Our February Adopt-A-Trail work was a single workday on 2N49 to clear trees from the trail.
The dedicated crew
For more see below:
The work started as soon as we hit the trail head with the typical garbage left in the clearing. Locals are constantly dumping trash here, it’s a real challenge.
Anak and I set the kids to work while we carefully supervised.
Anak and crew work on taking down an old recliner for disposal.
Loading the trailer up with trail head trash.
Once we loaded up as much garbage as we could fit it was time to hit the trailhead. About 1/4 mile up the trail we came across Matt and he joined in on the action, I had no idea he’d been up there waiting for us.
Matt ended up having some overheating issues climbing the steady grade of the trail so we had a chance to stop and enjoy the view.
Matt climbing the trail.
While we were stopped at Pine Flat to wait for Matt a hiker came up to us asking us if we know about the car over the side of the trail, we did not. This vehicle left a different trail and ended up in the canyon.
Long way down.
Wedged in.
Matt and I hiked down to the truck and found it to be clear of people. It was likely a stolen vehicle pushed over the side. I later reported it to the authorities and found out that they were already aware of it. Getting that truck out would not be easy.
Now that we were done with that it was time to go do the primary goal for the day. When I cleared the Windowmaker tree a few weeks back I was unable to take clear some more issues because I was alone and there was snow on the ground. While none were major hazards they were potential problems that had to be dealt with, that was the main purpose of this trip.
The first tree was the Widowmaker, I wasn’t able to get it quite as far off trail as I wanted. Sean hooked his cable up to it via a snatch block to a tree on the side of the tree and winched it further off the trail while Matt assisted with a digging bar.
After that we had a hole to fill from the root ball of a downed tree. We utilized some good old fashioned child labor for that job then topped it off with dirt.
Next up was the twin tunnel tree. To take this down we rigged up a choker chain to a snatch block, ran cable through the snatch block and back to my Warn M8000, then pulled the first stage down and got it off the trail. For the next stage we had to make some relief cuts with my trusty red Axe then followed much the same process.
Matt rigs the choker chain and snatch block while I had the cable up.
Down comes the first stage.
Pulling to the side of the trail.
Manually completing the job.
Rigging stage two.
Tom starting on the relief cut.
Taking it down.
Preparing to move it off the trail.
Moving it along.
Manually pulling down smaller remnants.
Winching one last larger piece.
Re-spooling the winch line while the crew moves the last large piece off trail.
More child labor!
And the trail is clear once again.
Once we got this cleared the rest of the trail run proceeded pretty quickly. As I was coming down hill I noticed the left hand wheel on my trailer was low. I pulled over to discover a nail in the tire.
Continuing the theme of child labor two of Anak’s varmints took care of the job.
On the way out we spotted this pretty little creek that was not running where it was supposed to. A bit of shovel work returned it to its rightful bed and removed a potential erosion issue from the trail.
Just as we were about done with the trail we noticed this contraption. I believe it was used to drag trails to grade them but was either lost or discarded on 2N49. We disassembled them and properly disposed of the components.
A very fully loaded trailer.
A well-deserved Nomad burger (bacon cheeseburger with peanut butter) from the Cedar Glen Malt Shop.
All in all it was a tiring but very rewarding day. Thanks to Anak and his kids, Matt, and Sean for joining myself, Sebastian, and Charlotte. If you would like to see more photos of the workday click this link.
Sequoia