Saddle Up - Trail Cut In with ODF

[NW99XJ]

The first day of June was also the first day of formal work on our new trail....
We finally got to get some work done on the rough cut in of the new Saddle-Up!!!
I had woken up about 30 min late, so after throwing together a few things I rushed out the door.....
I sent a quick message to Aaron that was a bit behind schedule, and made a B-line to 26.....
About 2 miles from N. Plains I find a few rain drops on my windshield and a familiar XJ in front of me....


After meeting up with Dustin on the freeway,
Aaron had told me he was just waiting for XCM (Matt) at the McDonalds and would be taking off in a few....
As Torx & I came up the off-ramp, those two were getting on the freeway,
.... Dustin and I pulled into the Mickey-Dees none the less, said hey and promptly got back on the freeway.
We met up with the rest of the group at the Shell on Hwy 6,
got a few last minute items (18 wheelers FTW) and headed out....
We got to Saddle Up right about 8:30
From L to R ....Torx, Gunner( in motion), Aaron, Shawn, and Matt:


From this point forward, I had forgot my camera in the Jeep,
so the rest was documented with my cell phone, I apologize for lack of quality in the pics
Jahmaal was not there yet with the Mini-Ex, so after hanging around for a few,
we decided to get to work in the small glenn of trees that separates the two halves of the new trail.
There was a lot of blow-down from this last winter, and it all needed to be cleared:


We got to work right away, four chain saws, and determination got a lot accomplished right away,
Gunner took the most important role of supervisor:


It also got our temps up so we started shedding hoodies pretty quick:


We got the glenn cleared in no time, and as we were making our way back down to the trucks,
we heard some "beeping" ....and figured ODF was finally there with the machinery.
We were right, and after Jahmaal got the mini unloaded....
he got right to work with getting it up into the staging area before the location of where the filter will be:


Matt up here from the Socal Chapter, and not having any stake in this trail, came to help and help he did.
There was a lot of shovel work that needed to be done throughout the day, Matt certainly did his fair share:

 

[NW99XJ]

Re: Saddle Up - Trail Cut In with ODF (cont)

Although there were times we were standing around, the mini did the lions share of the work that day:


THIS ended up being a familiar site throughout the day:


Although we did our best to design the trail to take advantage of the natural slopes and camber of the terrain,
and to avoid as many of the stumps that were there,
some HAD to be removed, this was NO EASY TASK, even with the excavator.


I stayed with Jahmaal and continued to work on the front side,
while the rest of the crew went to the far side and started in on more clearing of blow down.
We broke for lunch about 12:15 after getting a fair amount accomplished:


After a good lunch we got back to work,
Aaron after getting all happy with a belly full of food, got some wood:


More stumps were found, and apparently they kept getting bigger:


Which meant more digging ,and a LOT more work:

 

[NW99XJ]

We were making good progress, and had cut our way halfway up the hill towards the glenn of trees.
We were averaging about 100ft of cut trail every hour.
We got to the area where the face climb was to be, and ran into some trouble:


The discovery of an Artesian Spring haulted operations, and forced us to reconsider the line, and redesign that section of trail.
A good hour and a half of work was wasted because of a little spring.
(this took the wind out of a lot of our sails)
Upon a few minutes of hiking, and deliberation, a new route was scouted, and laid out.
Jahmaal got to work on closing off the access we cut in to that section
...and started the work on cutting into the new direction:


Although the massive face climb had been put on the back burner for now,
we will still have a good bit of climb and a decent obstacle in this part of the trail.
Up to this point we had probably a good 25% overall of the trail cut in:


After a bit more work, we exhausted the capabilities of the mini,
it just didn't have the power or the appropriate tracks to get up much of an incline without destroying the grade.
So we turned it around, got it up the hill via the road, and started working our way DOWN to the are were just at.


About halfway there Jahmaal discovered a hidden stump:


This thing was a beast, easily the biggest we had encountered that day.
That whole section was covered pretty thick with cut offs, and debris,
....easily a two foot layer of decomp, logs, and branches were on top of the dirt.
...thats why this stump was never seen on our initial routing hikes.
It was prob good hour before we got that damn behemoth out of the ground:


By this time it was about 6pm, we were all exhausted, burnt, hungry and tired.
Jahmaal had continued to dig after the stump was removed ion search of bedrock,
and it wasnt until about 10ft down before anything was found.
....this is going to prove to be a very important fact in how this trail matures and evolves,
as open differentials will dig and weather will erode A LOT of earth before this trail is fully defined.
We got a lot of work done that day, and we still have a ton more work to do.
But two maybe three more days like today, and we can start getting tires on the trail.
There will still be more work to do after the trail is opened, but this is one hell of a start.

I want to say a special thanks to Jahmaal Rebb for coming out despite the horrendous cold he was fighting
and for putting in a ton of work throughout the long day.
Also a big thanks to Matt for helping out a fellow chapter do some serious manual labor on a trail he is likely never to run.
Also big thanks to Aaron, Dustin, and Shawn for putting in such a long day of back breaking work.
We're off to great start guys, you should be proud.
I know I am.

 

[mopar440]

Very cool, guys!!! Hats off to ya all... wish I wasn't all gimped up... looks very promising!!!

 

[Bronzewyrm]

WAY to be guys! im neck deep in NWFest prep, I told aaron to do well. damn, you fellas kicked ass. the trail is coming along nicely, I cant wait to get a hand in

Bronze.

 

[TORX]

I had at least seventeen other things I should have been doing on Saturday, but it's not everyday you can help build a new Class II trail. So the goofy dog and I loaded up and rolled out early Saturday for the 0800 meet-up.

After meeting up with the rest of the crew at Gales Creek, we rallied up to Saddle Up. Eager to get to work, we began cutting the blow down in the trees. This particular section got hit hard last winter.

In less than an hour we had a path cleared. Amazing what a couple dudes and some saws can do. Once back at the rigs Jahmaal arrived with the ODF Mini_Ex and started constructing an entrance to the new trail.

Stumps. They're kind of unavoidable when routing a trail through a clear cut.

Tard.

Aaron, Matt, Shawn, and I headed over to the other side to cut some more downed trees out of the way.

After. There's still quite a bit of wood near the top to cut up and get off the trail.

After returning, we were stoked to see the progress Josh and Jahmaal had made.

Found another one.

View from the bottom.

When we finally got to the "feature" part we were pretty disappointed to find a natural spring underneath the soil.

Another spring area, this will require some rock to be placed over it for drainage.

After coming in from the top we made some good progress.

Jahmaal one upped himself with this one.

As usual pictures don't even begin to do this justice. I'm stoked by the progress we made. I think a few more work parties, and we should be good to go for opening it for use. Then we can fine tune it and add fun size rock where we want it.

Another machine would have been great, but it was a good learning day. For future work parties though, with two machines, and where we are at on the trail, we could kick ass in a day.

 

[LJ dude]

Good job guys! Its great to see some new trails being built. And even cooler that they are in our own back yard!!!