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[workhike] Cable bridge on the Phelix Creek Trail (Beginner Friendly) · Sat. Oct. 15th, 2011 - Sun. Oct. 16th, 2011

Warning: This is an old trip - it already happened

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Organized by: Christian Veenstra.

Start: Saturday, Oct. 15th
End: Sunday, Oct. 16th
Pre-trip meeting: Wednesday, Oct. 12th, 6:00 pm
Pre-trip meeting location: clubroom

Description:

After 4 years of construction the Phelix Creek Trail up to the club's Brian Waddington Hut is basically complete - there is still a little bit of work to do but I don't think anyone would imagine calling it a "route". It's a great trail.

However, last season's heavy-snow-loading winter took out the bridge at the far end of Long Lake... mostly - you can still make it across, but I think it qualifies as sketchy at best. The plan is to replace the log bridge with a cable bridge, cables having the advantage that they neither rot or collect snow.

In order to do this we'll need a small group (ie - a single carload) to carry up cable, hardware and tools and then install it. While we're there we can try and de-mud some of the trail around the lake by carrying in landscaping fabric and putting beach sand on top. Should be a fairly easy weekend trip - we won't need to get up terribly early on Saturday (by VOC standards) or come home terribly late on Sunday.

While we are up there, there's a few other things we can do to make the hut ready for the ski season. So we could use a second carload. See the web page for details. Of course all this does count as work hikes.

Of course, a basically unlimited quantity of work could be done improving the trail/road. For example, if the water bars were mellowed out a bit on the road it would make it accessible to a wider range of vehicles, but that involves the moving of serious quantities of dirt. There's also some sections where the slide alder is really starting to encroach on the road - enough to give "coastal racing stripes" to vehicles in the summer, and interfere with skiing in the winter. Would be a good place to use the "death machine".

There's also a few sidehills on the trail which could get downhill logs and a better incut footbed, as well as muddy sections higher up which could use landscaping cloth and beach sand. Don't get me started on the mud-slide which is the trail to the outhouse - that could use some real work.

If somebody is willing to take on a quasi-leadership role I can help you figure out what needs doing and how to do it, I just can't stand around to supervise directly as I want to make sure the bridge goes in right and think that that might be "complicated". It looks like Chris Y has a sufficient quantity of interest in his trail marking trip, so we don't need to worry so much about taking away from it.

See the wiki page link for a list of what you should bring. We will discuss these items and also tools at the pre-trip meeting.

Posted: 2011-09-30 17:07:39
Last modified: 2018-10-21 01:22:41