by Kevin Busko
The first KTA Trail Care Weekend this year of the Mid State Trail (MST) in the State College Region was held April 11-13 at the Seven Mountains Boy Scout Camp. If the turnout was any indicator of things to come, then we are in for a good year of Trail Cares and Crews. We had twenty volunteers signed in for the weekend. The weather could not have been any nicer, and we didn’t even need to fire the woodstove Saturday night.
On Friday evening, Tom Bastion got a jump start on the rest of us when, on his way to the camp, he stopped at the Hairy Johns Picnic Area of Bald Eagle State Forest and cleared a couple of blowdowns on the MST north of there. We divided into four work crews for Saturday morning.
The first crew headed down to brush-cut, lop, and chainsaw the MST from Colerain Road south to the Tussey Mountain vista above the Little Juniata Natural Area. The Moshannon Group Sierra Club group will go back there in June to do some additional trimming and blazing. The second crew brush-cut, lopped, and blazed the MST north out of Penn-Roosevelt State Park. The third crew cleared blowdowns and reblazed the unsigned Maple Spring Trail, which is a water access for the MST between Brewer Path and Tussey Trail north of the Colerain Road crossing. The crew then did a sweep of the MST from Ewing Path to Tussey Trail, clearing winter debris. The fourth crew met up at Cinder Pile Spring and replaced the sign on top of Winkelblech Mountain at the Sheesley Hollow/Winkelblech Trail junction of the MST. Afterward, we headed to Poe Valley State Park to the section of the MST between the Little Poe Fire Road and Long Mountain near Boiling Spring to do some blowdown removal and lopping.
Sunday morning saw us down to a still very respectable twelve volunteers, so we split into three groups. The first group headed back to Penn-Roosevelt State Park to finish clearing to the Trico junction north of there. The second group headed to Greens Valley to do some lopping and blazing. (Thanks, Donna. Your check will be in the mail.) The third group headed back to Poe Valley State Park to do some brush cutting, lopping, and blazing to clear the old fire lane that ascends Long Mountain from Boiling Spring southbound on the MST. We were finished and cleared out of the cabin by noon. Hopefully the weather and turnout next year will both be as nice as this year. Thanks, everyone.
In addition to all the regulars, we were pleased to see several new faces this year: Samantha, Karla, Lizzie, and Wellis. Hopefully we will see all of them at future Trail Care and Crew events. We were also pleased to have David Taylor from Dover, PA, step up to become an overseer for the Greens Valley section of the MST.