By Iona
This week my crew was building a new trail in State Forest State Park near Walden, CO. As a late start member, it was my first full week of work, so there was a lot of learning to
be done. Luckily, we had an amazing project partner who went over all the tips and tricks of the tools used in trail building.
Our section of mapped out tread was about a mile and a half from the parking spot, so after shralping up a dirt road in the vans, we all hopped out and took a chilly morning hike to the work site. On Tuesday, our usually green daily commute turned white, as snow fell and covered everything in the forest. It was absolutely incredible. We all celebrated a mini-Christmas in June by singing carols as we weaved our way through snowy trees and over icy logs.
Once we got to the worksite, I found the process of building a trail to be challenging, interesting, frustrating and satisfying all rolled into one. There were certainly plenty of obstacles to be dealt with in each section, but that allowed us to get creative in thinking of solutions and made our final walkthrough on Friday all the more rewarding. My largest obstacle was a massive rock that was smack in the middle of the tread. It took three people, a rock bar, a pick, and a single jack, but we managed to free it from the path and make way for some new, smooth path.
To top off a great week, we all celebrated the Fourth of July by hiking the Zirkel Circle. There’s nothing like jumping into a freezing lake and then warming up on the warm rocks in one of the most beautiful areas of Colorado. You also would not believe how many happy dogs we saw on the trail. Soaked From rain, but laughing the whole time, we returned to camp for black bean burgers and peach cobbler around the campfire. It was certainly a fourth of July I’ll never forget.
