Proof of Concept

The parking lot at Castle Craig was teeming with visitors on Sunday, despite the cloudy, muggy weather.

Visit #1149, Sunday 22 July 18, 2:00-4:00PM.
Temps in the 80's, cloudy and very humid.

In last week's post I reported finding a large pile of trash at a trailhead adjacent to the road near West Peak. I had asked the Parks Department back in 2014 to place something at this trailhead to prevent people from driving down the trail in their cars seeking privacy. They positioned shortened telephone poles there but as I expected they eventually would be rolled away. Today I was going to test a concept I had to remedy this situation.

Since I was on-call, I drove up to the trailhead in question and found, as I did last week, a pile of trash at the exact same spot. Note the bag of trash hanging from the tree branch.

Here are the telephone poles, scattered about.

Here's how they were originally situated in 2014.

Here is my Proof of Concept solution.

I bought four pieces of 1/2" by 2ft. long rebar, and a blacksmith's hammer. I had sharpened one end of the rebar to a point, but still had to find locations free of rocks to drive the rebar deep enough into the dirt. After positioning the log, it took roughly 30 minutes to complete.

Here you see the first telephone pole in place. If it lasts 4 weeks, I'll do the same with another pole. I will space them such that a trespassing ATV will still be able to get by, but regular vehicles will be prohibited. If I try to exclude ATVs, they'll merely run over more vegetation. It's better to funnel them down a trodden path.

When I was done, I picked up the trash, then cleaned up the West Peak parking lot and surrounding area. I then drove to Castle Craig and did the same there. Since I had my company van with me, I took the trash bags home for disposal. I collected quite a lot of litter considering I covered so little ground-a productive day I'd say.

The temperatures as well as the humidity were surprisingly lower up at the peaks versus the lower elevations. Not a bad day to be lazing on the rocks of West Peak.