It’s a Fun and Challenging Ride

I built a temporary bridge out of a 2×12 plus some bracing for the erosional ditch. It’s about 10 feet long and maybe 50 lbs, more than I wanted to carry through the woods. David volunteered to help me haul it so I strapped it on the roof of the 4Runner, grabbed the bike, picked up David and headed to Blackwater. Luck was on our side since I knew the combination to the first gate and the second gate was unlocked. We managed to drive within maybe 100 yards of the ditch. We dragged it through the woods and had it installed within an hour. I didn’t stake it in the ground because I don’t know if it will pass the safety test. Then David did some hole filling while I debated on whether to cut out the little oak tree or leave it. I left it and cut a small trail around it. The tree is a little to high for me to hop over but I bet someone could. We were back at the truck and doing laps by 11:00. We did a lap just to check out the trail, then 2 consecutive laps at a good pace. Then we had a quick lunch followed by another slow lap. I was tired by the end of the day. David and I got in 2 hours each.

When we were getting ready to eat lunch, a tractor came driving down the dirt road followed by four dogs. When the lady saw us, she whipped it around like she was running away but she stopped. She was just out collecting pine straw for her garden. She came by to talk to us and it turns out she works with Mike G. She also owns the donkey I’ve heard braying along with an alpaca. She seemed nice but it wouldn’t surprise me to find donkey and alpaca footprints on the trail soon. Some signs will be posted shortly after.

The phase 1 section of trail has gotten much faster, even the sections I was going to work on are now doable. The leaf litter makes it slightly slippery but I was able to keep my speed almost the whole 1.5 miles. The phase 2 portion is not so easy which is what I wanted. It’s up hill for quite a ways with several momentum killers thrown in. It flattens out a little but then after the bridge it’s back up hill again. I had to stand to climb due to the roughness killing my speed. There’s one more uphill section that winds through a pine forest that’s also kinda tough but once it flattens out, it’s fast. There’s one log crossing then it’s a shortcut back to the dirt road. It’s on this shortcut that I built a skinny out of a fallen pine tree. That was my project for today along with smoothing a bad section on phase 1. The shortcut is only temporary so the skinny wasn’t built to last and it probably won’t since it was mostly rotten but I think it will work for a few months. When I got done smoothing the rough spots, I collected pin flags along the established sections of phase 1. These I used to pin flag the trail along Redrock Road. I got about 2000 feet flagged but I need to go back through it to check some tortoise holes.

Something that’s amazing to me is that here in town, everything is starting to leaf out and the dogwoods are in full bloom. Up there in the forest, it’s still stark and leafless an the dogwoods are just starting to bloom. It’s hard to believe there is that much difference in climate. The schnauzer and I got 4 hours.

First Ride

I finally got to ride the loop yesterday. I had a meeting scheduled with Woody at 3:00 so my plan was to get there an hour early to do a couple of loops. I also had to attend a meeting at noon that my friend Christian was giving. Christian wanted to ride the trail also so it was going to work out good. Well, the meeting ran a little late so we only got to do one lap but the cool thing was that Christian has met Woody in the past and they knew a lot of the same people. That kinda helped break the ice. I guess over in Point Washington near Destin they have a bike trail that the forestry people built and maintain and Woody was one of those guys. So we talked about the trail some and he was ok with us bridging over the little ditch although he forgot to check if the pile o’ timbers was still available for our use. He also suggested we start thinking about blazing the trail and building kiosks. I think paint for the blazing would be the best so he was going to check on the specifications and color suggestions and I would do the labor. The kiosk might take a while but he definitely wants to start using the Juniper Creek parking area as the spot to park instead of the gate where I have been parking. That just means I have to build that northern section of the trail next. Out of the blue he started talking about day use fees. He said it would only be $1 to use the area but it kinda caught me off guard. I suggested that the club, having built the trail and are going to be maintaining it, would be exempt from the fee and he thought that was fair but he would have to run it by the bosses. That might also help with club membership. I think now is the time we need to create an MOU just to define some responsibilities and such. Anyway, we had a nice ride and I think the trail will be fun to ride although it’s still a little rough. I need to spend a few hours riding the loop and working out some lines. Hopefully next weekend.

3.2 Mile Loop

The Schnauzer and I got the loop done except for a couple of obstacles that I plan on building in the next few weeks. There are still some holes that need to be filled and maybe a few banked turns built. I haven’t gotten it approved by the people in charge but I don’t think they will have any issues. 5 hours.

It’s Getting Warmer

I’ve missed two weekends for various reasons I can’t remember but I finally made it up today. Yesterday was taken up with the Lumberjack Festival in Milton. Barbara and I were in the tree give away booth from 9:00 am until 3:00 pm. I was whooped when I got home but it was worth it. We probably gave away 6000-7000 trees. If half the people who got trees plant them and half of those trees survive, that’s quite a few trees being introduced to the environment. At the Festival I ran into Lesley who helped out on the trail back in the fall. She had her friend Jackson with her who I met at a party several weekends ago. They both wanted to help on the trail so I gave them my number. This morning as I was getting off the Interstate, Jackson gives me a call so I stopped by to pick him up and we headed for the woods. We started at 2050 with me flagging and him lopping. I flagged to 2064 and we cleared several hundred feet and rough cut several hundred more. It’s nice and open so it should go quickly next weekend. Once I get this small loop done, I want to hit 2335 to 2357 which parallels Redrock Road. That would make a nice addition if you parked at the wooden bridges on Redrock. That would be pretty close to a six mile ride and maybe four miles of single track. Maybe I can get that done before it gets to hot. It was 70 degerees today so I may not have much time. We got in 4 hours each so 8 hours total.

This is February?

It’s been unseasonably warm for February, probably mid sixties today. I hope summer is tolerable. Chris and David helped out again today and we got 1200 feet of trail rideable. They have been a big help the last two weekends. We started at 2038 and recleared the 300 feet I did last Sunday plus rough cut, widened and raked all the way to point 2050. This looks like a fun section to ride as it’s mostly an open area with some tight pieces through thickets. I haven’t scoped out the next 1400 feet but I hope it goes as fast as the last several sections. We got in 4.5 hours each for a total of 13.5 hours. I made them listen to Amy Winehouse on the way home. It may have scared them off. Tomorrow is going to be taken up with yard work, a bike ride and rain. Also, two huge cargo planes flew over, either a c5a or a c17, I can’t be sure. They lumbered over barely moving. Pretty impressive.

Volunteers

Saturday, David D. and Chris P. volunteered to help out. That meant the schnauzer got to stay home. David and Chris rode phase 1 while I hauled all the tools and two lunch boxes to the beginning of phase 2. Phase 2 is mostly up hill and with the trailer fully loaded, it was quite a haul. I set them up with lopping and cutting while I pin flagged as much as I could. We managed to knock out a whopping 1000 feet of rideable trail by day’s end. The only thing lacking was a good raking to finish it off. If I had more pin flags we probably could have rough cut another 1000 feet but I was using what I had. Lovely sandwiches were provided by Barbara and the weather was very spring-like.

Sunday was a day of a small hangover from the party we attended Saturday evening. At least I hope it was a hangover and not the beginnings of the flu that’s going around. I loaded up the schnauzer and we hit Home Depot for some more pin flags. We finished yesterday at point 2038 so I went back and raked up to that point and that’s where I started pin flagging. I got to 2051 and then went back and started lopping. There is a section around point 2041 that is full of small trees about 1″ in diameter. Trying to figure out a fun and easy way to get through that was beyond me today so I quit lopping and came back through with the ax and chopped out stumps. I was tired but my head had quit hurting. The schnauzer hurt his paw at some point so we called it a day and headed to the creek. All in all it was a block buster weekend with 15 hours on Saturday and 3 hours today for a killer 18 hours. If I could get two people out the next two weekends, we could finish up the short loop.

Another Half Mile of Rideable Trail

The Schnauzer and I made it up today. Yesterday I had things to do in the afternoon so I stayed in town and rode at the University. I haven’t ridden there in several months but it was just like always. The new trail maintenance efforts are starting to show. I hope it’s a long term effort because the trails need lots of work in places. I’ve been focusing all my trail work to Blackwater so I hope they are fine without me. Today I pretty much finished the trail to 2028 so that’s 2800 feet of trail that’s rideable. There are several holes to fill and a couple of big stumps to figure out. I also have two obstacles to work over. One is a fallen tree I want to ramp over. It’s about 18 inches off the ground and it’s still alive. I want to put a small table top over it. The other obstacle is the small erosion area that the trail crosses. I think a skinny across it would be cool with a small reroute for those that can’t ride it. So far it’s pretty rideable though. The Schnauzer checks it out by running it after I get a section finished. We also rode Phase 1 which is pretty nice. So that’s another 4 hours. Maybe next weekend I can get in two days.

Another Perfect Sunday

Saturday was crappy as far as the weather goes so we ventured up to Atmore to visit our friends Mark and Kimberly on their farm.They have goats, sheep, chickens, turkeys. What they didn’t have was a donkey. So for Christmas we got them one. Saturday was the day to pick it up. Now they have a new pet. I wanted to name it Odie that way it could be Donkey Odie (Don Quixote) but we’ll see.

Sunday Barbara volunteered to help out so we loaded up the dogs and tools and made it up there around 10:30. I chose to do cleanup today since I had help so we started at the beginning of phase2 and started trimming and raking. We made it to about 2014 before giving out but I think what is done is now rideable. With the trail raked, I think I can start pulling out pin flags to use elsewhere. Lots of gunfire but not really near us. So 8 hours for this weekend.

Only 3 Hours

Saturday was a wash. I didn’t get out of may bathrobe all day. The crappy weather and the cold made for a perfect day to loaf. Sunday the Schnauzer and I got a late start, not getting there until about 10:30. I forgot to tighten my loppers and I was out of pin flags so I just did some stump removal. I got to 2028 before I gave up. I gps’d the beginning of phase 1 so I could put something on the blog. The trail looks like it’s being used but the rain washed away all the old prints so I can’t tell if it’s hikers or bikers. We left at 1:30.

Another Beautiful Day

The Schnauzer and I flagged and rough cut about 1600 feet today to get to point 2030. The forest opened up nicely making the going easy. The only two negatives were a possible tortoise hole at point 2019 and a small erosion area at 2024. The tortoise hole looked new (if that’s what it is) so it could have been overlooked when they checked initially. It is right underneath the flagging for the point so I don’t know how they could have missed it. It won’t be hard to move the trail though. The other negative is an area of erosion maybe 100 feet long and the trail got rerouted right through it. I’m hoping they’ll let it slide or at least let me put a skinny over it. The Schnauzer and I put in 4 hours.

I only made it up once this weekend as we went to a bond fire/picking session at a friend’s house not far from the trail on Friday night. I think I was the best player there but that’s not saying much. It was fun playing those easy songs around a roaring fire. We made it home after midnight. The two teenaged children of our friend rode their bikes up to the trail and did a lap. And Justin’s girlfriend Lindsey has jogged on it a little. Another friend said he ran into a couple from North Carolina riding the trail.  It would be a nice thing to stumble upon but I hope they didn’t make that the goal of the trip. 

Saturday we had brunch at another friend’s house. To me, brunch is breakfast except it comes with alcohol and desert. It was worth skipping trailwork for. There may be the possibility of learning to surf and smoking some meat. Mmmm.