Redlands Trails

Build Day 13th May.

A few hardy souls braved the weather to continue building on the latest extension to Summer Lightning. The end of the new trail which drops onto "the tramway" has more or less been finished. The plan was to then go back to the top and work on the begining, but at this point the rain left us with little enthusiasm to continue!

However, the trail is rideable and is now has signs that will point you in the direction of the trail. Thanks to the few people who stopped by and helped us on a miserable day weather wise and to the Lady on the rocky mountain bike who has come along to build days a few times and I don't think we know the name of!

Summer Lightning tree

Just a quick update - Bruce, the Forestry Commission's beat forester for the area, got in touch yesterday to say that his team is up at Leith Hill this week, and they will remove the fallen tree on Summer Lightning. Thanks, Bruce!

Tree down on Summer Lightning

Apparently there's a tree down on the first section of Summer Lightning. I've put in a call to the Forestry Commission, who wil hopefully be able to clear it soon. In the mean time, please lift or ride your bike over the tree. I'll try and take a look this week after work, but am not sure when I can get out, so please bear in mind there is a tree down somewhere when hooning it down the trail!

Trail building, 14th January

  Trail building, 14th January 
  Originally uploaded by bent udder.

Jon, in the grey and black Race Face jacket, is standing on the new line here.

Lots of lovely sunshine yesterday. You can see how we moved the trail bed about two or three feet down the hilside, improving flow. The line now falls down the hill, making a wider (and therefore faster) corner.

 

 
 

Trail building, 14th January 
  Originally uploaded by bent udder.

  Trail building, 14th January 
  Originally uploaded by bent udder.

10th December build day - now with added turniness

  10th December build day 
  Originally uploaded by bent udder.

We got loads of trail done yesterday, with help from dozens of volunteers who stopped off or turned up specifically to help, including one intrepid rider all the way from Portsmouth.
Thanks to the extra hands, the trail now extends all the way down to the tramway, and includes a lovely sweeping bermed switchback - you can see it in the picture, hopefully.

One, thing, however - PLEASE DON'T RIDE THE TRAIL! There is very little drainage in place at the moment, so riding it will damage the trail and it will take longer to get it into sustainable condition. It takes a while for the ground to 'get used' to not having a nice grassy covering on it.

We'll be letting the trail bed in a bit over the next few weeks before benching in, which is most likely going to take place on 14th January.

The berm is sorted, as are about 100m of trail down from the berm. Gavin dug out some drains at the top of the trail, but noted that it's starting to drain quite well

Trailbuilding Report:26-11-06

We have started to work on what will be the new last section of Summer Lightning on Leith hill. Most of the top section of the trail has been cleared of debris and it has been partially dug. The aim is to create a swoopy line(though it doesn't look like that at the moment!) which will end with a turn that will take you to the bottom of the slope and deposit you onto the existing singletrack at the bottom.

On future build days the line will be refined and benched in to improve the sustainability. A hell of alot had been done by the time the sun went down considering the group averaged four people over the course of the day! Thanks to any riders who stopped by to give us a hand.

Also the current end section of Summer lightning was partially cleared of any muck that the recent torrential rain had washed onto the track. This section will be benched in in the near future.

The next proposed build day is on the 10th December. Watch the blog for confirmation.

Mail early, Mail often

If you've not had a Trail Mail through from us in recent days, and you'd like to be kept up to date with what we're up to, then it's worth subscribing to our mailing list. We mailed a bunch of people to see if they'd like to help out on the next build day. Please don't feel left out if we didn't invite you - it wasn't on purpose and we'd love you to come. There'll be cake and everything. Or rather, there will be sandwiches, freshly prepared by the lovely Sarah P.

We did have a nice, big, chunky mailing list that was deleted by the naughty ISP we use, and we've recontructed most of it from backups over the past week or so. But if you feel a bit left out, drop us a mail at redlandstrails@REMOVETHISredlandstrails.org and we'll add you to the list. Apologies for the obfuscation, but spammers are evil monkeys who should be chased through the fens by slavering bloodhounds.

Little bit of work on Summer Lightning

there has been a little bit of maintenance on Summer Lightning over the weekend. It's not hugely noticable, especially with the rain, but big scoops of mulch and silt have been removed from drains by the side of the trail - you may be able to see it in detail on the first section of the trail.
Because quite a bit of water has been sitting in certain corners, it has meant that
the ground has become wet and eroded, making those corners lower, and more likely to catch rain, increasing erosion exponentially. So we've packed loose stones into those corners. We'll be making good on the work later in the week, most likely.

Trail braids

  Repaired braid on Waggle Dance 
  Originally uploaded by bent udder.

If there's an obstacle on the trail that everyone else is riding, you should be able to ride it too. If you can't, or won't, there's no shame in dismounting and pushing over it.

But riding around it is pretty crap - it widens the trail, and in the case of Waggle Dance, most of which is off camber, it forces the trail down the hillside.

This tree root is about 2" high - it's easy to ride over once you've got the hang of it. If you can't ride it, don't force the trail off to the right where all that wood is piled up. it's piled up there for a reason...

Lookitthat!

  ...and if we napalm that bit... 
  Originally uploaded by ben.tudor.

Yesterday, a bunch of us were mostly standing around amid moist bracken, looking for places to put some sweeping switchback turns and lovely new singletrack for BKB. Yes, we're going to be re-routing the trail after the closure earlier this year.

I'll keep the details brief, because we're still working things out, but we will be getting rid of the straightline drop at the end of the trail. It is eroding at one hell of a rate, and it has caught out a few newbies.

Instead, we will turn the trail through 175 degrees before the last Bridleway crossing (hopefully getting rid of any trail conflict there) and swing back across the hillside away from Peaslake, before making another 175 degree switchback  turn and rolling back on towards the exit to the aforementioned bridleway.

This will do a bunch of things, but mostly it will make for a far less easily damaged trail, and cut skidding and erosion. We can leave the old last section of trail to regenerate and grow back over.

More news as we get it - or, if you're feeling curious, head over to our forum to have a look at the discussions over there.