View Full Version : Woo-hoo! I'm a maintainer
DiamondDoug
08-06-2007, 13:18
So there I was, huffing and puffing up a hill and swearing at ~whoever~ the trail maintainer was during my thru. "%#)$*&^@ stupid people who are supposed to maintain this trail, why haven't they (insert maintainer job here)," I muttered through clenched teeth. This happened on more than one occassion, as those of you who have hiked well know.
Fast forward seven years. This past Saturday I went out with Howard McDonald of the Carolina Mountain Club to be "introduced" to <my> section of the trail. I have 2 1/2 miles stretching from Big Bald to Little Bald along the NC/TN border, 30 miles north of my office in Asheville, NC. Now I get to be one of those clenched teeth muttered at people.
Seriously, I am thrilled. Howard and I had a great walk out and back (we can drive to the base of Big Bald), and I lopped low hanging branches and some briars each way. I've a shelter (Bald Mountain) to keep up with, and a couple of springs, so there is water and shelter if the weather wants to get all freaky on me when I'm up there. Up there is the right phrase, too, as I think the entire section is over 5000 feet.
A personal note, I took what became my favorite picture of my thru on this section. There was a downed tree across the trail that had been cut, lying in the middle of this lush gree vegetation giving the image a brown wave in a field of green. Most of the green was white fringed phacelia that was all in bloom, adding a white, popcorn effect. What a wonderful image, and walking with Howard on Saturday we passed the same downed tree, although the spring blooming phacelia is long past. (see http://www.whiteblaze.net/forum/showthread.php?t=10942 for my other, earlier comments about this section of the trail.)
I will try to do my best to be a good steward of <my> section of the trail. I sure don't want to open up White Blaze some day and read that someone wrote <my> section was not well kept.
Kerosene
08-06-2007, 13:26
Thanks for taking this on, DiamondDoug. I'll be thinking of you when I pass through in a few years.
Chaco Taco
08-06-2007, 13:55
Ill be passin through that section next week. Ill give you a good ,"Woop woop" from Big Bald.
camojack
08-06-2007, 14:00
Woo-hoo! I'm a maintainer
Me too. (http://gallery.backcountry.net/WorkingontheAT) Have been for years.
In fact, a group of us were on a mission over the weekend that included a cleanup at the pavilion in Port Clinton... :rolleyes:
Frolicking Dinosaurs
08-06-2007, 14:23
Welcome to a pursuit that is almost as addictive as stove-making and other DYI gear-making.
The Old Fhart
08-06-2007, 14:36
Those of us who know Doug have no doubt but that his section will be one of the neatest sections on the entire trail.;) Way to go Doug!
remember: using your elbow straps _before_ getting tendonitis is a whole lot nicer than using them after getting tendonitis
also: one slip with a chainsaw can ruin your whole day - get well trained before use and always use your safety equipment
Cookerhiker
08-06-2007, 15:12
From a tardy latecomer, congrats Doug. I hiked all over the place for over 30 years but didn't start trail maintenance until 2 years ago and I'm enjoying it despite my recent move putting me 160 miles away from my section. I've also started joining trail work crews (did one last Saturday helping replace a bridge). In fact, I'll miss some of the Gathering because of trail crew work.
A very heart felt Thank you to you and all the maintainers.
digger51
08-06-2007, 17:27
You maintainers do a great job. Thanks for all your efforts.
shelterbuilder
08-06-2007, 17:39
Welcome to the club, Doug. You'll find that it's more fun than people might think that it is, and the longer you do it, the more like an old friend your section will become. ENJOY:D
Brushy Sage
08-06-2007, 19:42
Congratulations Doug. It's a beautiful section.
Good to see you are still alive and well. I know you will do a great job amd you have a very beautiful section. Keep in touch. (By the way, are you practicing law or do you have that dream job of driving a van at the airport?)
superman
08-07-2007, 20:16
Congratulations on your new position in the world. I met you on top of Cheoah Bald in 2000. You were just finishing a pint of Ben and Jerrys. You were wearing orange sneakers and a bright flowered shirt. You looked like you'd just stepped off the plane from Hawaii. You pointed out the Smokies and named the mountains. It might have been Easter.
Life is good.
WalkinHome
08-07-2007, 22:28
Hey Doug,
Moved the privy at Horseshoe Canyon Lean-to on Sunday-where were you? LOL Have fun with your section-I know I have fun with mine (by Monson-privy was a helping hand) and I get an excuse to stay at Shaw's.
Tennessee Viking
08-07-2007, 22:47
Greetings neighbor from the Eastman club...and welcome to the maintenance life.
I hope you know what your getting yourself into...lol Walking and carrying lumber 3 miles in from the nearest access, pushing the loaded maintenance cart up a 10% grade hill, and hoping the tree your sawing doesnt fall on top of you.
Just kidding...well the work isn't but maintaining is really fun to do. Where else can you say...I build and move trail. Then you can lure hikers to help with maintaining by promising them a ride into town.
I just hope my club can get the Unaka Mtn relocations completed next year.
7Sisters
08-08-2007, 06:14
That's a great give back to the trail - thank you for doing this.
How are you instructed to "maintain" the trail. I have noticed there is an inconsistency in how sections are maintained. For instance, when I was in SNP, the trail maintainers were removing rocks in a particular section to make it easier to walk.
Oddly - I found this not to be desireable as the rocks are part of the integrity of the trail.
So who makes those decisions?
Thanks again for taking the next step in contribution to the AT.
DiamondDoug
08-10-2007, 09:19
Thank you all for the words of encouragement. Old Fhart, next time out I'm going to try and rig up a shower at the shelter. Well, unless that violates someones ethos concerning shelter creep (oh, let's not go there...).
And you Mainers, I got to tell you how lovely it is to walk down a trail that is real dirt, not a hopscotch through roots :D heh. I'll carry a pint of B&J sometime and think of you, Superman. After I shovel the ***** in the privy while thinking of Walking Home, lol.
7sisters - to answer your question I was given 6 pages of instructions on section maintaining. I think these were all written by Howard McDonald of the CMC, but they reference an ATC publication titled Trail Design, Construction and Maintenance. I received one sheet that is a general position description, a page with specific AT guidelines, and a sheet each on blazes, waterbars, clearing (limbs and other vegetaion) and procedures related to the moldering privy. Major work, such as removing blow downs, rebuilding or relocating the trail are to be left for the Trail Crew.
By SNP I think you are referring to the Shenandoah. That is a portion of a National Park, and the trail there was constructed by the CCC in the 30's. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but where the trail runs through National Parks there are different standards. My sheet says the [Carolina Mountain Club's] "goal for the Appalachian Trail is to keep it reasonably primitive but, at the same time, make it safe for the hiker."
I am fortunate in that I can drive to a gate within 1/4 mile of my section, or if I need to I can get a key and drive through and on a dirt fireroad get to a point less than a 1/2 mile hike to my shelter. From where I park it is about a 5 mile hike to go out and back, and I can finish each visit with a short walk to the top of Big Bald (not in my section; just south) for a 360 degree view before returning home. No side trail to an overlook needed; the trail goes right across the top of the bald. (Hi, Ray!)
I am really stoked to be doing this. I first hiked on the Trail in Pennsylvania from Wind Gap to Water Gap when I was 11 years old, and 30 some odd years later did my thru. Most people have white corpuscles in their blood; I think I have white blazes. I love being on the Trail, it feels like home.
Most people have white corpuscles in their blood; I think I have white blazes. I love being on the Trail, it feels like home.
:cool:
The last 2 sentences are worth repeating. I couldn't resist being 1st.
By SNP I think you are referring to the Shenandoah. That is a portion of a National Park, and the trail there was constructed by the CCC in the 30's. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but where the trail runs through National Parks there are different standards.
Correct. The Potomac Appalachian Trail Club (PATC), which maintains the AT in SNP, has very specific maintenance standards for its section of the AT, and the nearly 1,000 miles of other trails it maintains within the Park and north, east, and west of SNP.
These standards are agreed to between PATC and the various government agencies on whose land the trail(s) in question reside. The National Park Service (SNP) does have higher standards than, say, a national forest or certain state and municipal parks.
I am not aware that these standards in SNP include removing all the rocks, and if they do there is much work left to complete, but where rocks can be moved for safety, aesthetic, or water drainage purposes I think they may be.
And hats off to the newest additions to the universe of maintainers, as well as all those veterans out there!
Brushy Sage
08-10-2007, 10:28
Doug: From where I park it is about a 5 mile hike to go out and back, and I can finish each visit with a short walk to the top of Big Bald (not in my section; just south) for a 360 degree view before returning home. No side trail to an overlook needed; the trail goes right across the top of the bald. (Hi, Ray!)
Brushy Sage: Doug, have you hiked up Big Bald on the relocated trail, with the switchback along the northern slope? It still goes over the top, and goes through the green fields rather than along the old rutted road.
SGT Rock
08-10-2007, 11:07
Welcome to a new addiction. And that is a nice section to have on top of all that.
DiamondDoug
08-10-2007, 16:10
Brushy Sage: Doug, have you hiked up Big Bald on the relocated trail, with the switchback along the northern slope? It still goes over the top, and goes through the green fields rather than along the old rutted road.
Yes, Howard and I hiked up the relo at the end of our out-and-back. Even on a hazy August day the view from the top of Big Bald is pretty impressive.
Mr. Clean
08-11-2007, 08:04
I don't know if there are any standards for trail work except in each maintaining club, and I kinda like it that way. If the trail was the same for it's entire distance, it might get a bit dull. I see a difference between AMC and MATC, Randolph Mtn Club and Chatham Trails Assoc, and love the changes.
Jack Tarlin
08-11-2007, 11:49
Doug:
That's a beautiful section, you're very lucky!!
Have fun with it and thanks for taking this on.
walkin' wally
08-11-2007, 19:55
also: one slip with a chainsaw can ruin your whole day - get well trained before use and always use your safety equipment
Excellent advice. That can be a very unforgiving piece of equipment. I think it can ruin your whole month. It makes a nice kerf instead of a cut. Ouch.
shelterbuilder
08-11-2007, 20:06
[quote=Hog On Ice;389001
also: one slip with a chainsaw can ruin your whole day - get well trained before use and always use your safety equipment[/quote]
ATC sponsors several chainsaw safety courses (and crosscut saw courses for areas where power tools are not allowed) during the year. Set aside some time and get the training - it's free for maintainers. You learn a lot of neat stuff, plus you get to meet some neat people.
SGT Rock
08-12-2007, 19:45
Just be advised, there are some hikers that have hiked the length of the AT and think we are all a bunch of slackers that never do any work.
They will get over it.
On the other hand there will also be hikers that will stop and lend a hand - two that I remember over the years are Dare and Green Singer - both of which in separate times helped me to crosscut a good sized blowdown oak. Many others have also thanked me for the work I have done.
shelterbuilder
08-13-2007, 20:56
We often get "thank you's" from thru-hikers if they catch us on the trail with our tools, but the nicest "thank you" came from a husband and wife from Alaska who stopped and did a day's-worth of dry-laid rockwork for us when we were building the Eagle's Nest shelter almost 20 years ago in Pa.:sun
Bare Bear
08-13-2007, 21:10
It is amazing how when you hike you get a whole new appreciation for the Trail maintenance. I doubled my efforts after 2006.
By the way, those rocks have to removed to be sharpened and sent to PA for their sections.
SGT Rock
08-13-2007, 21:13
It is an addiction once you get started. I venture to say if I run across a maintainer while I am on my thru next year I am likely to offer to stop and help. Not only is it good for the trail, but it would give me something different to do for a while. I find immense satisfaction when I walk over a section where I have cleared a blow down or restored the tread-way in the past. I feel more connected to the trail when I have sweat equity in it.
As to you hikers that haven't done it yet, you really ought to give it a try.
camojack
08-13-2007, 21:54
We often get "thank you's" from thru-hikers if they catch us on the trail with our tools, but the nicest "thank you" came from a husband and wife from Alaska who stopped and did a day's-worth of dry-laid rockwork for us when we were building the Eagle's Nest shelter almost 20 years ago in Pa.:sun
Yes, it's always nice when they express appreciation. :p
Tennessee Viking
08-14-2007, 00:00
My clubs trail maintenence standards change depending on the environment, biological, erosion testing, rock/soil surveys, and a bunch of other factors.
My section was once maintained by the Forest Service, so we have a lot of forest service shelters with no privies. And when my club first started making trail back in the 50s-60s, no one really understood the erosion effect. So on a number a portions, we have trail thats crosses over the top of knobs and summits with climbs through run off gully. But now we now practice hillside digs.
In wilderness areas only non-mechanized tools can be used. So maintaing is a bit harder.
Most of our trail building is learned on hand. We do provide members with information on erosion prevention technics like water barring, dips, and such. Then when ATC trail crews come and visit, the trail leader usually helps in teaching our members new techniques.
shelterbuilder
08-14-2007, 15:35
We generally try to follow ATC recommendations for maintenence, but sometimes there are exceptions, like using blowdowns instead of removing them. My section (2 1/2 miles, around the William Penn Shelter) is prone to alternating bouts of horse and ATV abuse. The horses are hard to keep out; you have to try to block access trails with a well-placed "blowdown" at chest-to-head height. (And man, is it tough to get the "No Horses" signs up high enough that a rider can't reach up and tear them down!):mad: But ATV's need to be blocked with several well-placed deadfalls on the ground across both access and the AT in areas where they can't ride around the tree. Eventually, they get tired of playing the game and go home!:D
Our club (Susquehanna A.T. Club http://www.satc-hike.org ) until recently did not have individual maintainers but when recently our A.T. section doubled in length individual maintainers are now assigned. I'm proud to be one (Yellow Springs hollow to Cold Spring Trail) The standards given us are https://www.atctrailstore.org/catalog/iteminfo.cfm?itemid=113&compid=1 . Here's a set of standards from another footpath that get to the point more quickly: http://www.hike-mst.org/overseers.pdf
shelterbuilder
08-15-2007, 20:28
Our club (Susquehanna A.T. Club http://www.satc-hike.org ) until recently did not have individual maintainers but when recently our A.T. section doubled in length individual maintainers are now assigned. I'm proud to be one (Yellow Springs hollow to Cold Spring Trail) The standards given us are https://www.atctrailstore.org/catalog/iteminfo.cfm?itemid=113&compid=1 . Here's a set of standards from another footpath that get to the point more quickly: http://www.hike-mst.org/overseers.pdf
Did you folks absorb Wilmington's old section through St. Anthony's wilderness?
Tennessee Viking
08-15-2007, 23:57
We generally try to follow ATC recommendations for maintenence, but sometimes there are exceptions, like using blowdowns instead of removing them. My section (2 1/2 miles, around the William Penn Shelter) is prone to alternating bouts of horse and ATV abuse. The horses are hard to keep out; you have to try to block access trails with a well-placed "blowdown" at chest-to-head height. (And man, is it tough to get the "No Horses" signs up high enough that a rider can't reach up and tear them down!):mad: But ATV's need to be blocked with several well-placed deadfalls on the ground across both access and the AT in areas where they can't ride around the tree. Eventually, they get tired of playing the game and go home!:D
You should see what we are having to do. We have large amounts of trail abuse around the town of Roan Mtn. On the Elk River section in TN/NC we have a 40 footer on trail, but with a couple genuis cuts where only hikers can manuever through. Then we are about to start on a relo because some yocal keeps littering the trail, while the sheriff is taking time on this case. The forest service and my club even have video on of the guy littering. But its been 3 years since we started our complaining.
Did you folks absorb Wilmington's old section through St. Anthony's wilderness?
Brandywine Valley Outing Club's, yes. SATC's section is now PA 225 north crossing PA 325 to the turnoff to Rausch Gap shelter, from there north inclusive of shelter is BMECC. The remains of BVOC still are maintainers of Cold Spring trail north to Rausch Gap nominally now under SATC.
Pennsylvania Rose
08-16-2007, 08:28
Thanks a million to all of you maintainers! Wish I lived close enough to the trail to maintain. I had a blast working on the Konnarock and Vermont crews years ago and can't wait to have an opportunity to go back.
Hey Doug, welcome to the neighborhood. I have the section next to yours. I recently got dropped off on Big Bald by Ms. Janet so I could weedeat my section from Little Blad to Spivey Gap, much easier walking downhill ;) You are lucky you can drive to Big Bald and walk the fairly easy and very beautiful 2 miles of your section and back where I have 5 miles of all up hill from Spivey to Little Bald (aka Big Harry) then have to walk back ! It used to be not that hard but after 16 yrs of doing it I just can't do it like I could back then ! lol
I had just met the guy before you to see if he could take me up on some of his trips there to save me some driving logistics but he got a job offer and moved away. If you would be willing to get together sometime I would love a ride up so I can work my section one way and not have to make the drive back up there to retrieve a vehicle. I would even be willing to help with your section, we used to do it back in the day anyway caz it was on the way and not many have ever stuck with it and let it grow up out on the ridge. I am glad that section now has a new and eager maintainer ! Howard is a great guy and will really help you alot.
I have alot of forest service tools, weedeaters and about anything you may need, have 10 yrs. experience working with Konnarock crews as worker and crew leader, feel free to holler at me here anytime , in a PM, or send me an email, we should get to gether sometime. I have my section pretty much done for this year other than some blaze painting later this fall and am ready to go on a pleasure hike for once (don't get much time for that as a maintainer, always something needs doin ha ha) Thanks for your efforts and again big howdy and welcome to the neighborhood on our mountain and here at WB !
RAT>PATROL
DiamondDoug
08-20-2007, 09:39
Thanks Rat. How'd the hill look just at the start of my section? I'm thinking I need to weedeat it. Maybe I'll just get some goats. Now where did Moxie go? :p
Yeah, we can try to coordinate some. Send me a pm and we can hook up. What do you think about doing some magic on the top of Big Bald next spring?