One-third of a Mile Closer – March 31, 2014
The last day of March proved to be a winner for trail diggers. We had a great team of experienced Traildogs meet at the Blakely Mountain section of the trail just east of where the trail crosses Rick’s Road.
The Progressive Trail Design (PTD) team had roughed in and machine groomed the trail last week, and it was ready after two sunny days for the final hand grooming that only the Traildogs give to a a trail’s surface. We started the day developing the trail crossing sites on both the west and east sides of Ricks Road by constructing four large rock cairns on each side of the entry points and installing trail user posts on both sides of the road.
We then broke into two team working the trail surface and a special effort on the angle of repose to remove all the loose rocks that might later roll onto the trail. Trail lunch was at a sunny spot with large granite boulders to rest our weary backs on.
At the end of the day we had completed 1/3 of a mile of grooming, stopping at where the trail intersects the old service road that goes to the overlook of Blakely Mountain Dam. The PTD excavators reached the gate at the end of Rick’s Road today and are about two days ahead of our hand finishing team.
We will be back on the trail tomorrow starting again at 9:00 am. We have placed some red flagging tied to a tree to mark where to park on Rick’s Road. My apologies for brain gas yesterday when I gave instructions to those, especially Chuck Dumas, arriving from the west to turn left when reaching the intersection of Owl Creek Road with the Blakely Dam Road. For those of you coming from the west via Owl Creek Road, turn right at the intersection and go to Rick’s Road on your left; go up the hill to the flagged spot and park.
Those coming from the east via Blakely Dam Road, just follow the road to Rick’s Road, turn right, and go up the hill to the flagged spot.
We are planning our annual trail hot dog roast on the day we reach Trail’s end at the Avery Recreation area.
See you in the morning.
Jerry