by Cyndi Garcia

RECENTLY, I READ A NOVEL THAT centers around migratory issues of the monarch butterfly. It reminded me of when I first became aware of the monarch’s migration. At the time, I lived on a narrow barrier island, and I recall being surprised to see a monarch butterfly so close to the Atlantic Ocean. It was miraculous to see such a fragile winged thing of beauty gain any distance in the steady ocean breeze. The fact that we were literally located on the eastern side of the United States and these dainty butterflies were planning a flight route southwest over 2,000 miles astounded me. Come to think of it, it was late autumn, and I remember being concerned that the monarchs would never reach Mexico by the first frost. It seemed an impossible task and I wondered why they had flown so far from home.

As if I wouldn’t fly so far from home. Thirty years ago, the day after my college graduation, I packed my belongings into my trusty old white pick-up truck and headed south into Appalachia where yellow swallowtail butterflies were in abundance and reminded me once again of the monarch’s graceful movements. I was 21, and on my own. I was searching out sources of nourishment for my travels both inward and outward. I needed to shed my skin just like the caterpillar in Alice in Wonderland who asked Alice: “Who are You?” Indeed, who was I as I emerged from my chrysalis and spread my wings? I was in a different stage of my life, perhaps my first real adult stage.

I had been hired as camp coordinator by the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (then conference); and this was no ordinary camp. My duties spanned from everything imaginable in overseeing a dormitory full of volunteers and staff who were willing to labor for just about nothing to do trail work on the Appalachian Trail. The employee manual was 29 pages long, and the introduction began with the following: “despite the discomforts of aching muscles, blisters, wet clothes, insect bites, poison ivy and lack of privacy, you will be rewarded by the excitement of working in some of the most beautiful areas of the Appalachian Mountains, the camaraderie of fellow volunteers and the satisfaction of doing high quality work on the Appalachian Trail.” We were a crew that summer, the “Konnarock Crew” so named after our home base in the town of Konnarock, Virginia.

For five days a week, we camped in close proximity to the A.T. where we built sections of Trail and performed Trail maintenance. All of our personal gear, food, and tools had to be loaded each week into the one of the three large passenger vans. At one site, we carried in the all the lumber that was necessary to build a new shelter.

At the end of the work week, the crews would return to the building we called home. It was an old Lutheran girl’s boarding school sided entirely in chestnut bark shingles. There we huddled together on the wide covered front porch resembling butterflies roosting on a tree. The house had 16 bedrooms on the second floor, a kitchen, tool room, and a huge gathering room that served as a dining room and living room on the first floor. There was no TV and barely a radio signal where we were situated at the foot of Mount Rogers. The only means of communication was a pay phone located in the entrance hallway.

In addition to managing the finances, setting up schedules, and picking up volunteers who flew into the local airport over an hour’s drive away, I had the weekly task of grocery shopping for the ravenous bunch. Unlike the larvae of the monarch butterflies that feed exclusively on readily accessible milkweed, I journeyed 23 miles to the nearest grocery store. On average, I would fill three large shopping carts full of provisions and made numerous trips back and forth to the van to load all those bags of groceries.

Over 40 people came and went that summer, including three crew leaders and myself. Some weeks we flocked together at the same work site, other weeks, depending on the number of volunteers, we dispersed to separate areas like the intermingling of butterflies. Virginia has the longest section of the Appalachian Trail, so our work was mostly focused along its 550 miles. It was a shared experience that I will never forget. Although I don’t recall the total number of miles of Trail we built and maintained, at the end of the season I received a thank you letter from the Appalachian Trail Conservancy’s regional director for the area saying more people were involved that summer and more work was accomplished than ever before. Our productivity and competitiveness was infectious.

At summer’s close, the tools were sharpened and put away. The house was swept, and the refrigerator emptied of its contents. The base camp would lie dormant until next year’s crew arrived, like the butterflies that return annually to their winter dwelling place to begin the cycle again, when the succeeding volunteers will devote their time and energy in ensuring that the Trail, which traverses through 14 states, remains clear and blazed for the next season of hikers.