Wednesday, April 1, 2026

Covert Cutoff

How 'bout these two old xxx's?* Just under three hours of mid-day trail building to complete a brilliant by-pass. Say 850ft maximum distance taking into account a bit of meandering nuance. Say 240ft relief. Not a bad job considering at least 140+ years between the two of 'em...
(*Add your preferred superlative or expletive)

Built out of necessity. The final several hundred feet of this long traveled route had steadily lapsed into a beyond technical rocky, washed gully. Recently, a few large cross trail windfall trees sealed the final demise. The only solution was a detour. Only one viable route a ninety degree down ridge diverge to the west.


Woefully, the trail is additionally flanked both sides by a forest of heavy greenbriar thicket. Short of a brush hog, not a particularly appealing project considering all hand clearing...

leave it up to always thinking "our boy Howie" - he picked up a rotary brush-cutter blade attachment for his gas weed wacker... we'd never seen one before...

speaking from the perspective of having cleared and maintained ample trail over the years, all by hand, a most impressive tool... it made short work of the heavy briars...

A rough profile scaled from USGS topo...

Typical routine end result, indistinguishable from a deer trail...

a bit steep and technical... kept it a bit narrow thru the saplings ta' boot, just clearing the bar ends...

ditto a sloping log hop for some final fun and frolic...

 test pilot sent out a for the inaugural run...

Nice work!

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