Despite the rain on Wednesday and then last night (Friday), the Warrior's
Society and a select group of volunteers were determined to bring some order
out of the chaos and destruction caused by the heavy rains so far this
winter. So, bright and early at 8AM Saturday, we were to meet at the parking
lot at the bottom of Holy Jim and Trabuco Canyon trailheads to apply some
grit and muscle to the rain damaged Trabuco Canyon Trail.
I usually take Live Oak past Cook's to get to Trabuco, but the road was
closed this morning either from rain damage last night or an accident, so we
arrived at Trabuco Wash via the lovely, perfectly planned and way too
sanitary community of Santa Margaritaville (my apologies to any residents
thereof!)
We had a pretty good caravan of trucks and SUV's that traveled up the wash.
Either the homeowners in the canyon or the Forest Service, I'm not sure who,
did a pretty good job of cleaning up the canyon road. We all remembered
vividly the damage we saw just 2 weeks prior when we made our survey ride.
The road was impassable then, but today, though there was still lots of
water crossings and mud everywhere, the road was in pretty good shape and
passable by 2 wheel drive vehicle (as long as you had enough ground
clearance).
We pulled up to the parking lot and Keith was already there, tools arrayed
out behind his truck. He had shovels, picks, hoes, rakes, brush saws - you
name it. Tools for Everyone! While everybody gathered around as Keith gave
his quick trail tool safety instructions (don't whack your buddies!), Chris
pressed Tink into service to stay behind and watch all of the equipment,
food and beer that was to be lunch later in the day. Compared to the job she
pulled down, protecting our grub and grog from bands of roving marauders,
the rest of us pulled pretty easy duty.
The rest of us grabbed a tool or three and fell in single file and hit the
trail with a pretty good pace. Keith, as I have come to expect of him, just
flat out left most of us in the dust. He was on a mission. Not only did he
have to get up to the top of the trail to work on much needed repairs, but
then he had to head back to the bottom ahead of the rest of us to cook the
lunch time meal. Had it been me that had that responsibility, I'm afraid all
you would have been mighty hungry! Can I get a Hooray! for Keith?!
Chris wasn't to be held back either. He was determined to make it to the top
of Trabuco, where he wanted to do the bulk of the repair. Never mind the
damage down in the bottom of the canyon, he said, the top really needs work.
He had brought about a dozen pieces of 2x6 to make grade breaks in the trail
with, so we had these to carry along with the tools and our water. Darren
Maxwell and his daughter Lacey, quite a strong little lady, carried the bulk
of these 2x6's.
As we made our way up, we did find a few spots on the open rock section of
the trail, where it's high up on the left side of Trabuco Canyon, that were
pretty washed out from the rains, so we took 30 or 40 minutes here to effect
repairs. Chris gave us all a quick lesson in how to recognize and mitigate
erosion paths, and everyone went to work quickly. It didn't take long, and
we had a nice, cleaned up section of trail where there was previously a bad
wash out.
Off again, up the trail we went. Several of us had nippers and brush saws,
so we stopped to clear out some of the overhanging growth here and there. I
remembered a couple of low hanging branches from that last ride down Trabuco
that tried to rip my head off, and today I took care of them. We cut back a
fair amount of brush, opening the trail up nicely in many spots.
As we gained elevation on the trail, the air temps cooled. In the lower
canyon, I had thought myself overdressed, but not up here nearer the top.
Santiago Peak had cloud cover enshrouding it and the trail was also shaded
at times, helping to keep the temps down. Quite nice, really, given the
arduousness of our task. Everyone was working hard, and the cool temps kept
us all from wilting away.
We finally attained the upper reaches of the trails and went to work making
grade breaks, filling in erosion ruts, and general clean up of the trail. I
was relieved to see Keith heading down, as I knew we were all going to be
very hungry when this work was finished. Everybody put in a good hour or so
here, sweetening the trail. You could see everyone just working their butts
off, and several us commented that if our wives knew just how hard we were
working here, there'd be no more excuses for the overgrown backyards at our
homes. But, heck, my backyard's not big enough to ride in ; )!
Finished, for now, we picked up the tools and started back. Downhill is
where hiking, for me anyway, always gets real difficult. The constant impact
of boot to ground just jars everything. I'm sure everyone felt similarly.
After all that really hard work, we had to get ourselves down. With each
step, the two picks I was carrying got heavier and heavier, until at the
bottom it felt like I was carrying to bench top vises. Only Keith's cooking
- AND THE THOUGHT OF BEERS - got me down.
Back at the parking lot, Keith had pasta with meat and alfredo, salad, rolls
- but it was the Tecate that grabbed my interest immediately. Everybody was
eating, drinking and enjoying the feeling of pride one gets when finished
with a job, done well. Long after the soreness of the muscles passes, the
good feeling of accomplishment we get through the trail work will linger in
smiles as we ride the trails that we have so lovingly restored.
Bravo Warriors!
-Bob McCarter
 |
Copyright© The Warrior's Society® |
 |