Backcountry Trails Program

07/10/2025

June was an eventful month for the King's Canyon crew. A month full of training, change goodbyes and gift giving’s, And the introduction to new people and places. We started the month off learning about leave no trace principles in class time, and by the weekend we were immersed in a three-day wilderness first responder and water safety course, taught by Taz, A fun knowledgeable instructor from Sierra Rescue. This was followed by a lovely visit from Chelsea, who taught us spoons and played lots of other games with the crew, and later by Miguel, who generously stayed with us all weekend to help pack up camp and take the kitchen gear back to Eureka. Saying bye to our sponsors, Margarita, Alessandro, and Jose, and Aswell as our beloved cook Kasi was difficult as they have been so kind and welcoming. They taught us so much and became a part of our community. Each of us was gifted a beautiful long-sleeved California Condor shirt and stickers by the Ventana Wildlife Society, who had been our neighbors at our camp in Andrew Molera State Park and had taught us about the majestic birds they care for. We also got to visit other project sites on our last day of work such as the complex rock work another CCC crew is completing at Mcway Falls, and a bridge repair project the sponsors are completing near Pfeiffer Falls. After an eventful last week in Big Sur and after heartfelt goodbyes we traveled to Kings Canyon National Park where we were greeted by our awesome new sponsor team! Jake, Kyle, Jess, Sam, and Christy (our cook!) And the new camp they had set up for us as well as a lovely meal.

07/10/2025

The Shasta Trinity crew has been having a grand old time living in the forest and chucking dirt. We've been busy bees this June fixing up the Sugar Pine Trail/ brushing, treading, cross-cutting and moving rocks. On weekends we've been lucky enough to see many gorgeous lakes by hiking to Big Bear Boulder, Tangle Blue, and Caribou, where we basked in the sun like lizards on a rock. Our community bond grows stronger through showing off our calluses, and shrieking in the frigid Creek. We put on an open mic karaoke night hosted by the famous Mae. We had a celebration for pride night and many evenings of catan. We had a Backcountry wedding where “tongs” objected. Numerous visitors graced us with their time and snacks! Shout out to Bobby Z, Karlson, Anna, Miranda, Travis, Morty, and Chelsea. With them we shared delectable meals around the fire and played campfire songs. It's been a wonderful and challenging time we can't wait to see what our next Backcountry camp has in store for us. We are moving to low gap this week. Goodbye Sugar Pine Camp and hello July!

Written by: Isabel Aksamit
– Hi Momma!

06/17/2025

Klamity Crew May Overview
By Sierra Green, Crew Supervisor

Dear friends and family of the Klamity Crew,
It's been about a month since the crew has entered into their new lives in the Backcountry and they are doing well! It’s been a mix of learning how to both work and live together while navigating new skills. Some of the trainings the crew has gone through include map and compass, How to start a fire, emergency action planning, animal tracking, and leave no trace practices (graciously taught by Adam the Ranger).
On top of all of that, the crew has been learning how to work efficiently as a team on the grade. We clear trails of fallen trees, overgrown brush and retread damaged trails. Each site has its own unique set of needs. To top everything off, the crew had to move camps not only once, but twice! Don't worry though, we still found time to celebrate our first holiday, simply called Quadruple B-Day (BBQ, brats, burgers and baldies). For those that are curious. Some of the crew got a fresh cut!
The first month for the Klamity Crew has been jam packed, but we've taken on every obstacle in stride. This allowed us to help the beautiful places around us and each other. I hope you'll stay tuned as we blaze our trail into the unknown adventures ahead. Wish us luck on this journey of a lifetime.

06/16/2025

Our crews are moving to new camps this week! Please start sending mail to the addresses shown. Stay safe out there.

06/16/2025

Sequoia May Overview
By Sam Boutelle

We cracked May open before dawn so we could pack everything we’d brought to Orientation into our rigs for the drive to Mount Tamalpais. We all rushed to clean up every last trace of our time at Placer Center, and by 7:40 we’d circled up one last time as a community of over 90 corpsmembers, supervisors, and staff to share powerful words such as the reminder that, “This is a work program”, and a lightning round of physical training (PT) to get our hearts pumping and our voices straining before the long drives to come. One by one, vans and trucks pulled away and began to find their way across California to each crew’s first real home for the season.

We built our camp in the final days of our first week. Sponsor Logan helped us set up a proud rainfly over our kitchen and central seating area. Tony, another sponsor, took point on setting up a collection of rough-hewn H-braces to house our backpacks and the kitchen’s ample collection of cast iron pans. Our supervisor, Sam, took point on setting up a pair of “white wall” canvas tents to house our kitchen and our community supplies. Our final two sponsors, Connor and Jose Luis, helped us clear brush and logs from our future tent sites. After a long day, we were grateful to sit down to our cook, Jocelyn’s, handmade tacos for our first meal as a trail crew.

Our home is perched at the edge of civilization. We can see the lights surrounding SF Bay on our horizon. We walk down to vault and flush toilets when we need to use the bathroom. We’re not yet bathing in lakes or creeks. Perched high on Mt. Tam, we shower off at the end of the day with sometimes hot, running water. Clouds skitter and sprint across the sky some days, blanket the bay and leave us perched above a silver sea on others, and douse us with a steady drip of condensation when the atmosphere decides its time for us to take a fog bath. Park visitors wander past our camp throughout the week. A local race organizer has shared poems, thoughts for the day, and support for our work when he regularly treks by. Weekends are busy, but our camp is still sheltered enough, even with an audience looking in as they pass by.

06/16/2025

May Monthly Overview – King Canyon Crew – May 31,2025
Written by Michelle Lopez Lorenzo
The king’s Canyon Crew has been off to a strong start in Monterey State Park! Our Crew has had the opportunity to tackle some front- country projects Julia Pfeiffer Burn State Park, and though we’ve been by the coast far away from the Sierra Nevada, being in Monterey State Parks has given us a good sense of the backcountry program right off the bat, and has prepared us well for he physical challenges we will face in the national park. May 1st began before dawn and with much anticipation, it was travel day from orientation! Several corpsmembers cowboy camped (sleeping with no tent) for the first time to save the time it would take to pack their tents, and to watch the stars before dozing off. Our truck and van were fully loaded before breakfast. After breakfast a memorable and powerful sent off by the BCTP staff, among them the energetic BobbyZ hi-fiving all 81 CM’s + staff in a big circle, before telling us to get out! Shout-out to CM Josh Cryns for navigating from placer to big sur using the GPS in his brain! He is from the Monterey area, has a great sense of direction, and his local knowledge has been a great asset to the crew. After setting up camp, we had our first 3-day weekend ahead of us already! Our lovely cook kasi greeted us with a warm meal, and generously offered to cook for us during our first weekend to make us feel welcomed, Fed and at home. Though our crews normally backpack each weekend, we had a lovely 1 mile round- trip hike to Andrew Molera beach on Friday, and a more challenging 5-mile hike up the steep east Molera trail on Saturday, to practice packing our daypacks with required items each CM will need to bring to work everyday 1 gallon of water, their first aid kits, rain gear, a warm layer, along with more daily useful and essential items. Finally on Sunday, we were ready for our big training hike, an 8-mile loop with our full weekend backpacking packs, and gear on. Over the course of the weekend, the crew learned how to make their itineraries, calculate mileage topography and adhere to the buddy system pinnacle of safe hiking in the program!

06/16/2025

Trinity Alps- May Overview
By Bella Nemling

Hello from the Trinity Alps Wilderness! May has been an exciting and eventful month for the Shasta-Trinity Crew. We’ve been busy building our front country camp, making it into a nice place to call home. Our sponsors are good teachers and have been showing us the ropes of our new day-to-day life. So far, we’ve had three weekend trips. We hiked up to Granite Lake and Stoddard Lake. Already, we’re trying to soak up all Shasta-Trinity has to offer. Andrew, Jose, and Daniel all got a bit older this month and we were happy to celebrate with them. Sadly, we lost our brother Andrew, we already miss him and hope he’s doing well. He also promised to write to us, so he better uphold his word. These last two weeks we’ve begun maintaining and restoring our first trail, which has been fast paced, exciting, inspiring, sweaty, dirty, breath-taking, tiring, and so much more. This new schedule is one we’re all getting used to at different paces. We miss you terribly but still have the strength to continue. In this next month we will strive to learn and to grow, we will push ourselves and each other, and of course… take so many pictures on the crew camera.

06/16/2025

Big Basin-Inyo – May Overview
Supervisor: Bren Mansfield

May started with an early morning at orientation and a six crew circle-up before Big Basin/Inyo began their trek towards the coast. Once arriving in the Santa Cruz mountains, the crew met their sponsors, Matt, Patrick and Jude. Setting up camp and going over the local area on their maps took up the rest of the first day in their home for the next six weeks. The first weekend was spent doing Wilderness First Aid with Liam from Sierra Rescue, who wowed the crew with his extensive experience in search and rescue and water safety. The crew hit the trail on Monday, excited to get moving after seven days of learning skills necessary to navigate the season. Thick brushy trails greeted the crew on the grade and it was a push to clear the walls of ceanothus which reveal the fire damaged trail beneath.
When Program Coordinator Bobby Z showed up to say hello, the crew was waiting with hijinks and lore, trying to convince him they were deathly afraid of the sump and that Criptids were lurking around camp in the night. The crew continues to search for the banana slug the size of a Volkswagen Bus without even a trace of the slime trail to follow.
With sponsors urging the crew to hike faster, Big Basin-Inyo supervisor Bren thought of the perfect motivation: if the crew could catch her, she would stop at a store on the weekend so they could buy snacks. Moving faster than anyone had ever seen them before, the crew launched into their hiking ergonomic stance and went faster than they even when “seconds” are called at dinner. They did not catch Bren, but someday soon. Speaking of dinner, somehow cook Alijah manages to make every meal the next best meal. Highlights include steak for breakfast, homemade focaccia bread, the most delicious pesto, and rice crispy treats that make the mouth water.
After two weeks of heavy brushing for postfire repair, Big Basin-Inyo learned the nuances of state park treading and different loads to set up with a griphoist. They completed their mission statement, began community events and led classes in the evening.

06/16/2025

Our crews are MOVING! Check and see where they ended up and send your mail to the new locations.

06/09/2025

05/15/2025

to the rockworkers of the BCTP past! Our 2025 April Crew Overviews are on the way, so stay tuned and stay present.

04/23/2025

Meet our Supervisors!!

Name: Steve Jerome
Crew: Klamath

Steve was born and raised in the Midwest, spending his early years in Iowa and Wisconsin. Seeking adventure, he left Davenport, Iowa in 2007 and traveled by train to the West Coast, where he joined the CCC Backcountry Trails Program in Stanislaus National Forest. After completing his Backcountry season, he became a crew leader at the CCC Los Padres Center in San Luis Obispo, followed by several seasons as a Backcountry Trails Program sponsor/foreman in the Klamath National Forest.
After finishing his time as a sponsor in 2011, Steve traveled throughout Latin America before pursuing higher education. He began at community college in the California Bay Area, studying psychology and biology, and later transferred to the University of New Mexico, earning a Bachelor of Science. Initially focused on pre-med and physical therapy, he moved to Reno, NV after graduation and worked in a variety of jobs including a job in agriculture management, teaching biology at a community college, and working in a physical therapy clinic.
A devoted martial artist, Steve also trained and competed in Muay Thai kickboxing in Thailand before returning to the U.S. and shifting career paths. Instead of physical therapy, he pursued a Doctor of Chiropractic Medicine at the University of Western States (UWS) in Portland, OR, graduating in late 2023. Now, he is furthering his education in Naturopathic Medicine to expand his scope of practice, focusing on internal medicine, chronic disease treatment, and injury rehabilitation. With a background in sports medicine, neurobiology, and functional medicine, he specializes in healing tissue injuries and addressing chronic health conditions.
Steve currently lives in Portland, OR, with his fiancé and two dogs, continuing his lifelong passion for medicine, movement, conservation and adventure.