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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
As of last November I'm the steward of the mile and a half section of trail between Irish Hill Road and Damon Road. This was my first hike of the year through the whole thing, so I was excited at the prospect of doing some trail-clearing. I parked at the crook of Irish Hill Road and hit the trail at about 5:00. The first stream crossing was vastly easier than it was in March, when the water was twice as high from the spring melt.
Carrying two axes and a machete was awkward, but I soon discovered a way to make it less so. I remembered that my cheap little worn-out day pack had a carry loop on top. I stuck both axes in there and they stayed well enough for the purposes of this hike. I need to come up with a safer and more secure arrangement, though.
Red wintergreen berries provided the first cheerful wink of color along the trail. Withering trout lily leaves testified to yellow that had passed, and cinquefoil leaves promised more yellow to come.
I could hardly believe how soon I'd passed over the stream crossing that Grace and I helped redirect on July 4th. In March, when I was gingerly making my way through, over and around mud and runoff with a six-year-old, it seemed like a much longer hike!
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
I passed out of the woods and headed south on the wider section that parallels the hedgerow. I found that part more delightful, not just because I've spent less time on it, but because of the forget-me-nots sprinkled liberally along the verges. The way they grew partially obscured among the grasses and tiny maple trees made me think of faeries.
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
Along with the touch-me-nots I saw lots of dandelions, both blooming and seeding. Once again I was rewarded for taking the time to get some macro shots of a flower that I've seen hundreds of millions of times: when I looked at these pictures later, it was like seeing a dandelion for the first time.
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
I stopped to take pictures of violets, apple blossoms, and a bird's nest made of mud and straw that I found just a step off the trail, about six feet off the ground in an apple tree. Now I wish I'd have taken pictures of the wild mustard that stitched the trail with yellow. What new intricacies would a closeup have revealed? I'll make a point to find out next time.
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
Now that I've looked at the shots, I have to say that the most rewarding of all the photographic subjects on this hike were last year's burdock. I love the way the seeds were so clearly waiting to be shaken loose by an animal attempting to worry the burr free from its fur, and I'm fascinated by the golden yellow hooks that I never would have noticed if not for the macro shots.
Even more so than the forget-me-nots, the copses of myrtle made the trail magical. There are large patches of open, shady woods along the western edge of the trail that resemble nothing so much as a gently undulating sea of periwinkle. In one particularly dramatic spot, the remains of an old tree jut up from a mound so that the dark green sea seems to wash against a craggy island spire.
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
When I saw the treefall across the trail a few hundred yards north of Damon Road, my heart rejoiced. It's been far too long since I've had the opportunity for some real trail-clearing. This one was nothing compared to some of the monster blowdowns I cleared in the Adirondacks back around the early aughts, but then again I'm not in my best shape right now, so it was a good workout.
My father's words about always clearing the ground before swinging the axe echoed in my ears as I went to work with the machete. I got the little stuff cleared away and then went to work with the axe.
It's always much more challenging to chop through logs when they're suspended over the ground like these were: the position puts you at a muscular disadvantage, and the lack of bracing means that a lot of your striking force is dissipated. So naturally I place my first cut to bring down the entire length of log that needs to be cleared.
I tend to cut up logs so that the pieces are right at the upper limit of what I can move. This always feels a bit weird because I'm minimizing the time I spend chopping, an activity that I enjoy more than almost anything. But it also makes it as difficult as possible for me to wrestle the pieces off the trail. This is exactly what I want, because it gives me the best possible full-body workout.
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
So I got that big log up on the bank where it couldn't possibly jump out and bite anyone, and took some shots of my kill. I just looked back at the time stamps on the pictures, and found that fifty-nine minutes passed between the last shot of the treefall and the first shot of the cleared trail. Under an hour: not bad for someone so out of shape.
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
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| From Link Trail Hike, Irish Ridge Road to south of Damon Road - May 15, 2010 |
When I reached Damon Road there was still plenty of sunlight, so I decided to continue south for a while. This section was even more delightfully forget-me-not-ridden, but another problem soon soured the experience: it was a mud pit, and it was obvious that ATVs were the reason. I made my winding way, avoiding the mud as best I could, but still wound up with wet feet by the time I turned around, probably less than a mile in.
On the way back I met a hiker with her dogs and had a pleasant conversation about the trail. When I reached my car and headed back toward Oneida, I was shocked to see that it was 8:30. I'd sure had a lot of fun on the trail for three and a half hours to have flown by so fast!
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