Monday, October 22, 2012

2012 Wampum Chapter Pumpkin Pie Hike

 
 
Good Morning Fellow NCTr's:
Another beautiful October Sunday afternoon and another herd of pumpkin pies led to slaughter and consumption along the North Country Trail. They were delicious! We had over forty hikers take the 2.5 mile walk from Hodgson Rd. over to the shelter at Watt's Mill (with a side trip to Indian Rock along the way), joined at the mill by another dozen or so people for some NCT comaradarie (and PIE and cider!)
 
I have some photos from yesterday's excursion posted here https://picasaweb.google.com/105725471641034380528/PumpkinPieHike2012#
 
Thanks to everyone for organizing, contributing, participating in, and supporting the effort. And also for everyone's hard work on building and maintaining the trail as we received many nice compliments from our constituency about what we do and how well we do it year-round. 
 
This was, I believe, our fifth community outreach event of the year, Ellwood City's Earth Day, Darlington Days, McConnell's Mill Heritage Festival, and the Gear and Beer Autumn Festival at Brady's Run Park being the other four, and compliments to everyone who put all the time and effort into making these successful. Gettin' the word out about this great community resource. Happy to see another four groups of hikers just out walking our section of NCT yesterday - we invited them all to have some pie with us.
 
 
Dave Brewer
Trail Work Coordinator/Communications Coordinator

Saturday, October 13, 2012

We're Busy Here!!


 
Busy, busy, busy. We're so busy that even the beavers stand in awe of how busy we have been and will be. That's busy. Really busy.


Two great trail work sessions over the past few days and I appreciate Doug Turner and Lee Fairbanks for coming out on Thursday morning to get some mowing and pruning done each direction from Fletcher Hill Rd., as well as doing what we do best - digging holes and filling them right back in. Two blaze posts and a Carsonite sign installed to help ease the challenge of navigating a well-run-over and small-explosives-impregnated Cemex property.


This morning Lee and I headed out to the Hodgson Rd. trailhead to install our new sign there. T'was freezing but it is amazing how digging a three-foot-deep hole (next to a gas pipe) and carrying 150 lbs of sign will warm you right up. We also picked up some trash along the road and did some mowing out on the Kirkwood Farm, as well as enlisting Eleanor's help in doing some trail checking between Hodgson and Watt's Mill in preparation for next Sunday's hike.




Also, Dennis Garrett and his travelling promotional team have been getting everything ready for our trip to the Tri-State Gear and Beer Conservation Fest at Brady's Run Park tomorrow to talk to people about the North Country Trail. I can't name the names because I'm not sure who all is doing what and I know if I try I'll leave someone out, so I'll leave that for Dennis's recap of the day.


Monday evening, the 15th, is our monthly chapter meeting at Hito's in West Pittsburg - 6:00 PM (come a bit earlier if ordering dinner) and next Saturday morning, the 20th, is an American Heart Association First Aid class set up by Dennis as the final step for chainsaw certification and for anyone else who was interested.


Of course, next Sunday afternoon we'll have hikers gathering at 1:00 at Watt's Mill for our 2.5 mile Pumpkin Pie Hike. Come out for this walk on a very, very nice section of trail - especially at this time of the year. Beautiful out there. Bring a friend along and introduce them to the trail. Or, just come on out to the shelter to enjoy some NCT comaradarie.


We'll need to sneak in one last trail work session before the hike, primarily to get the Rickstrips put down on the shelter access trail bog bridge. We'll go Friday sometime - giving it a couple of days for the weather forecast to firm up before deciding on what time would be best.


So, we've been busy and there's more to do. The beavers shake their heads in disbelief. Then they lower their heads in shame in the knowledge that they've been defeated.


Thanks for all you do for the trail!!


Dave Brewer
Trail Work Coordinator

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

McConnell's Mill Heritage Festival Follow Up

Hello All,
 
I am reporting on the Chapters two days at McConnells Mill State Park Heritage Festival this past weekend. We were blessed with two beautiful fall days which brought out great crowds of people to this 20 year old event. This being our first time attending, we were not sure what to expect, but whatever we might have been thinking, I doubt it could have matched what actually happened.
 
We talked to hundreds of people about the trail, mostly just casually interested people, but many sincerely interested in where to find the trail, where it went, etc. We had printed 100 of our new chapter brochures and only have about 10 left. We sold 75 raffle tickets for the picture of the Mill in the park, donated by Jim Nocera. I am going to guess we made 50 to 75 hiking sticks; mostly for kids, but also a couple adults. We distributed 140 NCTA orange bandannas supplied to us by the National Park Service.
 
Dave Wright's shaving bench was the star attraction of our display area; often families waited 45 to 60 minutes to peel the park off their hiking stick. Dave was the hardest working man at the event. Between he and Jim Houk, they make a huge pile of shavings. (On Saturday late in the day, kids standing in line noticed we had run out of sticks to carve, so four of them went to the woods and came back with their own sticks - and Dave just kept on working.)
 
The park personnel were very pleased with our display area, especially the hiking stick venue. They invited / encouraged us to be at National Get Out Doors Day at Moraine State Park next June.
 
Along with being a successful "trail awareness" event for the Chapter, this was a very good fund raiser - Photograph Raffle - $130
Hiking Stick / Bandanna Donations - $240
Total - $379
 
We all had a good time. Thanks to Jim Nocera for all the work on the brochure and the donation of the beautiful photograph that was raffled; for Dave Wright and Jim Houk working for many hours with all the kids, making all the sticks. For all those who helped talk to all the visitors - Gail Blakley, Dorothy Buquo, Kaye Turner, Herb & Kathy Adams, Susan Fudurich, Lee & Eleanor Fairbanks, Cathy Garrett.
 
Buckle up and get ready for the Gear & Beer Tri-State Fallfest on Oct. 14th - 12 PM to 5 PM.
We'll do it again one more time this year.
 
Thank you all for making this such a beautiful weekend.
 
Dennis Garrett