Careers of Backcountrypost.com

Langdon Greene said:
If someone would just pay me to examine topographic maps for 4-8 hours a day..... *sigh* Surely that kind of job must exist somewhere, right?
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Hi Langdon - I remember you!

Yes that job exists right here at BCP. We call it Guess the Spot, Maps Edition and the pay is comprised of the respect and adoration of our other map-addled members like @Ben, @Rockskipper and @Outdoor_Fool and me, although I am at the bottom of the totem pole guessing-wise.
 
Well that is almighty AWESOME! Thank-you!!
Nick said:
Yep. First in August 2007 as my blog with aspirations of making it a community someday, then converted it to the community format in Jan 2012.
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Well that is almighty AWESOME! THANK-YOU!!!
 
LarryBoy said:
Finishing up the Hayduke (western third of it), followed up the CDT. After that, we'll see. Maybe S America or New Zealand, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.
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New Zealand is on my bucket list- especially since the prime season is in the winter (winter here, that is..)!
 
Miya said:
I love it! I told my friend that I saw some girls rockin' some cocktail dresses while hiking and it is on our list now! :) But I agree, hiking in heels would just be dangerous lol.
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ok..CORRECTION..I thought that was @LarryBoy wearing that outfit haha!! So I take back the TMO comment..lol..
 
AustinCronnelly said:
I'm a system administrator for county government based out of Farmington. I work a 4-10 schedule which allows me the option of 3day weekend adventures or a day that I can carve some outside time for myself. More often than not, I'll keep my kids home from preschool/daycare and try and spend meaningful time together, always trying for it to be outside. It seems as if the rest of the week is such a rush and blur of pickups, dinner, bath, and bed, that I consider myself lucky to have that option.

Probably my favorite part of my job is that my office is tucked up against the mountains and I have a big view out my window of the great trail system in the foothills that I'm able to get out and run on during lunch or after work.
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Ya-know, that is exactly how I feel..spending time with my family. I LOVE backpacking, but when I am out in the wilderness enjoying the reverie and my wife and kids are not, I would rather just be home with the fam if I had to choose between the two..kind of boring that way I suppose..just a family kind-of-a-guy..
 
Parma said:
I'm the director of licensing & trademarks for BYU. I oversee the university's logos/trademarks. I work a lot with companies that make BYU merchandise and the retailers that sell it...that's why I'm usually wearing BYU gear in all my photos :)
And as my side hustle I'm a hired hitman, primarily in eastern Europe.
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the hitman part..next time I'm in Armenia, good.to.know.
 
powderglut said:
It's been a good life ever since I left the North Shore of Massachusetts back in 1974. Accounting school at Northeastern University ...FOR WHAT??????
I was a dishwasher, busser, pizza cook, waiter, bartender in my early 70's ski bum years in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. Worked ski shops , drove airport shuttles and taxi. All mostly in the winter ski season in order to get close to 100 ski days each year.... which I usually did. For summer work... I started my own concrete flatwork company in Steamboat Springs. We started out in 1985 as 2 partners and eventually incorporated with over 15 employees. We built schools, hospitals, mega homes, condos, etc.. over the years. (basement floors, driveways patios, sidewalks, etc) which I finally.... YAY!!!!!!!!!...gave up this past year after successful back surgery. Years of gravity sports and construction will do it to you every time. Am feeling very fortunate to ski again and hike my brains out. I finally joined the ranks of Social Security and Medicare this January.
Got a great Utah spring trip planned (this April) in the Henry's, Swell and maybe a little Bears Ears. And finally.... my wife and I are celebrating our 40th year together..... with a 40 day trip to Iceland, Scotland and Italy/France wine country in Aug/Sep this year. Is it fiscally responsible? Probably not. But hey... gotta do it while all the body parts still work. As Warren Zevon said "I'll sleep when I'm dead."
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Rock on! 40 years - that's Awesome!!
 
Yvonne said:
Way back in Germany where I grew up, I worked many years assembly line in a small plant producing plastic parts.
Later I was a CNA for ten years before moving to the US where I earned my two university degrees in history and photography.
Since last year I work as a lava tour guide here on the Big Island of Hawai'i and I have to say it's the best job ever. Playtime 4-5 times a week and I get paid for it. I do the regular lava tours with small and big groups a well as specific German translation lava tours for the company I work with. This summer we will also start offering night time in Volcanoes National Park, so I will get a few more extra days each month and can also take pictures in the park at night.
I do only work part time right now, so I still have a lot of extra time to venture out on my own.
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Sweeeet! I've been to Oahu, and really wanted to jump over to the big island and see the lava flows, but time didn't allow - definitely on the bucket list. Wenn ich da bin, werde ich hallo sagen! :)
 
TractorDoc said:
The user name provides a hint or two. . .
I grew up in a family business as a mechanic working on construction equipment. I enjoyed my time playing/working on Caterpillar big boy toys but knew technology changes would make it challenging for small independent businesses like ours to grow/prosper. The obvious thing to do was apply, get accepted, and graduate from Veterinary School. . . which I did. Fifteen years later I'm running my own practice and starting to have some time to travel again. I grew up in a rural environment and have always had a love for the outdoors; that continues today but our 200 acre farm lacks the topography that can only be found farther West. I realize dozers, track hoes, and wheel loaders can be the enemy when it comes to the environment -- my love of machines and the wilderness walks a line of progress vs. preservation. At the end of the day though I would much rather watch the sunset in the backcountry instead of having a view from the tractor cab.
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@TractorDoc, its all about perspective: I also own/use Loaders, Excavators and other very nice hydraulic equipment to leverage my time, save my back and be in and enjoy AND help protect the backcountry more so than if I didn't have them. :)
 
This is an awesome thread! The more I look into this site, the better I like it..

I grew up in the construction industry: learning how to run a hammer before I knew how to ride a bicycle. In HS I was drawn to Civil Engineering and went on to get that degree at Utah State University. By the time I had my undergraduate work done I was self-employed putting myself through school as a licensed General Building Contractor and decided to stay in school and complete a Masters Degree in Groundwater Engineering (I find groundwater very fascinating). Hindsight I would have done my masters in geology focusing on groundwater (I love geology too!).

As I was close to finishing my Masters, I did a 2 week stint working for another engineer (some surveying, but mostly sitting in front of a computer learning autocad) I quickly realized I am much happier being self employed, so I focused my efforts as a General Building Contractor in new home construction. I soon learned that it is more profitable to develop your own property for new homes then buying them from someone else retail, so I jumped into residential land development, utilizing my Civil Engineering education a bit more.

I'm also a sponge learning what is good for the body and what is not, and eventually became a trained Cranal Sacral Therapist, if you ever heard of that - which I mostly use trading with other massage therapists/CS therapists. My wife calls me an encyclopedia for what is good for you (physically). Perhaps in the future I'll devote more of my time as a Mentor for good health and extending your quality of life, showing those who wish to learn how to completely heal from chronic diseases, injuries, etc..

I did suffer from construction burn-out and went off entrepeneuring: developed and founded an all natural skin care company, but after half-starving my family for 7 years, lol..I am back in the building profession full-time till I have the option of working because I want to, not because I have to. :)

One thing is for certain: I love being an entrepreneur and enjoy being my own "employer", while being outside. My wife and I chose to live nearby a Mountain range designated Wilderness area just 1/2 mile from our home, so I can be in it, often. When I am hiking, backpacking, trail-running, skiing, snow-shoeing I always have a smile on my face.

I must admit though: I have the most joy just being home with my family..kind of boring I know..

Oh, and every other weekend I save the planet from the dark side of the force as Superman..
 
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[QUOTE="Born to Hike, post: 106028, member: 3927"t that degree at Utah State University. .[/QUOTE]

The more Aggies the merrier... haha
 
fossana said:
What about data sci jobs?
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Ummmmm...... yuck. Seems like the vast bulk of them are in business (bleh), and/or are usually more scraping &/or tedious mining; plus, there's just so much ad hoc-ism in that realm... At the risk of shaking my cane while grousing "Get off my lawn!" ;) it's my opinion that there's very little science going on in most of those so-called 'Data Science' [sic] jobs. They want a coder with minimal superficial knowledge of maths/stats. Just shoot me now.

When a recruiter is more interested in products I've helped sell/produce, or in my SQL coding experience than in my publication list, then I'm 99.44% sure I don't want to work for them. "Dammit Jim, I'm a mathematician, not a programmer!" [How is there not a StarTrek Enterprise emoji?]

That said, I will take a Data Sci contract from time to time if it's truly interesting (rare) or I have the opportunity to do something useful with it for the public good (and/or can get another science journal article out of it).
 
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I'm a deputy public works director for a large city on the east coast. I enjoy it (mostly) as it allows me to get outside from time to time and get a little dirty if I wish. I love the smell of fresh asphalt in the morning. I also found out the hard way in college that getting a degree in civil engineering was much easier than one in electrical engineering. One down side of the job is I gotta work when it snows so I don't get to enjoy winter much unless I'm on vacation. Ironically, my high school career counselor told me I would end up being a park ranger. If she only knew how much time I've spent in national parks over the last 20 years. My dream is to retire to Southern Utah but the wife, being from Vermont, loves green mountains, so I'll likely have to settle for a couple of trips a year out there.
 
Well, it’s been awhile since I have even lurked here, but I read through this entire thread, and it was fascinating.

I’m not much of a poster here, but lurked often from 2015-17, and would like to be more a part of this community than I am. Sometimes it’s just hard to get over my jealousy of all you Utahn’s :roflmao:.


I am a lighting technician (read : Grip) for television and films in NYC, working primarily in advertising. Have been since graduating in 2010. Sounds cool, and a lot of the time it is! It’s also a lot of picking up and putting down sandbags(literally!).

This life has a lot of pros, chief amongst them that I am freelance; if my bills are paid, I can take as much time off as I like, whenever I like. (Hello month long road trip/hiking adventures) The cons are that outside of that chosen time, I can be pretty unreliable in my every day life as I work a minimum of 12 hours a day not counting my commute (no committed weekly activities for me), and often on short notice (oh, we had plans tomorrow/this weekend? Sorry, work came up.) Makes it hard to start or maintain friendships, something already difficult to do here in NYC. Another con is that this career sort only exists here and in California, and makes moving somewhere else difficult, which has been on my mind for many years. I’ve been in the NE/NYC area all my life. Been thinking a lot recently about a change(as has my wife), but not sure what that will or could be to!
 
It is looking like my ‘career’ may reach out and drag me away from my summer in The Winds. Hey, tropical storm Barry.
Mostly I’ve been an independent carpenter. As I got older and less interested in the physicality something else found me in ‘08. I work for a corporation performing residential disaster damage inspections for a federal emergency habitability repairs grant program. After storms, fires etc. people suffer loss that can lead to conditions deemed uninhabitable by government criteria and they may be able to get some financial help to keep them from being forced out by lack of means. I work on my own with a tablet. I’m loaded up with applicant info, we meet at the damaged dwelling and I assess disaster caused damage to real and personal property. Conditions can be challenging. I see a lot. Last season I spent seven weeks in North Carolina working Hurricane Florence got home for 8 days and then I was deployed to Paradise, California. I work as hard as I can. Sometimes I top 100 hrs a week. When I am on it is all on then it is over. Being frugal I can live the year on two months work. This all fits with my view of life as an odyssey. It can feel like being dropped into the Twilight Zone.
 
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