Spring Maintenance Work on Pearl's Trail 5/26/2017

Springtime, and that means the annual Spring cleaning of the Trail the Hoofers adopted for Pearl on her 80th birthday.  There were regulations put in place for us on how to maintain the trail.  The paperwork is tremendous (governmental red tape). Each of us had to be read the safety features that were not new to us, due to the fact we have all been hiking for years, but still the forest service has to protect itself these days.  So we listened very attentively as Jean read the pages of do's and don'ts.  Then we had to sign that we heard this list and were in good health etc.   We donned our hard hats, (a requirement, which actually proved itself very useful as I hit my head twice and Jean once... so we were both grateful for being required to wear them.) and we hiked Pearl's trail slowly looking for trash, downed trees, and pruning anything that was encroaching the trail.

The crew: Jane, Ginny and Jean. The Newbies: Sally and...

Rose.  How about our hardhats! We look so official!

Pygmy Flower Rock Jasmine (Northern Fairy Candelabra)

We saw many trees across the trail this is #1

#2

What a mess, we were able to drag part of it off the trail (A very small part!) But mostly cleared up the small branches.

Keeping our eyes peeled for trash while Jane trims some overgrown branches

It was a beautiful cool day -- great day for a hike

Sally and Jean work while Jane poses with her hard hat

Ginny wins the prize for the largest piece--styrofoam 

Here, Ginny stands on one side of the trail with me on the other so you can see trees #3 & #4 blocking the trail

Here is #5.  When we couldn't move the fallen tree we would prune or break off as many branches as we could to allow access either over or under the tree.  Jean kept a growing list of all the fallen trees so that the forest service knew about them.  They said they would be out on Wednesday to start removing them.

We even found some remnant snow

Not as pretty as when we went snowshoeing 

I believe this is #6 looking back at it after we pruned away the branches.  I am not sure I captured all the fallen trees, I possibly forgot a few as I was looking intently for trash

I was the sweep and surprised that all the gals passed this not too far off the trail...so I found the most unusual item.  Looks like it might have gone with the thong Jane found on a previous maintenance hike! 

Ginny turned back just before reaching the ski area while the rest of us continued on for lunch and to check out the progress on the restaurant

After the winter, deconstruction began anew; just some of the major beams left to be taken down

Beautiful views!

This really shows the steepness of the ski hill...one of the reasons I don't ski

After lunch we continued looking about.  This signs warns you to keep your drones at home.  

More pictures of the deconstruction...the restaurant looks very small with these pictures

The plans for the new restaurant...the old one was 53 years old! The new one will be 2 stories, 12,150 square ft. with views of both sides of the mountain.  Completion date is Summer 2018.

Heading back was easier after all our work, but we still had to maneuver over and under the fallen trees (these may have been #7 & 8)

We all had our own techniques

Since Ginny left early I didn't get a picture of her bag.  She actually had quite a bit more: at least 4-5 beer bottles, cans, and various plastic cups

Here I am posing with my most "unusual" finding.

We all had a great time working on the maintenance of Pearl's Trail.  We made some great improvements and several hikers thanked us for keeping the trail beautiful.   That, and the smile on Pearl's face made it worthwhile.  Thanks to Jane, Jean and Ginny who do this regularly, and here's hoping that more Hoofers volunteer from time to time!  Until then....

HAPPY HOOFING!