Our task for this project is to relocate the white trail / LP off the road and onto a newly acquired portion of land on Hook Mountain, adjacent to the Marydell Faith & Life Center in Nyack NY. Here we will be building brand new trail through an area jam packed with numerous big rocks and many fallen trees. The new trail is close to where we can park, so that’s a plus, but the amount of work needed to construct this trail is enormous. There are many many large rocks that have to be moved out of our path before we can even begin to construct the trail. Our first order of business was to clear the fallen trees and setup the high line. Three saw crews got to work with one going to each end and working toward the middle and the third crew starting in the middle and working toward the end. Of course after we set up part of the high-line, the chief felt it would be better if it were higher. Isn’t that always the case. (sic) The fun part of this weekend was the turkeys that roam free in the area and were always looking for a handout. We know better and just left them alone, except for a few pictures. The bear skull Lissa found was a real treat. One more thing, yes it rained on Saturday and we all got soaked (nothing new there) BUT the sun came back out and it didn’t take long for us to dry off.
By the end of the weekend it was still very hard to see where the trail will be going (except for the flag ribbons marking the trail)
There is a whole lot of work to be done before this project is finished so we don’t expect to complete it until sometime next year.
As you can tell from the pictures this project will take a lot of effort and as always, it will be done by volunteers.
Speaking of volunteers, not everyone could make it every Friday, Saturday and Sunday and that’s OK with us. Some volunteers came out every day, others came out for one or two. Don’t feel that you have to commit to the entire project or even a weekend, join us whenever you can, any help is greatly appreciated and being a volunteer you can come and go as you see fit.
This project is just beginning, new volunteers will get to learn something about crew life and about trail building, I know everyone will have a great time.
If this looks like the kind of activity you want to be part of, contact us, we're a community of volunteers who build, protect and maintain hiking trails.
