Spend 30 days backpacking through Wyoming’s Wind River Mountains — rugged, glacier-carved terrain renowned for sheer granite walls and alpine lakes — while completing a backcountry service project on the public lands you’re traveling through.

The course splits roughly in half between hiking and service work. During the hiking portion, you’ll cover about 50 miles through elevations from 8,000 to 13,000 feet, learning navigation, backcountry cooking, wilderness first aid, and Leave No Trace principles along the way.  

During the work-project portion, a Forest Service ranger will lead your group in projects that might include building or repairing bridges, clearing eroded trails, replacing signs, or cleaning up impacted campsites. You’ll base camp at remote sites for four to seven days at a time, putting in long days of hard work. 

As your skills and group cohesion build, instructors hand over more responsibility — you may travel in student-led groups for a day at a time. 

Leadership is woven into everyday —  expect to practice communication, decision-making, teamwork and risk management whether you’re backpacking or swinging a pulaski.

You’ll leave with the wilderness skills to keep traveling in the mountains, and firsthand experience of what it takes to care for them.