Rugged Mountain Outfitters

Three days left to apply for Pack and Purpose, and this is worth saying as plainly as possible.

This is one of the most intentional veteran programs Heroes' Harvests has ever built, and nearly everything is covered at no cost to participants, with food, accommodations, and all equipment provided free of charge. The only thing on you is getting yourself to Golden Forge Ranch and back home. No riding experience required and no fitness test.

The weekend runs July 10-12, 2026 at Golden Forge Ranch in Colorado, in wall tent camp with horses, a pack string, and a small group of veterans doing real work together in real terrain. The skills are real, the setting is genuine, and the people around you will be the kind who understand without needing everything explained. This is not a feel-good weekend. It is two days of early mornings and hard work and the kind of challenge that reminds you what you are made of, grounded in faith in the Lord and the grit you already carry.

Applications close June 30th and space is limited to five participants. If you have been sitting on this, consider this the nudge you needed. If you know someone who needs to hear about it, send it to them today because three days goes fast. The link is www.heroesharvests.org/upcomingevents and the sign up button is right there waiting.

If Pack and Purpose is not for you, there is a good chance it is for someone you know, and this post is worth sending to them today.

A veteran who has been quiet lately, someone who got out a year ago or ten years ago and still has not quite landed, a Gold Star family member who wants to be around people who understand without having to say much, someone who is doing fine by every measure but knows something is still missing. This weekend was built for all of them, and the only thing it costs them is the willingness to show up and do the work, plus getting themselves to the ranch. Two days at Golden Forge Ranch in Colorado, wall tent camp, horses, a pack string, real skills, real people, and a program grounded in faith in the Lord and the grit that does not leave you just because the uniform did.

Heroes' Harvests covers food, accommodations, and all equipment at no cost to participants, travel is at participant’s expense. Pack and Purpose is built around Mission, Skill, and Tribe, space is limited to five people, and applications close June 30th. Share this with anyone it might reach and point them to www.heroesharvests.org/upcomingevents.

Day five of the Backcountry Horsemanship and Wilderness Medicine Course was not a classroom day.

Students woke up knowing everything they had learned over the prior four days was about to be tested in a single, continuous exercise. The group saddled up, packed their animals, and headed out on a 1.5 hour trail ride through mountainous terrain with a full pack string in tow, navigating the kind of country this course was built for. Leading pack animals through rugged terrain requires everything working together, your horsemanship, your situational awareness, your ability to manage a string while keeping your head up and reading what is ahead of you.

Midway through the ride the scenario shifted. A casualty went down and students had to transition immediately from trail riders to first responders, drawing on four days of wilderness medicine training to assess the patient, control the scene, and manage the emergency with the tools and knowledge they had on hand. No prompts, no instructors walking them through it, just the skills they had built and the judgment to apply them. That is what this course is designed to produce, people who can operate confidently in the backcountry on horseback and handle whatever the mountains throw at them.

Day four of the Backcountry Horsemanship and Wilderness Medicine Course and students put the first three days to work right from the start.

The morning began on the ranch property with students applying everything they had learned, this time with a pack string in tow. They worked through managing the lead rope of a pack string, learning how to properly tie off multiple horses to each other and keep the string moving safely and under control. Once they had a feel for it, the group headed out for a short ride into the surrounding terrain, pack animals in tow, putting those skills to the test outside the comfort of the ranch.

The afternoon medical block was the heaviest day of the course, covering airway and respiratory emergencies including airway anatomy, airway protection strategies, and managing the unconscious patient in the field. Students worked through anaphylaxis and epinephrine administration, maxillofacial trauma and dental injuries, penetrating and blunt chest trauma, pneumothorax and tension pneumothorax, rib fractures and their complications, and finished with neurological emergencies covering traumatic brain injury assessment, spinal cord injury management, and burn classification and field treatment.

Day three of the Backcountry Horsemanship and Wilderness Medicine Course and the pack animals came into the picture.

The morning was dedicated to pack animal operations, covering all the equipment used to get a load into the backcountry and keep it there safely. Students got hands on with decker and sawbuck saddles, soft and hard sided panniers, and manty loads, learning how to properly pack, balance, and secure each configuration. They also worked through three of the most important hitches in pack animal operations, the barrel, basket, and box hitch, and practiced manty load tying from start to finish.

The afternoon shifted to a full block on environmental injuries, covering the full spectrum of what the mountains can throw at you. Cold weather injuries including hypothermia recognition and management and frostbite treatment, heat related illness from cramps and exhaustion all the way to heat stroke, lightning strike management, plant related injuries, and altitude illness covering acute mountain sickness, high altitude pulmonary edema, and high altitude cerebral edema. By the end of day three students could pack a mule and recognize life threatening environmental conditions in the field.

Pack and Purpose is open to veterans of all branches and eras, and it is also open to Gold Star families who are still searching for connection after loss.

If you lost someone who served and you have been searching for a way to be around people who carry the same weight and speak the same language without having to explain it, this weekend was built with you in mind just as much as it was built for the veteran sitting next to you around that fire. The work is real, the setting is genuine, and Golden Forge Ranch sits on 170 acres of Colorado land that has a way of putting things in perspective. For the weekend of July 10-12, 2026, it becomes wall tent camp, a working corral, and the kind of place where something real can happen if you are willing to show up for it.

Heroes' Harvests built this program around Mission, Skill, and Tribe because those are the three things that hold people together and the three things that transition, loss, and time have a way of pulling apart. Food, accommodations, and all equipment are provided free of charge to every participant, and the only thing not covered is travel to and from the ranch, which is on each participant to arrange. No riding experience required and no fitness test. HūmnKnd Films will be on site to document the weekend and tell the story the way it deserves to be told. Space is limited to five participants and applications close June 30th at www.heroesharvests.org/upcomingevents.