Saturday brought a cool morning. The rest of the day turned out picture-perfect.
Ah, fall is here.
Visit #1330, Saturday 25 September 21, 8:00-10:15AM, 4.8 miles, 9.0lbs. of litter.
Temps in the low 60's to start, climbing to near 80, sunny.
I hadn't been to West Peak in a while so Saturday's route would take me there, via East Peak and Castle Craig.
Recent grass cutting by the Meriden Parks Department along the Soap Box Derby track exposed a lot of hidden litter. I collected enough by the time I reached the water treatment plant that I chose to leave the bag there and open another.
On the Green Trail, I found a fallen tree which I vaguely recalled when inspecting from the recent tropical storms Henri and Ida, but apparently forgot about. I put it on the list to be removed in two week's time.
Just west of the Halfway House, this large branch had fallen. I removed it.
Up at Castle Craig, I found the parking lot and surrounding area very clean. I've been suspecting for roughly the last year that others, whether the Meriden Parks Department or privateers, have been keeping things cleaner than I would normally find them.
I reached West Peak and paused to enjoy the view.
On the way down I encountered another fallen tree, which I'll tend to in two week's time.
Back at the parking lot, I found it much more full than when I arrived at 8AM, when there were merely enough cars to count on one hand. Today was certainly a day to enjoy the outdoors.
I dropped off my trash for the weekend, but I still wasn't done.
During last week's adventures, I mentioned discovering some new graffiti but I couldn't photograph it due to a technical issue. I solved my problem, and I'm here to tell the story.
I found new graffiti at Echo Point but wasn't prepared to treat it. So I returned later that weekend on my bike with some tools.
Neither a plastic nor wire brush would remove it. However, I brought something stronger- Citri Strip.
I applied it once, went for a thirty minute bike ride, and upon return scrubbed it with both brushes. It definitely loosened the paint to a goo, made more so when I applied the brushes again. I slathered on more Citri-Strip and went home. I knew rain was scheduled during the week so the Citri-Strip would wash away. When I returned by bike again this past Sunday, this was the updated result.
Before going the Citri-Strip route a third time, I tried scrubbing with both the plastic and the wire brushes again.
Probably good enough for government work, but not for me. So I added Citri-Strip (is this beginning to sound like an infomercial?) one last time and will leave it for the week, where it will dry up naturally and I don't believe any rain is forecast. I will revisit this next week to inspect the final product.
I found a quarter in Hubbard Park on Saturday. By my calculation, I earned 7.1 cents per hour.
Visit #1329, Saturday 18 September 21, 7:00-10:30AM, 5.8 miles, 19.3lbs. of litter.
Temps in the mid-60's to start, rising to near 80, partly sunny with mild humidity.
During a bike ride past Hubbard Park last week, I noticed a roadside memorial had popped up at the West Main Street entrance to Hubbard Park.
I found a similar memorial nearby in December 2018. It could be from the same people who erected the first memorial because I found Bud Light bottles in both instances. Nevertheless, on Saturday morning I removed it.
I have decided on a quasi-regular schedule of trimming the roadsides to East and West Peaks, using my newly acquired polesaw. If I don't make it a regular, periodic activity, it will take too long. Today that would be my plan. I will limit myself to one hour of "polesaw time" otherwise it will leave less time for trail maintenance and litter collection.
The picture doesn't show much other than the fact that I have the polesaw with me. The red line you see is my marker to show where I leave off so I know where to pick up on my next session. In the photo you're looking downhill, and the fork in the road to East-West Peak is behind me. I made approximately 900 feet of progress.
Of course, I was picking up litter as I was trimming branches, but I could only keep an eye on one side of the trail until my hour was up.
I followed the road down and across the north end of Merimere Reservoir.
At Echo Point, I found some new graffiti, which appears to have been done with fingerpaint. I actually returned to Hubbard Park on my bike on Sunday to remove it, but my iPod gave me grief so I couldn't photograph my work. Stay tuned for more info next week on how I dealt with this and whether I was successful!
Would you like some coffee with your sugar?! And remember; it's no longer Dunkin' Donuts, just Dunkin'. Also, did you know that sugar packets vary in size based on brand, region, and country? Apparently in some markets people prefer more/less sugar. It can vary from 4 to 10 grams of sugar per packet.
At the south end of Merimere Reservoir I was stopped by a man who marveled at the amount of litter I collected. During our conversation, he told me he was at Disney World reading some Disney literature where their researchers had calculated they needed to place trash bins EVERY TWENTY FEET for a sufficient number of people to consider using them.
I returned to the parking lot and calculated I was done for the day.
Finally, fall arrives. Cool dry mornings, aahhh...
Visit #1327, Monday-Labor Day, 6 September 21, 7:30-8:40AM, 1.0 miles, 5.3lbs. of litter.
Temps in the mid-60's, sunny and mildly humid.
Visit #1328, Saturday 11 September 21, 7:40-9:55AM, 3.6 miles, 8.9lbs. of litter.
Temps in the mid-50's to start, rising to the 70's today; sunny, dry, and very breezy up at Castle Craig.
I couldn't wait much longer to use my new pole saw to trim the roadsides to East and West Peak, so on Labor Day I finally began, starting at the Castle and working my way down. Unfortunately, I was only one hour into my task when I received an after hours service call and had to leave. I'm sure there will be plenty of good weekends coming up to continue. The opening photo is also a good example of how overhead clearances (at least on the left hand side, for now) are improved with the pruning.
Early Saturday morning I was finally able to address the graffiti at East Peak. I was alerted to this many weeks ago by a regular hiker, but Storms Elsa, Henri, and Ida kept forcing a delay as I dealt with fallen trees and limbs on the trails.
The morning was dry, sunny, and incredibly breezy out on the rocks.
And this recent bloom of graffiti was quite widespread.
My Find of the Week, grill tongs.
I also found one of the tools of the vandals' trade.
I painted over everything you see above, and more. The complete task took roughly an hour.
I returned my painting gear to my vehicle, removed my coveralls, picked up litter along the nearby trails, then continued to do so around Castle Craig and the parking lot.
Afterwards, I drove down to the park and cleaned up the trails on the south side of I-691. Finally I was done!
Might as well start off with a little "No Respect" humor, from the king himself.
Visit #1325, Saturday 4 September 21, 7:20AM-12:20PM, 6.8 miles, 1.7lbs. of litter.
Temps in the low 70's, sunny and dry.
Visit #1326, Sunday 5 September 21, 7:20-8:20AM, 1.0miles, 12.4lbs. of litter.
Temps in the 60's, cloudy with mosquitoes, arrrgh!
Saturday I parked outside the north end of Hubbard Park and planned a long hiking route, to finish clearing the trails of fallen trees and branches from Tropical Storm Henri. Little did I know, my day would be much longer than I expected.
But first, an alert hiker found this note in Hubbard Park last week, obviously addressed to me.
Forget the grammar and spelling errors; apparently some people think I should to do all the work, in ALL of Meriden's parks, while they do nothing. I tell ya' I don't get no respect at all!
Anyway, I crossed the north end of Merimere Reservoir and picked up the Blue Trail along the ridge line, removing any fallen trees and branches with my chainsaw. The weather was absolutely spectacular.
You can see there wasn't much need for my chainsaw on the Blue Trail; most of my work was limited to my loppers.
I reached the Orange Trail leading down from Castle Craig. At the bottom I found this note.
I reached the next objective on my planned route, a fallen tree on the Main Trail, courtesy of Henri.
It was while cleaning this up that a hiker came along and informed me of a very large tree that had fallen across the trail adjacent to the entrance to the I-691 walkbridge. I had been there last week cleaning up after Henri and it wasn't there then. My curiosity piqued, I decided to hike away from my planned route and check things out.
Boy, the remnants of Hurricane Ida were no slouch in the fallen tree department!
This tree was BIG. The best I could do for now was to clear a modest path for hikers. The 16" bar on my chainsaw wasn't enough to tackle this job so I would have to return at some point with a longer bar.
I turned around and resumed my original plans to clear the final trail from Tropical Storm Henri damage.
Here's the first tree, which I found on my recon bike ride roughly a week ago to assess storm damage.
I finished this trail and was out of water, food, and enthusiasm. I called it a day.
But that large tree, on such a heavily traveled trail, was on my mind. I was thinking it wouldn't take long to remove it if properly equipped and with it being Labor Day Weekend, the trail would likely see considerable usage so should be presentable if possible. So early Sunday morning I parked in the SMALL dirt parking area across from Belmont Avenue and walked the hundred yards or so to the tree.
Working with safety first in mind, and with the proper tools, the tree dropped with no harm to your dear author.
The series of cuts resulted in cookie-cutter pieces.
Once safely on the ground, I cleaned up the trail as best as one could considering the damage.
Who is responsible for the fence and whether it will be repaired is a question I don't have the answer to.
After I was done here, I returned to the parking area across from Belmont Avenue and did the right thing, picking up litter (including a two-piece artificial Christmas tree complete with lights!), and trimming away brush from the gate so it would look presentable.
While doing so, a party of two cars arrived. This parking area will REASONABLY accommodate two cars and I was already there. The driver of one car asked if I could move my car over so he could fit his in. I told him I would be done in fifteen minutes and if he waited I would be leaving after I finished my work.
He responded by saying, "You can fit four cars in this spot." Whereupon I suggested he COULD PARK IN HUBBARD PARK INSTEAD. After all, I'm doing ACTUAL WORK TO KEEP THE TRAILS CLEAN, and HE'S JUST HIKING, so where he parks shouldn't matter and he should be considerate and show his appreciation of my labor by parking elsewhere this time. Yet he was determined to park as close to the trailhead as possible.
Instead of waiting or parking in Hubbard Park, this is how close he parked to me. One wonders how he managed to get out of his car.
Any closer and we should have rented a hotel room.
I guess my labor doesn't matter. I tell ya'; people doing the dirty work get no respect at all.
I hope you find time this holiday weekend to pay respect to all those doing the hard work so you don't have to.
