Lumberjackin'

Rain and an eerie fog were in order for the day.

Visit #1013, Saturday 7 May 16, 7:40-11:40AM, 7.9 miles.

Temps in the low 60's with a steady, light rain.

This week's plan was to clear the trails of the fallen trees I found last week. A little rain wasn't going to get in my way.

There just so happened to be a 5k and 10k run in Hubbard Park on Saturday morning as well. With that knowledge, I knew starting my day early would be to my advantage as the runs started at 9:30, I think.

So I walked the road toward Castle Craig in advance of the runs and picked up trash along the way. My plans wouldn't take me all the way up the road; I went as far as the turnaround for the 5k run and, after surreptitiously dropping off my first bag of trash, I myself turned around and walked back to pick up the trailhead.

Once I picked up the trail which parallels the road, I reached the first tree of the day which needed removing.

If you look closely on the right, you can see what appears to already be a path around the fallen tree, even though I don't think it's been down more than a couple weeks. I unpacked the chainsaw and conducted business.

That was the only fallen three on this trail. I hiked all the way to the top, then walked the road toward West Peak to pick up the other trail, going down, that also parallels the road.

My next victim.

Not shown in the photo, I removed that bent tree as well.

This fallen tree had an added feature...

...mountain bikers had added a couple logs in front of the tree to facilitate riding over it, instead of using good technique!

With a properly applied chainsaw however, technique is no longer needed.

Next candidate.

This trio of leaning trees almost formed a teepee frame over the trail.

And the last tree for the day.

At the bottom,  I picked up the road back to the park. Enroute, I passed the water station where I earlier dropped off my first bag of trash.

Unfortunately, I also began to encounter cups discarded by the runners. I really doubt the volunteers walked the road all the way up to Castle Craig to pick up any others. This is a good reason why they either shouldn't hold these events in Hubbard Park or they should hold the event organizers accountable for the trash they create.

The event also supplied bottled water, and I began to find discarded empties as well. I'm sure they were from the event because I made a special trip by registration to see what brand of bottled water they had on hand. You can see one empty left on the table above; I found another in the grass.

This really mystifies me-

This cup had lipstick on it. Really? You're running 5k or 10k and you make sure and put lipstick on BEFORE your run? I'm a guy so maybe I need to be educated on this?!

Fortunately the rain stopped roughly 2/3 of the way through my work so the trip back to the park wasn't that bad. I dropped off my second bag of trash, then went home to take a shower. Only THEN I would put MY lipstick on...