Author: Karl Mosgofian

Project: San Mateo Memorial Park - Mt. Ellen Trails

Photo Album: 1805-12 Memorial Park

On Saturday, May 12, we returned to San Mateo County’s Memorial Park to complete the work on the Mt. Ellen Summit Trail and Nature Trails, continuing both above and to the west of the work accomplished on the May 13 and August 18, 2017, workdays. In keeping with the following day’s celebration, the Trail Center crews did a job to make any Mother proud.
The weather was clear, with temperatures in the low 50’s at the outset and the low 70’s when the workday ended. The trail tread is soft Douglas fir and redwood duff and a mix of organic and sandy soil made workable by last winter’s rains. The work area was almost entirely under tree cover. Our 32 volunteers included a nice mix of experienced and first time volunteers
As on previous workdays, we staged the trailer and volunteers in the pull-out area immediately before the park entrance kiosk. We accessed the Nature Trail by hiking up the eastern end of the Mt. Ellen Nature Trail, while the upper Mt. Ellen Trail was accessed from the west. Many thanks to Rangers Dave Vasquez and Matt Auda-Capel for reserving this area, providing lumber and stakes for the retaining walls, and coordinating with us on the work scope.
Eva and Lisa’s crew began above the western junction of the Summit Trail with the Nature Trail, clearing and repairing a badly damaged switchback before proceeding uphill to brush, widen, bench, and outslope a quarter mile of trail, adding drains where needed. Karl and Helen’s crew (yay, PAli volunteers!) did similar work at the peak of Mt Ellen Summit Trail, artfully dodging lush groves of mid-spring poison oak while installing barriers to discourage the prevalent shortcutting of switchbacks by hikers. Aaron and Lianna’s crew turned a nearly impassable path, overgrown with trillium, forget-me-nots, and grass, into a bona fide Nature Trail (now a showpiece for the Memorial Park network), greatly improving the tread and replacing a rotting retaining wall, severely damaged by a fallen Douglas fir. Hank Magnuski and Dave Croker led a cozy crew, quickly dispatching that same fir, then buckling down to the time-consuming job of cutting a notch into and building steps approaching a fallen 36” diameter redwood which had previously and entirely blocked the trail. Special kudos to Tom, the Grim Reaper, for preceding all crews; luckily for all, neither he nor his weed whacker ran out of gas.
As of now, all planned Trail Center work for the Mt. Ellen Summit Trail and the Nature Trail has been completed. The Trail Center looks forward to working with SMCP on Pomponio Trail. Per discussions and walk-thru’s with Rangers Dave, Matt, and Louisa, this would require either the replacement of the footbridge at the extreme west end of Pomponio or carefully coordinated access from the east.
Thanks to Dave Croker for driving the trailer, to Kathy for coordinating and signing in our glorious volunteers at the beginning of day, and to Larry for catering the snacks and beverages at the end of the day.

Bill Farrell

 

Project: Sugarloaf Mountain Open Space - City of San Mateo 

Photo Album: 1804-21 Sugarloaf Mountain 

Earth Day 2018 saw the Trail Center continue our new trail project at Sugarloaf park (Laurelwood Park) in San Mateo. About 40 volunteers came to help us complete the “Segment 3” trail on a beautiful spring day. The new trail—now called the “Dappled Light Trail”—connects the Amphitheater Trail that we built a couple years ago with a major trail junction on the south-central side of the park. We were confident this would be our fourth and final workday here. We were correct…sort of.

The work areas were split into 3 distinct areas. Dave Croker supervised the upper work areas where crews finished about 150 feet of trail, constructed a switchback, and made the connection to the Amphitheater Trail. Judd Volino supervised the crews that worked on the bottom section of trail that connects with the Salson Trail. That section was longer at about 300 feet, but had a shallower side slope in many places. One last crew tackled the third distinct work project which was a major retaining wall that kept the trail on grade as it passed around a beautiful and unique buckeye tree. Both the upper and lower crews finished* the work within their sections with a few stragglers staying on an extra half hour to finish up. That meant we could officially open the entire new trail to hikers! We had our first hikers before we picked up the last tool.

The retaining wall was quite a beast. We used a new design based upon state park designs using 4”x8” pressure treated lumber for longevity. We expect this trail will get a lot of traffic all year long, so we wanted this structure to last. The wall crew used generators and power tools to shape the timbers, and heavy duty drills to bore holes for 4-foot long foundation stakes that helped hold all the pieces together. The crew here worked hard for another 45-60 minutes past all the other volunteers until the backfill that had been created during the rest of the day ran out. They were understandably pooped when they finally made it back to the trailhead where the rest of the stragglers were still congregated. At this point something happened that I can’t remember happening before: 6 more folks decided to head back out and try to complete the backfill of the retaining wall. For the next hour and a half, these 6 diehards widened and flattened the nearby approaches to the retaining wall in order to generate enough backfill to almost fill the wall. The extra work also widened up the trail to closer to Trail Center standards. It was quite a sight to see. Make sure you visit the photo album for this project to fully appreciate the efforts of everyone on this trail project.

Trail work aside, I have to mention that lunch turned into an excellent affair that included sandwiches and goodies provided by the San Mateo Parks Foundation. Thank you to the contributors and volunteers that delivered the lunch to the work area! Everyone thoroughly enjoy it. Some nice congratulatory words were given by Trail Center President Judd Volino and San Mateo city supervisor Sheila XXX.

Thanks as always to all the background support from Judd to help organize the work day, Kathy for her expert coordinating, Larry for refreshments, and all the crew leaders and crew leader trainees for making sure the volunteers were taken care of and worked safely, and for ensuring expert trail was constructed. Thanks also to San Mateo City Parks for procuring and delivering all the supplies needed for the retaining wall.

Dave Croker
July 3, 2018

Project: Castle Rock State Park 

Photo Album: 1802-10 Castle Rock 
Photo Album: 1803-10 Castle Rock 

The Trail Center once again teamed up with California State Parks in February and March, 2018. This time we helped open up a new trail between the long-time parking lot off of Highway 35—“Castle Rock Trailhead”—to the new parking lot under construction on the Sempervirens Fund property to the north. Due to very enthusiastic and large turnouts, we were also able to send some crews off on other projects near the trailhead, including trail construction and junk cleanup on the new trail being constructed between the new parking lot and Castle Rock Falls.

In February, we were joined by 2 other groups in addition to the state park trail maintenance staff: the Friends of Castle Rock and Portola and Al Lisen’s Skyline-to-the-Sea crew. All told we had around 50 people working on a trail segment that is only 0.2 mile long. With the combined groups, it allowed crews to split up to tackle different projects. Al Lisen’s group volunteered to undertake the hardest work which was removing the old—now unnecessary—barbed wire fence between the state park land and the Sempervirens property. They ended up removing several hundred feet of fence! Another group of mostly Friends of CR and P worked on a large turnpike on the connector between the old parking lot and the crossing of Hwy 35. That left the majority of the new trail to Trail Center and park staff. But, despite that, we were able to finish the new trail segment for as far as wsa allowed. In addition, we had a crew that used a grip hoist (heavy duty come-along) all day long to remove tree stumps, and two crews constructed retaining walls out of rather large fir logs. This new connector trail will officially open at the time of the opening of the new parking lot. The excellent February weather allowed for a lengthy refreshments hour afterwards.

March weather took center stage, but fortunately didn’t perform until mid-afternoon. Another large turnout—this time sans the Friends of CR and P—allowed us to make significant progress on several varied projects. Three crews—supervised by Dave Croker—worked major maintenance projects along the Castle Rock trail that had been lingering on the state park’s project list for quite sometime. The top two crews worked to replace the aging “bridges” across the headwaters of Castle Rock creek. The state park crews had gathered the materials and started the prep for the new bridges that were replacing the old. Trail Center crews worked hard all day long, and managed to nearly complete the upper bridge, while the lower bridge was finished, but the approaches were not because they required more materials than expected. The bottom crew rebuilt 3 major side drainage crossings along the trail. Each built structure ended up being large drain dips with buried, downhill rock support. The other Trail Center crews—supervised by Judd Volino—ended up in a different area to the northwest of the old parking lot. Crews spent quite a bit of time (and energy!) hauling out old telephone poles and other debris from the drainage that the new Castle Rock Falls trail will follow from the new parking lot. By lunchtime, crews were digging in the dirt constructing new tread along this new trail. An American Conservation Corps crew will complete this new trail. It will also be open after the opening of the new parking lot. A light rain came in by 2pm, but blew over in time for refreshments. Another shout out goes to Al Lisen’s crew for continuing to remove old fence. This time they came within just 150 feet of finishing. By the time you read this, the rest should be removed.

Thanks as always to all the background support from Judd to help organize the work day, Kathy for her expert coordinating, Larry for refreshments, and all the crew leaders and crew leader trainees for making sure the volunteers were taken care of and worked safely, and for ensuring expert trail was constructed.

Dave Croker
July 3, 2018