EJ’s Update - Teton Pass 7/25/10

Randy Roberts and Tom Kholhart were busy yesterday picking out rocks and smoothing out the lower section of the Ridge Trial and Phillips Canyon Trail after the bridges.  Thanks for smoothing out this section.  I’ve seen it knock down several riders in the past.  This section of trail will now be much more user-friendly for our beginner-intermediates.

I forgot to mention the Inner City Youth group in last weeks report.  This group of roughly thirty inner city girls dug for several hours on the lower volunteer section of the Ridge Trail.  I wouldn’t really say that most of them enjoyed digging in the dirt, but it was a good experience for them.  Randy led a educational part of the volunteer project and let the girls ride a mountain bike.  The girls loved this, and were almost fighting over the bike by the end.  Several of the girls had never ridden a mountain bike before.  This was a great idea of Randy’s ,and we plan to include more education with our volunteer groups.

I also received report that the Fuzzy Bunny Trail is almost competed.  Harlan and his crew have been working very hard this early summer on this new trail construction.  The “Phase One” hand dig is now complete.  “Phase Two” will include some machine digging with a mini excavator on the lower Fuzzy Bunny trail in a wicked brushy and sidehilled section.  Harlan and crew will also be busy the rest of the summer reworking the Powerline Jumps with a machine and constructing the Candyland Trail which will connect Jimmy’s Mom and the Parallel Trail.  Harlan’s crew and the Freedom Riders are also having a huge summer of trail construction.
Mike Piker has also been busy this last couple of weeks clearing line of sight on our trials.  He especially focused on the Nelson Drive section of the Putt-Putt where we were starting to have a few user conflicts and blind spots.  Mike also worked with Jim Verdone and his backhoe to clean up several gravel sections of the Old Pass Road.  Mike also swept the entire Old Pass Road with pathways new Sthil paddle broom.  The Old Pass Road is now much safer for road bikers.  Thanks Mike and thanks Jim.

Have a nice week.

Erik Jacobsen

USFS

EJ’s Teton Pass Update 7-7-10

We had another huge week in the trail building world last week. On Friday we had a grand total of 42 diggers on the Ridge Trail with the FS/FOP trail crew, the Henry’s Fork Fire crew, the Student Conservation Association, and Waldo’s Nordic Diggers combining forces. That was a lot of workers in the woods! It was something to see.

On Tuesday we headed out to the Ridge Trail with the Henry’s Fork Fire Crew. We started up high and tied in the Hunt Trail section on Tuesday. It was a project that we started last year, but did not finish. The crew connected the dots, and now there shouldn’t be a question on how to find the Hunt Trail section.

Wed.-Fri. we worked with the Henry’s Fork Fire Crew on the lower Ridge Trail section after the BPA bridge as you head up-hill. Teton Helitack got a good start for us last week. It was nice to see that they had already busted out a bunch of brush, roots, and small trees. It was a huge boost and gave us a great start for Wednesday. The crew dug uphill and encountered very difficult digging. They called it the hardest that they seen. There were a lot of roots and rocks, and there wasn’t too much good dirt to work with. By the end of the day the crew started a long side hill section, and that is where they found the “red gold”. They found some great red soil. We brought out a couple of wheelbarrows on Thursday and used this good soil to fill in several rough sections of trail. We also worked the long side hill section, and a beautiful wide bench was constructed. On Friday we had the large force of 42 workers on the trail. We built a whole bunch of trail and made a nice connection to the road for the weekend. Over a mile of trail was constructed in just three days.

Waldo set up a great Pica’s dinner for the Henry’s Fork Fire Crew at the end of the day on Friday. The crew loved it and truly deserved it. It is the best that they eat all year. Thanks Waldo for setting this up and motivating the crew. Thank-you to all of Waldo’s donators-
Jim Verdone, Andy Olpin’s friend, and others.

Randy Roberts is back in the woods working hard. You can definitely tell when he is out there working. The woods suddenly get a lot louder. Thanks for keeping it fun Randy.

The Student Conservation Association worked the Ridge trail through the holiday weekend. They continued to work uphill, and made two more connections to the road. They are a good bunch of kids, and they have been working hard. Teton Helitack continued to work on the Ridge Trail last week and through the holiday weekend. I thank them for all their help.

This Tuesday the SCA’s made the connection to what we are calling “Shock Treatment”. This section really wants to be built by a mini-excavator. We have skipped this section for now and headed uphill to a section after the Hunt Trail. It should turn out to be a great section of trail. Galen did a great job with the layout in there.

Have a nice week.
Erik Jacobsen
USFS
EJ

Piker’s Report from Blacks Canyon 6-30-10

Spare a buck or two for trails?

Our buddy and eternal trail advocate, Walt Berling, is taking the St Anthony’s work crew out to lunch Friday to thank them for their efforts.  These guys have been tirelessly working on the Ridge Trail completion on Teton Pass.  If you haven’t had a chance to help out - here’s your chance.  Stop by the shop today to throw in a couple bucks to the cause. Fitzy’s will match up to $100!

Teton Pass Trail Update from Pike

EJ Update - Teton Pass 6/20/10

Chris P., Mike Piker, Drew Kneeland, and Walt Berling spent a lot of time clearing the Teton Pass trails this week.  They opened up Phillips Canyon, the Ridge Trail, Arrow Trail, Big Rocks, the History Trail, and lower Blacks.  Thanks for your hard working efforts.  The trail ambassadors have been kicking butt and doing all the trail maintenance this year.  Note that some big patches of snow still exist in the high woodsy sections of Arrow Trail and Phillips canyon.  I was up at the Phillips Canyon trailhead on Teton Pass yesterday and there were a ton of people enjoying the newly cleared trails.

This week is going to be a huge one.  The St. Anthony’s work crew is back.  We have this hard working 20 person hand crew for 2 weeks.  They will be working on the Game Creek reroute early in the week.  It shouldn’t take them much more than two days to finish, since the SCA’s have gotten so far.  There is less than a mile left to go.  After that they will be working on the Josie’s Ridge reroute.  This is a smaller reroute of about 1500 ft. and should take them only a day.

Submitted by Erik Jacobson USFS

Trail Updates

CACHE CREEK, GAME AND SNOW KING

If you read the Jackson Hole Weekly, you may have noticed that they announced summer as officially here.  What does that mean?  Well, aside from the occasional puddle, most everything up and around Snow King and Cache Creek is good to go!  Ferrins, West Game, and ‘Cache to Game’ are all riding nice and fine.

TETON PASS

Teton Pass is riding great too!  Arrow Trail, Snotel Loop, and Powerline are all riding sweet!  Lithium and Blacks are good too, but getting up to them you may have to pounce throw a little bit of snow (we know you’re not scared).  See you on the trails!