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What We've Been Up To!
Springtime Trails: A Time to Tread Lightly
By Wes Tucker As with most things, spring is a time of transition for a hiking trail. So before you lace up your boots and rush off to the trailhead, please give a thought to the trail itself. Spring is a vulnerable time for a hiking trail. All winter long the treadways (the part of…
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Doctor Trail-love Or: How I Learned to Stop Postholing and Love My Snowshoes
By Wes Tucker I’ll grant you, the snow amounts so far this winter have been underwhelming. But it’s winter in New Hampshire, and that usually means snow… lots of snow. So when the snow does fall, and you plan to hike the trails, you’re going to need a pair of snowshoes. Many new winter hikers…
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CHVTC 2025 Job List (so far)
Trailmaster Craig has released his wish list for the 2025 trailwork season. Of course we’ll have all our usual Level 1 maintenance work to do; Spring patrols, clearing blowdowns and drains, brushing, touching up blazes, and such. This list of Level 2 projects, building fixtures, steps, waterbars, etc., requires more planning and specialized skills. Equal…
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2024: 40th Worklog Summary for Cardigan Highlanders Volunteer Trail Crew
Fourteen volunteers turned out: 12 had and 2 earned their tartans. Our 650 hrs on trails is 136% of the average of the five years pre-covid: 476 hrs. Our admin hrs = 222, outreach hrs = 46. DNCR values vol. labor@ $34.64/hr, so our 918 hr = $31,799.52. We patrolled 19 miles, cleaned 240 drains…
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Season Final
Hello Trail Crew, Snow’s on the summit of Cardigan, ice and rain today, 2″ snow for Thanksgiving, then cold… maybe our 2024 field season is over. Our worklog has 837 hours, we add 96 more by the web minion plus 7 for the worklog summary, for 950 hours. Our field season is April Fool’s to…
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News From Our Trails
We have enjoyed these last 12 weeks or so of warm temps and almost no rain. Here is a snapshot of what we did with the trailwork time we had, among other life chores and fun. We raked 208 drains after winds blew all the leaves off the trees. They filled drains to a depth…
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Bob Sawyer! And Other News.
Congratulations to Team Leader Bob for getting recertified by the state of NH as a chainsawer. Bob took part in the state’s chainsaw safety course on Saturday and passed with flying colors. He is now certified for the next 3 years. Well done! So if you catch a whiff of chainsaw exhaust and bar oil…
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10/22/24: Blazing Skyland
Yesterday Steve D. and I, TM Craig, hiked from Alexandria 4 Corners west on Skyland Trail. Hiking was slowed by fallen leaves that hide hazards like roots, rocks, limbs on the path etc., but in an hour we reached the col between Brown Mtn. and Church Mtn. After lunch we poured white paint into a…
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10/12/24: Andrew Brook Trail Drain & Step Work
On Saturday October 12th Highlander’s Bob, Josh, Scott, Ben, and Craig ascended Andrew Brook Trail armed with shovels, picks, 10 lb. rock bars, caution tape, and surveyors tape to a drainage area a short distance above the third brook crossing. We created a detour route around our work area using safety orange surveyors’ tape to…
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