Step 2 To Re-Opening Old Trails - Trail Hike w/ Forest Service

Date of the Next Hike

  • Feb 11th

    Votes: 2 100.0%

  • Feb 25th

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Other (Specify in a Reply to the thread)

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    2
DRaider90

DRaider90

Uwharrie Off-Road Volunteering
Joined
Oct 23, 2007
Location
Weddington, NC
Time to get the gears turning on this one. We are looking at either doing a 2nd trail hike 2 weeks from now, or 4 weeks on the weekend of the Workday. What would work best for the group? Goal will be to get the Forest Service to go with this time to share their input on what we have found so far also. Post up any ideas/feedback!:driver:
 
It will be much easier and quicker going over what we have already explored especially if we cut off the lower section of gold mine from the saddle to cotton place. With this in mind it will be quicker to access the trailer to the saddle from dickey bell. Just a thought.
 
I agree Kenny we should start from Dickey Bell and walk in from there. I wonder though do we need to bring the FS in this early. Even with all the talking and walking we did today we still Have a lot to settle as far as route and what to do environmentally. I am wondering if we should do one or two more Hikes and figure out what were doing from the Saddle back to the parking lot as far as trail lay out goes before we bring the FS out to Hike.
 
I talked with Kenny and Scott on the phone for a couple hours today catching up with what happened. It was agreed that the best plan of attack would be to come in on the Dickey Bell side (what is in reality an old part of Gold Mine) and enter from there. This is taking into account that the bottom half of Gold Mine to Cotton Place isn't really a viable consideration due to its environmental issues. A big part of why the trail got closed in the first place.

I can't guarantee we will be able to get the Forest Service out on this hike, it can be productive with or without them. As one person said one hike won't provide us with all the information we need. But my goal is for them to be with so we can find out if we are headed in the right direction. Because its not our decision on what parts of the old trail get used, etc. I heard some promising news about the trail that split off of Gold Mine and went up to Daniel, that would be an ideal route to go. Just route the trail down below the "Gatekeeper" obstacle and we would be set. BUT we don't know if that trail section was closed because of Bald's Eagle's nests or only god knows.

So before we get ahead of ourselves it would be nice to get their feedback. That is just where I am coming from at least in planning these hikes. But lets keep the ideas/feed back coming. Keep in mind I wasn't there, so I can only go based off of what you guys tell me on here. :driver:
 
I agree that we dont want to get too far off track and what you have been told so far is correct about the bottom half of goldmine being unusable but I am just thinking we should have a plan of attack and have several options to give the FS before our next hike. I think if we bring them in now it almost seems unprepared. So say one more hike to more firm up where we want to take the trail. Because as of right now we had three groups split up at the end and every group took a different way back to Cotton Place. So i think one more hike where we could see where the Daniel loop goes and if it still ends up at the Saddle or if we are still wanting to dig in to the hill. Then we can offere a few different ideas to the FS and have a clear path we want to show them. Not just a "well we want to take it that way on the hill somehow?"
 
I think we need a better understanding of the trails that branch from Daniel down to the saddle area before we take the forest service out there, and we need to settle on a definant trail that will tie the two together so we can show them exactly how we would like the new proposed trail to run besides going out and without knowing where the second half would run (from the saddle to daniel).

My idea would be to do another hike in 2 weeks to maybe scout this area and possibly rattlesnake trail, also maybe bring some ribbon and mark the proposed trail, then 2 weeks after that take the forest service for the hike of the entire proposed trail run.

Also this would give the OP a chance to walk the trail as he missed it yesterday.

Let's just take a deep breath, and not rush this, let's look as professional as possible and know exactly where we would like the trail to go.
 
Yes exactly. I am just worried if we rush getting the FS involved into this we will not seem like we are organized and would turn off the FS. I think we should have the defined plan and maybe a few options to show them.
 
It seems like we are looking at this from 2 different perspectives.

2 years ago when this idea originally came up the concept was to hike the trails with the Forest Service. That means on the first hike that we just had originally they would have been with us.

But I figured this wouldn't be a good idea, that we would need one hike to get an idea of our options and where we wanted to suggest to the Forest Service we take the trail.

To put it simply while some are viewing this as rushing to get the Forest Service out there, I view it as prolonging them from being out there.

Regardless lets not miss the point that getting the Forest Service out there on a hike is no easy task. I remember how much work it took to get a hike for the June work weekend organized. And that was riding with a little bit of hiking on trails that were open, during the week when they are working anyway. Let alone hiking trails on the weekend when it would take arranging overtime for them to be out there (they have almost no budget to work with this year).

So the Forest Service may not make it out for the hike either way. But Monday I am going to talk with Terry Savery and see what her opinions are, and share what I have found out thus far. And after what happened with this last hike I am not going to make any commitments right now on the next hike. My situation here isn't great right now, but my vote is to at least have a hike the weekend of the workday. Maybe have one 2 weeks out for those that can make it, plus another one the Sunday of the work weekend.

So until I hear more back from the Forest Service lets try to focus on what dates we want to set, and our plan of attack for at least 1 more hike if not 2.
 
There is a great access point after the gatekeeper. That has planty room for vehicles to make the turn onto the new trail. Areas below the gatekeeper would take more work to develope. Still doable but a little more work. I will chime in once we get more people voting on when they are going.
 
I respect your opinion Eli but I dont think your hearing our point. I know it takes a lot of work to get them out there but we dont have a clear plan to show them yet. Honestly we all took different route back to camp from the Saddle so we dont know the best plan of attack yet. I think one more hike to get that plan even if it ends up being something the FS rejects at least we had a full idea to give them. For this new trail plan to work we need to be highly democratic and organized about it. I know it will take several years from now to open this trail so whats a few more months now. The easier and smoother we make it for the FS to open this trail, the more likely they are to let us explore for future trails. Anyone else have an Opinion? Because I will stop if im the only one who feels this way.
 
Visibility in the woods is MUCH better this time of year with the leaves gone. That is my only input on timing for getting the FS out there.
 
88bronzetrooper said:
I respect your opinion Eli but I dont your hearing our point. I know it takes a lot of work to get them out there but we dont have a clear plan to show them yet. Honestly we all took different route back to camp from the Saddle so we dont know the best plan of attack yet. I think one more hike to get that plan even if it ends up being something the FS rejects at least we had a full idea to give them. For this to work we need to be highly democratic and organized about it. I know it will take several years from now to open this trail so whats a few more months now. Anyone else have an Opinion? Because I will stop if im the only one who feels this way.
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I agree with you here. We missed our target return trail and discovered one that might be an option. I think the trail we were suppose to be on needs exploring. The more info we gain now before we go to them is better IMHO.
 
I think we are getting way ahead of ourselves here.

The goal of hiking the old trails is to gain information to share with the Forest Service to open the door in an attempt to get trail(s) opened/re-opened so Daniel is no longer a dead end trail.

This is an on going process. What I am gathering is that some think we are going to do the leg work, create a master proposal and then either the Forest Service accepts it or rejects it. That won't end up in us getting a trail opened/re-opened. This has to be an on going process of a back and forth relationship with the Forest Service. We find out information, then we share it with the Forest Service. They give their feed back, then we go back and gather more information. Trail hikes will be an on going process, even after we have the first (there will be multiple) trail hike with the Forest Service.

This is beyond the point that there is a good chance the Forest Service won't make the next hike we have. Its hard to get them out there, so I have been trying to get the message across that the Forest Service coming along or not coming is a moot point so to speak. Lets forget I even mentioned the Forest Service at this point, and lets try to focus on getting the next hike organized.
 
I would like to show everyone the trail I meant to be on! Sorry!:confused:
 
Ha Ha Scott its all good. We know your lose your memory when you get old :p. Should be fun to see what the trail has to offer.
 
Memory? What ? What did you say? he he

I want to show ya'll the trail I was trying to find Saturday but my thoughts are that we have a completely separate trail leading out of the Daniel Parking lot and hooking back up to Dickey Bell not back to Daniel.

I believe this is what the FS is looking for. Maybe us going down that trail we did from the saddle was for a reason? It certainly by-passes alot of the enviromental challenges on the old Gold Mine Trail and gives us a completely separate trail from Daniel. It could still be called "Gold Mine".

Anyway I just wanted to through my 2 cents in......
 
UORTC said:
Memory? What ? What did you say? he he

I want to show ya'll the trail I was trying to find Saturday but my thoughts are that we have a completely separate trail leading out of the Daniel Parking lot and hooking back up to Dickey Bell not back to Daniel.

I believe this is what the FS is looking for. Maybe us going down that trail we did from the saddle was for a reason? It certainly by-passes alot of the enviromental challenges on the old Gold Mine Trail and gives us a completely separate trail from Daniel. It could still be called "Gold Mine".

Anyway I just wanted to through my 2 cents in......
Click to expand...

that was my thinking. why have a trail running right beside an existing trail. the trail we took from the saddle that kinda ended could easily be extended beyond the 4th gulley and downhill towards the parking area if not all the way to the parking area.
 
A suggestion for the next walk. If you want copies of the photos bring a laptop so they can be downloaded off the cameras.
 
another 2 cents

I really enjoyed the hike in the woods and meeting everyone. Sorry about the foggy memory from 40 years back, but I think we need to remember that the first order of business is to familiarize ourselves with the terrain in order to get a picture of what's there, what's feasible within those, and what out of those is likely to meet the USFS requirements with the least finagling. There's really no use to push the USFS to go with us until we have a proposal and alternatives worked out to present to them. I'm willing to go back and do more hikes to "catalog" the options, and whenever is OK by me. With a few days notice, I can skooch the schedule to accommodate the dates.


I really would like to go back to the Daniel end and hike the switchback connector possibility, if for no other reason than to refresh my foggy recollection of how I got that Yamaha trail bike from what's now the Daniel switchbacks over to the Gold Mine saddle in the early 70s. If I remember correctly, there weren't any real enviro issues, but that's not to say there aren't archeological considerations. This process is going to take time and lots of legwork (in more ways that one), so lets come up with dates.
 
If the weather holds like it should I can come out this weekend if you like.
 
Is the plan the same? Meet at outpost between 9 and 9:30?
 
Thats what I was thinking. Ok So we will all meet at the Outpost at about 9am and be leaving there at 930 to head to Cotton Place. Looks like 4 of us so far.
 
Hi all. If the plan is to do a walk this weekend (11 Feb) I will not be able to make it. I'll actually be out of State a bunch between now and mid March. I'll make the weekends I am here. Thanks.
 
So are we all still game for Saturday at 9 at the outpost?
 
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