Cal Osterberger
Wilderness & Trails Intern
Middle Fork River Trail, Salmon-Challis National Forest
6/17-6/24/2026
It's somewhere between 3 and 4 in the morning. I am about 8 miles into the Frank Church nestled along the Middle Fork of the Salmon River. I wake to the patter of rain on my tent, the lullaby it creates does not soothe me back to sleep. In a bit of a frenzy, I fumble around with the zipper of my sleeping bag, make it out of my tent, and scramble around gathering my boots and clothes I had left to dry out overnight. Once I am back in my bag I sit wondering if my morning will be one of wet boots and soggy clothes. With this on my mind I quickly fall back asleep; nothing I can do now but pray. I wake next at 6 to my lovely alarm, I quickly shut it off, no snooze button for me this morning. I instead opt for setting an alternate alarm at 6:30, breakfast is not in the cards for me this morning. 6:30 comes quicker than I hoped. I stare at my tent for another 5 minutes before getting ready for work. Socks first, mostly dry, are slid onto each of my battered feet. The rest of my clothes follow before I venture out into the damp world of trees and dirt. Time to throw on the boots, my mad dash last night was not in vain. The boots are definitely damp, but dry socks go a long way in the fight for comfort. I grab my backpack, sit down with the rest of my crew (most enjoying a coffee and oatmeal) and begin packing for the day. Lunch, tools, and plenty of water take up about 10% of the space in my 80-liter pack. A quick stretch and briefing from my crew lead follow, retread day. After grabbing a pulaski, shovel, and small hand saw (the famed big boy) I set out with the rest of the crew to start the day.
Photo of the creek crossing we did in the morning in order to get to the section of trail we were working on
The day begins with about an hour long hike to get to the point where work stopped last night. A few creek crossings and a caffeinated Clif Bar later and I am starting to fully come back to life. One of my coworkers and I will be a two man retread machine today, powered by watermelon sour patch instead of gas; every piece of blown-out trail in the vicinity is shaking with fear. After a discussion on the proper way to retread a trail, work begins. The tread of a trail is what you actually walk on. Overtime, lengths of tread will deteriorate and sluff off into the abyss below the trail. We are working in a river canyon where the tread is cut into a mountainside. Tread blows out here for various reasons: water, gravity, time, and heavy mule traffic are the primary culprits. In certain sections, small rock slides turn the trail into an uneven rocky sidehill situation for those using it; this is where the shovel comes into play. My morning is spent one scoop at a time, throwing a shovelful of rock from the trail. Progress comes fast, and before I know it, about a hundred feet of tread has been rid of rock and returned to its former, much flatter, glory. Future trail goers will not need ankles of steel for this section anymore, and pack strings will glide by without hindrance. My coworker is alongside me with the Pulaski, a sort of shovel/axe combo tool. His focus is on the sections of tread where it could be said that there isn’t much trail left. He digs, swing by swing, back into the mountainside to reestablish the trail and remove some earth on the uphill side of the tread. If he does his job well, the next group that comes through here will only need to do a little shovel work to get the trail back into shape.
Several hours later, it is lunch time. The damp chill of morning is gone, now replaced by a blazing sun. We are covered in dirt from our toil, and shade is on the mind. After finding refuge from the sun under a Ponderosa, we take a seat. Today’s lunchtime discussion: underrated Saturday nights. Much discussion follows and I chase a tuna packet tortilla with a scoop of peanut butter to settle my empty stomach. We decide that, among other things, hitting your local bowling alley is a heavy hitter in the world of underrated Saturday nights. Lunch culminates in a quick trip to filter more water for the afternoon. Back to work.
Photo of the Middle Fork Trail where we worked, much of this section was where our retread work was focused
5 PM comes, and the rest of our crew meets up with us after a full day of cutting trees out of the trail. We join them for the hike back to camp. Solid progress was made today, and the hike back to camp is now closer to two hours than one, a sign of a solid day’s work. Once we are back at camp, we assemble in a rough circle in the “kitchen” (a somewhat shady patch of dirt) to cook dinner. Tuna mac is on the menu tonight. I fire up my stove, boil my pasta, and before long, dinner is served. Some hot sauce puts the chef's kiss on the meal, and I chow down while we recount the more inconvenient parts of the day. I clean my stove and pot, stow my food for the evening, and head to the river. The end-of-the-day swim is a vital component of my day. It's something I look forward to all day in the blazing sun, but now, as I stand in the frigid Middle Fork, I am having second thoughts. Before I have too much time to reconsider, I lay down in the water. Soon it's over, and I am headed to my tent for the evening, clean (relatively), in a fresh (relatively) set of clothes, and ready for bed. Once in my tent, I lay in my sleeping bag reading a book until I am rudely awoken by said book falling on my face. Seems to happen every night; today we made it about twenty pages before I dozed off, solid work.
The same routine will be repeated for another four days until I hike out and return to a world where Frank does not rule. In the end, I am a gambling man– boots, socks, and work clothes stay out of the tent to air out. Surely it won’t rain two nights in a row.*
(*Editor’s note: It did NOT rain. Boots were dry!)
Group photo of a section which required heavy shovel work to remove rock which had slid into the tread
Boise, ID
University of Utah: Biomedical Engineering
Cal is from Boise. His childhood was spent developing a love for all things outdoors, a time during which the Frank Church Wilderness left a profound impression on him. After spending the last 7 years living outside of Idaho, he craves nothing more than to experience the Frank as an adult who can fully understand how special it is.