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Sep. 15th, 2009 10:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Referring to the map I posted yesterday will help you understand today's posting.
We recall that priority one from yesterday was to drive up and down Oregon Road until we located Big Fill on the neatly redone and clear and easy-to-find signs. Drive down Oregon Road, locate Big FIll trail (again) and go down it from Oregon to cross Pike to ATV trail, see if it is (a) real and (b) passable for horses and (c) connects to ATV trail as advertised. Well. No Big Fill trail and I was totally fucking looking for it. Big Fill, I decided, was Big Fat Lie.
So I turned to Priority Two: Drive down Oregon Road, locate Big Fill and follow uphill to Woodridge Road. Walk length of Woodridge Road to Red Bank, walk back on Oregon Road to car (this part should be downhill), drive home. No Big Fill, so no Priority Two.
Priority Three: Up to the left on the ATV trail and then out Fisher to Snowfield. Down Snowfield. Come back on bottom-valley ATV trail (already walked but mostly level and should go quickly) and look for the alleged Big Fill trail that was not visible last time. This, I could do, but as I was already over on Oregon Road, I got to thinking. I could check Red Bank down from Oregon Road across the Pike and across the creek. I could go up Red Bank (nicely steep) and go out the ridge on the atv trail to Snowfield (nicely steep) and head down Snowfield (thus killing the two vertical segments of the trail) and then come back on the valley-bottom atv trail (to look for Big Fill yet again) and then go across on Big Fill OR continue on to Red Bank and come back on Red Bank.
How'd that go? Red Bank was longer and steeper than I remembered it being. It was also entirely suitable for doing with horses. The ridge out to Snowfield is perfectly OK for horses. Snowfield heading downhill has better footing than Red Bank and is also quite arguably less-steep than sections of Red Bank. Our kiddies are going to go UP Red Bank and out the ridge and then DOWN Snowfield. It'll be good practice. (One can argue that I'm doing the scared straight of trail rides, but one can also argue that riding in the flatlanded valleys on lovely two-track dirt roads isn't very fucking trail-like. We live smack in the middle of the Ridge-n-Valley Province, for fuck's sake. It's not fair to just do the valleys.
Coming down Snowfield, I located Big Fill. Finally. It's a trainwreck of fallen trees, looks like pick-up sticks. The section of James Buchanan State Forest in which I am scouting trail is relatively remote. It's low-traffic and not used all that frequently by hikers or horse riders. The trails are pretty damn challenging and the part where I'm working is not particularly accessible to normal humans. They'd have to walk three or four miles to *get* to the damn trails, y'see. Where I'm going with this is that the poor McConnellsburg ranger people have other, more heavily-used areas to maintain trail. Big Fill will get on the roster next time around, probably, but right now it's not useful for riding on. So, the Big Fill portion of the thing is out. Damn out.
Rerouting, Ho!
We have received reports that the deer exclusion fence on the ridge is gone. We have also received reports that the deer exclusion fence on the ridge is still there. One set of reports is wrong. So, now I have to walk the fucking ridge myself out to the Garlick Road junction. Bugger. Maybe I can get someone to drive me up the damned mountain. They could just drop me off up there -- I can get myself back down all right, not even horribly far from home and all downhill. That would be easy.
So. Things remaining to scout.
1. Is the ridge clear of deer exclusion fence? This is an important question because it adds about two miles of fairly easy ridge work *and* has a really nice beefy hill climb early on in the ride to settle everyone's damn hash. The wiggling about with the other hill effort early in the game is an attempt to replicate the road up to Hull's without having the road up to Hull's.
If the ridge is clear, we can truck out the ridge, go DOWN on the ATV trail at Garlick Road, then hit the bottom of the valley, go UP Red Bank, go out the ridge to Snowfield, come DOWN Snowfield, out bottom of valley along the atv trail back to Red Bank, cross creek (everyone drink big), and then slog it home easy peasy on Oregon Road and the valley road. If the ridge is clear, I'm fucking well done scouting and the ride is ready to go. Scouting the ridge is priority one.
2. If ridge is not clear of deer exclusion fence, then there will need to be scouting of Woodridge and its connections (if any ) with Oregon Road so that I'll have enough distance to make ten miles. There will be at least some uphill scouting on this part and there is no way to make it easier. Priority two.
3. If ridge is not clear or if it is, I need to scout the slant up to the road to Hull's from above the Ray's Hill Tunnel. This can be an easy downhill walk if someone drops me off at the top end of the thing. Priority three -- even if I have to walk it, it's quick and easy.
We recall that priority one from yesterday was to drive up and down Oregon Road until we located Big Fill on the neatly redone and clear and easy-to-find signs. Drive down Oregon Road, locate Big FIll trail (again) and go down it from Oregon to cross Pike to ATV trail, see if it is (a) real and (b) passable for horses and (c) connects to ATV trail as advertised. Well. No Big Fill trail and I was totally fucking looking for it. Big Fill, I decided, was Big Fat Lie.
So I turned to Priority Two: Drive down Oregon Road, locate Big Fill and follow uphill to Woodridge Road. Walk length of Woodridge Road to Red Bank, walk back on Oregon Road to car (this part should be downhill), drive home. No Big Fill, so no Priority Two.
Priority Three: Up to the left on the ATV trail and then out Fisher to Snowfield. Down Snowfield. Come back on bottom-valley ATV trail (already walked but mostly level and should go quickly) and look for the alleged Big Fill trail that was not visible last time. This, I could do, but as I was already over on Oregon Road, I got to thinking. I could check Red Bank down from Oregon Road across the Pike and across the creek. I could go up Red Bank (nicely steep) and go out the ridge on the atv trail to Snowfield (nicely steep) and head down Snowfield (thus killing the two vertical segments of the trail) and then come back on the valley-bottom atv trail (to look for Big Fill yet again) and then go across on Big Fill OR continue on to Red Bank and come back on Red Bank.
How'd that go? Red Bank was longer and steeper than I remembered it being. It was also entirely suitable for doing with horses. The ridge out to Snowfield is perfectly OK for horses. Snowfield heading downhill has better footing than Red Bank and is also quite arguably less-steep than sections of Red Bank. Our kiddies are going to go UP Red Bank and out the ridge and then DOWN Snowfield. It'll be good practice. (One can argue that I'm doing the scared straight of trail rides, but one can also argue that riding in the flatlanded valleys on lovely two-track dirt roads isn't very fucking trail-like. We live smack in the middle of the Ridge-n-Valley Province, for fuck's sake. It's not fair to just do the valleys.
Coming down Snowfield, I located Big Fill. Finally. It's a trainwreck of fallen trees, looks like pick-up sticks. The section of James Buchanan State Forest in which I am scouting trail is relatively remote. It's low-traffic and not used all that frequently by hikers or horse riders. The trails are pretty damn challenging and the part where I'm working is not particularly accessible to normal humans. They'd have to walk three or four miles to *get* to the damn trails, y'see. Where I'm going with this is that the poor McConnellsburg ranger people have other, more heavily-used areas to maintain trail. Big Fill will get on the roster next time around, probably, but right now it's not useful for riding on. So, the Big Fill portion of the thing is out. Damn out.
Rerouting, Ho!
We have received reports that the deer exclusion fence on the ridge is gone. We have also received reports that the deer exclusion fence on the ridge is still there. One set of reports is wrong. So, now I have to walk the fucking ridge myself out to the Garlick Road junction. Bugger. Maybe I can get someone to drive me up the damned mountain. They could just drop me off up there -- I can get myself back down all right, not even horribly far from home and all downhill. That would be easy.
So. Things remaining to scout.
1. Is the ridge clear of deer exclusion fence? This is an important question because it adds about two miles of fairly easy ridge work *and* has a really nice beefy hill climb early on in the ride to settle everyone's damn hash. The wiggling about with the other hill effort early in the game is an attempt to replicate the road up to Hull's without having the road up to Hull's.
If the ridge is clear, we can truck out the ridge, go DOWN on the ATV trail at Garlick Road, then hit the bottom of the valley, go UP Red Bank, go out the ridge to Snowfield, come DOWN Snowfield, out bottom of valley along the atv trail back to Red Bank, cross creek (everyone drink big), and then slog it home easy peasy on Oregon Road and the valley road. If the ridge is clear, I'm fucking well done scouting and the ride is ready to go. Scouting the ridge is priority one.
2. If ridge is not clear of deer exclusion fence, then there will need to be scouting of Woodridge and its connections (if any ) with Oregon Road so that I'll have enough distance to make ten miles. There will be at least some uphill scouting on this part and there is no way to make it easier. Priority two.
3. If ridge is not clear or if it is, I need to scout the slant up to the road to Hull's from above the Ray's Hill Tunnel. This can be an easy downhill walk if someone drops me off at the top end of the thing. Priority three -- even if I have to walk it, it's quick and easy.