This year's series of wind and rain related issues impacting our workdays was upped a notch for the Feb. 25th workday with enough snow dumped on the Santa Cruz mountains the day before to create chaos on pretty much every road leading to Big Basin.
Highway 9 was closed to traffic from Saratoga to Boulder Creek due to snow along with down trees and power lines, and Bear Creek had snow and ice with numerous vehicles sliding off the roadway, so those coming from the SJ area needed to go the long way around through Scotts Valley and Felton.
It was a little easier for San Lorenzo Valley residents of the Crew, but some crew members were trapped in their homes by down trees blocking driveways and everyone had to zig zag their way around the many branches and other debris that littered Highway 236 into the park on the morning of the 25th.
Despite morning temperatures in the low 30's and the uncertainty of what roads would be open, we still had 14 people show up including two first time folks from the SJ area who took the long way around to get into the park.
The actual work was only to hike the RWL, lower and upper Dool, and lower Sunset, looking for storm damage but in the end finding nothing.
The only real work for the day was constructing two rolling dips on upper Dool to divert water off the trail.
After completing the trail check and eating lunch back in the HQ area we took a short hike to scout our next long term assignment, clearing the Skyline-to-Sea Trail from the back of the Redwood Loop to Middle Ridge Fire Rd.
The trail is 0.8 miles in length, about the same distance as the recently completed lower Sunset Trail, but is densely overgrown to the extent that it will be early summer before it is cleared. Once completed it will join Sunset, Dool and Meteor, as another link between the Basin floor and Middle Ridge.
The crew put in 91 hours and thanks to Rory Brooks, John Collins, Tom Condy, Peter Gelblum, Marc Koenig, Janie Leifhelm, Sean Miller, Whitney Mitchell, Mike Peasland, Devdutt Sheth, Dale Stadelman, one of Rory Brooks's co-workers Ellen Stearns, and two first time folks, Fremont Bainbridge and Peter Mage, for finding a way into the park and enduring the cold morning temperature.
by Mike and Jeff
photos by Mike, Sean, and Fremont