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Cottonwood Gulch Expeditions

Knowledge through Wilderness Adventure

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a 'wilderness expedition' — what do you do?

Our expeditions travel to wilderness areas and explore them — on foot. Each group will visit several different regions of the Southwest: red rock canyons, high desert mesas, and alpine ranges. We explore mostly on foot, backpacking and day-hiking into the backcountry, but we also take canoe trips through river canyons. The wilderness areas of the Southwest are vast. They conceal remarkable cultural secrets as well, including important ruins and contemporary Native American communities. Just like any expedition throughout history, our wilderness expeditions have as their purpose the discovery of new knowledge. First, it is our goal to find new information about all the places we visit and add to our knowledge base about the Southwest. This includes a field guide to the flora and fauna of the high desert and an inventory of historical sites in the Southwest. Second, it is our goal to live and work as a community, learning to rely on our fellow Trekkers and to trust ourselves. Our expeditions demand personal responsibility and a commitment to the group from each of their members.

Are you backpacking the entire time?

No. Each expedition will take from one to four backpacking trips during the summer. The length and difficulty of each backpacking trip depends on the group, but the longest trip we do is a 6-day backpack. The trails are difficult, often over alpine ridges at high elevation, and will challenge all levels of hikers. Our emphasis is on learning how to hike safely and responsibly and we hope our Trekkers will become life-long hikers on their own. We take time to look around and enjoy the environment, traveling anywhere between 4 and 15 miles in a day.

Where do the trips go?

Our expedition trips will go off the beaten path in the Southwest. We travel to all Four Corners states: New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado. Our wilderness destinations are mostly areas that few others visit and include: the Gila and Aldo Leopold Wilderness Areas of southern New Mexico, the Blue Range Primitive Area of the White Mountains in Arizona, Cedar Mesa and the La Sals in southern Utah, the High Uintas Wilderness Area of northern Utah, the Delores Valley in the southern Rocky Mountains of Colorado, and the Sange de Cristos in northern New Mexico. Every expedition will also visit ancient ruins and contemporary communities in the Southwest. Ancient pueblo ruins include sites at Chaco Canyon, Canyon de Chelly, Keet Seel, Grand Gulch, Hovenweep, and Bandelier. Cultural immersion trips will visit with families on the Navajo Reservation and friends at the pueblos of Zuni, Hopi, and Zia. At each destination, we establish a temporary base camp with the vehicles and our mobile kitchen. We stay in each place for 3-8 days, taking day or overnight trips from the base camp.

How do you travel?

We use 15-passenger vans and a gear truck for each expedition. The truck, which we call the commissary truck, carries all the food, water, and tents we need as well as our mobile kitchen and our personal gear. It also carries our scientific equipment. These include GPS units, a selective library, many art supplies, and minidisc recorders for recording digital audio. We establish temporary base camps in undeveloped areas and stay there for 3-8 days, taking day or overnight trips from the base camp to explore the area. We spend every night on the road camping — either sleeping in tents or underneath the stars.

How dangerous is this?

Cottonwood Gulch has been leading safe expeditions into the Southwest since 1926. In that time, no member of the expedition has sustained serious injury. We firmly believe that prevention is the best medicine: our staff instructors are hired and trained based on their demonstrated skills and experience in wilderness situations. We emphasize sound decision making skills in order to avoid the risk of being caught unprepared in the backcountry. Our staff instructors are all trained in wilderness first aid. Our instructors are familiar with the emergency response units in all of the areas we explore, in case they are needed. As with all active outdoor pursuits, there is some possibility for minor injury, such as a sprained ankle, cuts and bruises.

What happens in the backcountry if someone gets hurt?

Our staff instructors are all trained and certified to provide initial treatment in the wilderness. In the case of a serious injury or emergency, staff work in teams to follow our coordinated evacuation plan, which involves local response teams familiar with the terrain. Again, this has never happened on a Cottonwood Gulch expedition in over 75 years of leading wilderness treks.

What are the projects like? Are they individual or group projects?

Projects vary from year to year and group to group. Younger groups, such as the Outfit, Turquoise Trail and Prairie Trek expeditions all focus more on group projects, while the Mountain Desert Challenge pursues primarily individual projects. In recent years, Trekkers in the Prairie Trek and Turquoise Trail have surveyed the local wildlife and plantlife, researching a field guide to the Zuni Mountains; they have worked on a mural in our natural science museum that diagrams the paleologic and geologic timeline from pre-history to the present; they have pursued projects in photography ranging from portraiture to historical research; they have sketched and painted from nature; they have recorded and produced audio logs of their summer on CD. Trekkers in the Mountain Desert Challenge have composed, performed and recorded their own music; they have researched the history and politics of Los Alamos Laboratory; they have built sculptures on base camp; they have created photo essays with photographs developed in our solar-powered darkroom; they have proposed innovative and rational recycling approaches for the Foundation to follow at base camp.

Do you do community service projects?

We do, but we don't call it that. Over the past 75 years, we have built strong ties with neighbors, friends and families throughout the Four Corners states. We consider this entire network across the Southwest our community and we place a high value on contributing work to make it a better one. When expeditions visit our friends on the Navajo Reservation or in the Zuni, Acoma or Zia pueblos, a portion of the visit is usually spent helping to construct a new hogan, repair a fence-line, or prepare for a kinaalda. These same families often visit us at base camp to share their skills and history with us. Similarly, expeditions may work with the Bureau of Land Management, Forest Service or Park Service to improve and maintain trails and campsites, gaining access to restricted or otherwise hard to find areas. Trekkers learn how to work with their hands in order to give back to their own community.

Can I reach a group on the road in case of an emergency?

Yes — we have our ways. Expeditions do spend the majority of their time in the backcountry, far from telephones and usually out of cell phone coverage. However, group leaders do carry cell phones and check in with the director regularly over the course of the loop. In case of emergency, the director can reach the group, in person or with a message, within 24 hours. For normal communications, the groups send and receive mail every day at the base camp and at least once a week on the road. Trekkers have opportunities to phone home when they visit towns for supplies, about once every 10 days.

Who are your staff?

We recruit staff nationally and positions are highly competitive: in a recent year, we drew 80 applications for three staff positions. On average, more than half of our staff are returning instructors and many of our new staff are expedition alumni themselves. At least one member of each group staff holds an advanced certification in wilderness medicine. Our senior staff and group leaders are all experienced classroom teachers and outdoor educators, with a wealth of curriculum development experience. All our senior instructors hold degrees in the areas in which they are instructing. The median age for these senior staffers is 27, while the median age of our entire staff is a little over 24 years old.

How many staff are in each group? How big are the groups?

We have one group staff member for every five Trekkers in the group. There are between 14 and 20 Trekkers in each group, although group sizes do vary according to age. There is a designated group leader for each expedition, who sets the itinerary and is responsible for all aspects of the group. In each group, there is an expeditionary cook and one or two other instructors who are designated as a naturalist, sociologist, historian, or artist.

Who are the other people in the expedition?

Trekkers and staff for the expeditions come from all over the United States. The diversity of our groups means that all Trekkers meet new kinds of people each summer. The one quality that unites most Trekkers is curiosity. For many of our younger Trekkers, this is the first time they have ventured into the wilderness. For our older Trekkers, the expeditions may be either a wholly new experience, or the continuation of previous experiences, either at the Gulch or in other outdoor programs. Trekkers often have strong interests, which they pursue actively in a wide range of topics, from music to mineralogy, from wilderness leadership to wildlife biology, from creative writing to cartography. Many of our Trekkers are the friends, siblings, children and grandchildren of former Trekkers and staff at Cottonwood Gulch.

How do Trekkers get there and back home?

Most of our Trekkers fly in and out of the Albuquerque International Airport, where they are met by their group staff and shuttled back to our base camp. Some Trekkers ride Amtrak trains in and out of Albuquerque, where they are also met by their group staff. Trekkers from the local area are often dropped off at base camp or in Albuquerque by their parents (who are always welcome to visit us at our base camp). Some families choose to make the travel part of a family vacation, and enjoy a visit to the Southwest together before dropping off their Trekker.

How athletic do I need to be?

Anyone in normal physical condition should have no difficulties participating in all activities. Our expeditions build to the more challenging activities, so that Trekkers have time to adjust to altitude and climate, while gaining confidence and experience, before tackling our most challenging hikes. Each activity can be challenging to any level of athlete: on backpacking trips especially, we often split into smaller groups, with routes and destinations geared towards the ability and interests of the members of the group.

What do you eat?

Our base camp and group cooks take pride in feeding our expeditions well. Each meal is prepared with both nutrition and taste in mind, using many fresh ingredients. The food is predominantly Southwestern in flavor, although each cook brings their own flair and style to the menus. One group is known to have had vegetarian sushi in the backcountry, while another finished the road loop with a banquet of steak, mashed potatoes, Caesar salad and chocolate cake, with crackers and cheese for hors d'oeuvres. While in base camp, groups eat family style in our mess hall. On the road, when groups are camped with their vehicles, the group cook prepares all meals with the assistance of our rotating KP detail. When not with their vehicles, groups take turns preparing their own food over camp stoves — selected and packaged by the group cook — in small cook groups of three or four Trekkers and a staff instructor. We eat well and believe in the importance of fueling our bodies properly in this challenging environment.

Do you offer scholarships?

We do offer a number of scholarships, funded by our endowment and by the generous donations of alumni and others interested in outdoor education. These scholarships are awarded on the basis of need and decisions are made by the Foundation's Scholarship Committee. Timely submission of application materials (available from our web site) will help to ensure with financial assistance. We cannot always accommodate every worthy applicant. We encourage families to contact us directly if they are in need of financial assistance or have questions regarding our scholarship program. Donations in support of this, and all our programs, are always welcome.