A celebration of Jim Langdon and 100 volunteer vacations

At WTA, we love to celebrate milestones. Everyone who completes five work parties gets a hard hat with their name. After 25, you get a vest, and after 50, you get an engraved hand saw. We know part of the fun of attending volunteer work parties is watching the number of days you’ve completed grow and setting goals to the next milestone. 

But one volunteer just reached a new milestone that we haven't seen until now. Jim Langdon just completed his 100th volunteer vacation. Volunteer vacations, also called “weeklongs,” are 4 or 5 days of trailwork with a day off in the middle to explore the area. WTA provides all the meals and volunteers share camp chores like cooking and dishes.

For Jim, 100 volunteer vacations, plus some backcountry response team trips (BCRTs) and a couple dozen day work parties adds up to over 700 days (and nights!) with WTA since he started volunteering in 2005.

That’s in addition to running the Friends of Badger Mountain volunteer trail work program and maintaining an Inter-Mountain Alpine Club (I-MAC) gear rental program from his garage.

When I joined WTA staff in 2021 as logistics coordinator, I heard about Jim’s reputation as an all-star volunteer with specific food tastes. I learned to pack extra oatmeal and raisins on all of his trips. At the end of the summer, we finally met when he delivered a dozen custom handwashing stations he rebuilt specifically for volunteer vacations!

Jim and a fellow trail crew member on Jim's first volunteer vacation, March 2005. Photo by WTA staff.

To celebrate Jim's 100th volunteer vacation, I hiked out to visit Jim on his 100th volunteer vacation at Moore Point on Lake Chelan. We surprised him with celebratory peanut M&M’s and a photoshoot to document his huge milestone.

Jim’s first WTA work party was a volunteer vacation at Peshastin Pinnacles State Park in 2005. He chose this trip because it offered car camping. 

"If it wasn't any fun I figured I could just leave," he said.

He recalled it was a cold week so everyone volunteered to wash dishes each night just to get their fingers warm. It must have been fun enough, however, because Jim signed up for three more volunteer vacations that year! 

Jim didn’t even think about reaching 100 volunteer vacations when he started volunteering. 

“I don’t set goals like that and who in their right mind would set that one?” he said. “I retired and wanted to give back to trails since I hike so much, but I didn’t think it would be as much as I have done. I was surprised to make it to 500 days.” 

So why did Jim keep coming back to volunteer vacations? 

“I like the team work part and (having) time to get to know everyone,” he said. 

He says BCRTs, which are more self-supported backcountry trips, are similar but "not quite the same because volunteer vacations have communal meals and camp chores like dishes or helping cook.”

Jim also found joy in teaching people new things. He became an assistant crew leader in 2007.

“I like showing people how to move big rocks and logs,” he said.

Jim (center) with Lisa (left) and Melissa Perozzo (right) getting comfy at camp on a volunteer vacation at Moore Point in 2024. Photo by Erin McMillin

One of his favorite memories on a volunteer vacation was when he  showed a new volunteer how to find, carry and set rocks in a staircase. 

“After several rocks she said the next one was all hers. It was great!” Jim said.

That volunteer soon became an assistant crew leader herself. 

As he signed up for four or five trips every summer, Jim started returning to some key trails each year. WTA staff and Forest Service teams shuffle every few years, but Jim provides continuity and knowledge of the sites. Jim has worked on the Lakeshore Trail at Lake Chelan 21 times, returning every year (except 2020) since 2006. He’s seen forest fires, washouts and windstorms batter the trail and keeps coming back to rebuild. 

Jim and his partner, Lisa Black, who is an accomplished crew leader, have become experts on some of WTA’s favorite volunteer vacation locations like Chelan Lakeshore, the Pasayten Wilderness and trails in the Twisp River valley. We rely on their expertise in the area. Jim and Lisa trained many staff members, including me, on trips to Moore Point. 

So after 700 nights on trail with WTA, Jim offers some simple advice for anyone considering a volunteer vacation. Have fun and stay comfortable! One benefit of a volunteer vacation is that crews are often car camping or gear is carried by mules, so you can bring a little extra gear. 

Jim suggests “a real pillow and a nice air mattress!”