RATtreks

Work Trip On AT section – 3-11-2021

A new year means a new season of trail work. After waiting on the 2+ feet of snow to melt off the TN/NC mountains, we were finally able to access my trail section for a Pre Spring walk through to see what shape the trail was in and how many blow downs would require the saw crews. It was a cool and cloudy morning as my son Tyler unlocked the forest service gate so that we could get my Jeep up the old, overgrown forest road to make the 2.5 mile trip to reach access to our trail section. There was something different about the road but, being half asleep and not feeling very good from working too hard in the days prior, we just could not put our finger on it. We were pleasantly surprised that the road was clear of all but one or two small blow downs that we had to chainsaw out of the way and also noticed that someone had removed several trees since we were last there. I knew it was not the Carolina Mountain Club (CMC) so it had to be the USFS which was odd as they stopped maintaining the road many years ago. We made good time without any issues and soon found ourselves hiking up the short side trail to the AT. We did stop and drop a 12 pack of Mountain Dew in the Spring for any hikers that may be coming through on this day.