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Trail Blazers Editor's note: This article originally appeared in the Boston Globe, on August 29. The author is the niece of RMC Trails Chair Doug Mayer. The article was written as an assignment for a summer journalism class. Working for a trail crew isn't exactly the most glamorous summer job. Sure, putting in 40-plus-hour weeks in the woods of northern New Hampshire, through heat, rain, mud, and mosquitoes might get you a tan. But it will leave some pretty impressive bruises, scrapes, and bug bites as well. No matter. This summer's Randolph Mountain Club first-year crew knew what to expect when they signed up for 10 weeks of hard labor. ''I like the hard, physical work a lot,'' says Rachel Hestrin, who will be a junior at California-Berkeley. ''I like being tired at the end of the day.'' It is Hestrin's second season on the crew, and she is joined by Roz Stever, a senior at Simmons College, and Maggie Worthen, a sophomore at Smith College, both first timers. All three belong to the Student Conservation Association, a national organization through which they found themselves in the White Mountains. While Hestrin, Stever, and Worthen aren't the only women working trails this summer, they form a rare group. Doug Mayer, who has been the RMC trails chair for the past 10 years, can't remember another all-female crew anywhere in the White Mountains during his time. ''Historically, trail crew has been heavily male dominated,'' says Mayer, who is in charge of hiring workers, though in recent summers it has been more balanced. ''I hope for a 50-50 crew each year. This year, the women applicants for the SCA slots totally outshined the male applicants. It wasn't even close.'' Looking back on her first trail work experience as a high school student, Hestrin remembers how quickly she lost interest in school when she realized what alternative careers in the wilderness existed. ''I wanted to live on a farm,'' she recalls, noting how her body missed the physical work when she was cooped up in class. She hasn't had much trouble with a lack of activity recently. The crew works Monday through Friday, usually from about 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., although depending on the current project, they may not arrive back at camp until after dark. Sometimes they spend days camped out in the woods. The crew participates in a range of projects, all aimed at maintaining the trails in the region of the White Mountains that the RMC oversees. On the easy days they brush out trails, clearing them of overgrown bushes, branches, and ferns. A more challenging assignment consists of constructing wooden water bars to prevent trail erosion, or building cairns, rock piles that mark a path for hikers. Recently, the women teamed up with RMC's senior trail crew to carry 700-pound beams, called stringers, to where a bridge had collapsed.
But in addition to their daily trials and tribulations on the trails, the women have had to face another obstacle. Working beside the largely male senior crew, the three have struggled with the realization that they simply may not be built to carry the same weight or work as efficiently as the men. However, over the past weeks, those differences have become more insignificant. ''As the summer has progressed, I've discovered that I can move the same rocks and pack the same things that the guys can,'' says Stever. ''It's just that we all have to figure out how to move a certain amount of weight with what our bodies have to offer us by way of brute force.'' There is little doubt that the women are pushing their bodies to the limit. A cut across Stever's shin and a bag of frozen peas serving as an ice pack tells the story of her most recent injury. Worthen, who has twisted her ankle multiple times in the past few days, unwraps her Ace bandage to discover that the day's hiking has increased the swelling. She remembers aloud that she had to wrap it in duct tape earlier in the week because there were no bandages. Despite these often painful setbacks, all three women agree that the experience on the crew has been distinct and rewarding. They emphasize the teamwork involved makes it special. Plus, there's the added incentive of a freezer stocked with Ben & Jerry's ice cream, courtesy of Mayer. When the crews are not camping out, their residence is humble yet comfortable: each member has her own tent, a semi-permanent structure that is 10 feet by 12 feet and wired with electricity. The first-year and senior crews also share a small house, the Jones Cottage, where such necessities as bathrooms, a refrigerator, and a television are located. But there is still a sense of being in the wilderness, as each day's project brings the group to another isolated location in the woods and a new adventure with new challenges begins. Worthen remembers her initial
motivation for joining the crew. ''I wanted to do something different,''
she recalls. Mission accomplished.
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And
the adventures don't end on the trails. One night a bear found
its way into their quarters and did some damage to both the compost
and the clean rolls of toilet paper.