My local trail group, Mancos Trails, has made an adjustment to how volunteer trail work is going to happen this year. Usually they would meet as a group on a section of trail and go to work. All of the tools would be provided and delivered to the site. Volunteers would show up and work then go home.
This year we have the COVID pandemic going on and group activities are being limited, severely. The trail group works along with the United States Forest Service to maintain a section of trail known as the Mancos Spur. Currently the USFS is restricting volunteer efforts in part of the attempt to combat the pandemic.
Part of this is that large groups cannot work on the trail together, unless they are isolating together. To accommodate this the trail group is organizing an adopt a trail program. In this program we will be assigned sections of the trail which we can then work on our own, or with anyone in our isolation group.
As an added perk the trail group is distributing tools to everyone for the season. More tools are always welcome and tools for building trails will be helpful for building my trails. They even mentioned that one of them would be a Rogue Hoe.
We will have 3 goals for trail work this season:
- Cut back brush from the trails.
- Repair or improve trail tread.
- Report any larger trail issues or issues that we were not able to complete.
For part 3 we are using an app called Survey 123 that adds data to the USFS’s ArcGIS data for the area. This allows us to quickly and easily add a GPS point with notes and photos. If say a large tree needs to be chainsawed we will be able to let the USFS crews know exactly where they need to go.
Overall I am excited about adopting a stretch of trail and working it this summer.
Workout detail
I got up and rode my bike before work today. It was a great feeling to get up and get things done before work. I had a nice breakfast and then rode up and down the highway doing a few intervals for about an hour.
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