100-Mile Wilderness region. A 10-day spike crew is scheduled there, as well as a week-long, all-girls spike teen crew. (Spike crews reside at backcountry campsites near their trail work sites.)

Additional one- to four-week teen trail crews have been slated this year in the Berkshires and White Mountains.

"We strive to offer youth the opportunity to experience first-hand trail stewardship, conservation ethics, and leadership skills," says Alex DeLucia, AMC's Trails Volunteer Programs manager. The challenge of trail work "encourages communication, problem-solving, and teamwork," he notes.

The teens' program is designed to inspire young people, and it's working, as evidenced in comments on the AMC Trails blog. This one is from Teen Volunteer Leadership Crew member Allison Cluett: "The work, while challenging, was extremely rewarding; rarely do you have the chance to create such lasting things that you could visit years later and say, 'I helped build that!' I certainly have a newfound appreciation for the trails I hike, aware of how much labor went into their creation and maintenance."

Adult Programs
Volunteer trail crew opportunities are also available for adults who can pitch in for a week or more. Venues include New Hampshire's White Mountains, the Mahoosucs, the Maine Woods, the Berkshires, and two national park locations—Acadia in Maine and a park on the island of St. John in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Other trail workers do their part on their own time, often close to home, as trail adopters. Through the Adopt-A-Trail program, volunteer trail stewards sign "adoption papers" and assume responsibility for a segment of trail. Work is done when most convenient for the adopters, but volunteers pledge to tend to their trails at least three times per year.

Adults who aren't necessarily looking to heft a hazel hoe or wrestle rocks on a trail crew can still contribute to trail stewardship through the Alpine Steward program, a joint effort of AMC, the White Mountain National Forest, the Mt. Washington Auto Road, and New Hampshire State Parks. Through this program, volunteers hike to heavily visited spots on Mount Washington or the Franconia Range and interact with hikers, explaining the need to stay on marked trails to avoid damaging fragile alpine vegetation.

The contributions of such AMC North Country volunteers as trail crew members, Alpine Stewards, and trail adopters are substantial. In 2011, 1,074 volunteers provided 24,209 hours in support of trails, an increase of 28 percent more participants and 20 percent more hours contributed compared to just two years prior.