Anne Maio, president of the Mount Rogers Appalachian Trail Club (MRATC), is our September
volunteer of the month. And no matter what month, you can be sure she will be volunteering in some capacity.
Anne moved to southwest Virginia ten years ago after researching the area and learning about MRATC. She was looking for people who share her love of the outdoors, and she was also looking for volunteer opportunities. Since that move, she's devoted much of her time to the A.T. and to the club. She is also a literacy volunteer.
A retired librarian, her organizational skills come in handy as she keeps track of the club’s membership records, volunteer hours, and tool inventory and assists the Trail supervisor in organizing weekly work trips.
Anne also participates in and leads recreational hikes. She is involved with phenology monitoring, invasive species monitoring and management and, more recently, corridor boundary monitoring, finding boundary survey monuments (sometimes with a metal detector) and using GPS to note coordinates so they will be easier to find next time.
Fellow MRATC member Carol Broderson says, “Anne hikes almost every day, and she never goes hiking without her loppers and her saw. She often brings a can of white paint and her brush, too. Anne is currently in her third term as president. By consensus, the members agree that no one could do all she does as well as she does. Anne is a tireless volunteer for the ATC.”
Anne estimates that she spends more than 20 hours a week volunteering. As she puts it, “I like to know when I get up in the morning that I have something worthwhile to do.”
We are grateful that many of those worthwhile things involve the Appalachian Trail.