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2018/12/26

Quinet's Court Restaurant

I just got permission to hold Wetzel County's "Hiker Fellowship" event at Quinet's Court Restaurant in New Martinsville, West Virginia. These may start in February?

Website Upgrades 12/26/2018

Campground & lodging mileage from the establishment to the trail was added yesterday.  Adventurer's Project's "Hiker Resources" web page had to be practically rebuilt to handle it.   Today, I added a mileage chart of the Road Fork and Whipple Section - Buckeye (off-road)/ North Country National Scenic Trail.  I won't touch the on-road, but that's much easier to use the "measurement" tool in the BTA's digital mapping on Avenza Maps there.

A link to my Generic Gear Inventory was created on the Hiker Resources web page. 

2018/12/16

Adventurer's Project's Website, Doggy Sitting, Chapter Cross Pollination

Information and links were added to Adventurer's Project's website regarding the City of Sistersville II ferry that crosses the Ohio River from Fly of Monroe County, Ohio to Sistersville of Wetzel County, West Virginia.  The ferry is 11.1 miles from a place in the Marietta Unit of The Wayne known as the Walter Ring House and Mill Site (Ring Mill) on the Road Fork Section.  That area marks the northeast corner of what is known in the Buckeye Trail as "The Wilderness Loop." 

I've been in Lake County, Ohio doggy sitting lately and my plan is to be back in Woodsfield of Monroe County, Ohio tomorrow.  But on the way, I'll be taking some pictures for possible fresh content for the Adventurer's Project Facebook page.  Furnishing it with fresh content is harder in the winter considering that we don't do much hiking, or have much in the way of events.  I already have a stockpile of more than 600 photos waiting to be used. 

On the trip down to Woodsfield, I'll be photographing areas on the Buckeye and North Country Trail's outside of Adventurer's Project's coverage zone.  There's probably some supporters who need to know that the trail is something that extends outside themselves and what they generally do in their daily lives, or what they know of.  While we're not in a place to be exporting the occasional hiker, ultimately supporting the Buckeye Trail's south and east will ultimately be how it works and what it does.  Hopefully, their efforts will someday help further our hiker numbers in return?  I call this effect "cross pollination."  In theory, if there isn't a chapter on one of their ends, it's likely that hikers won't gravitate there.

2018/12/14

ADT Diagnostic Continued

There have been problems with my GPS data for the American Discovery Trail.  I've noticed that with what I have saved recently in Google Earth that I'm somehow missing things?  Right now, I'm writing my Mock Hiker Logistical Diagnostic map by way of the North Mid-West Route (NMR).  I was working with ADT - Indiana on the NMR earlier and it has multiple amenity gaps.  That's a conclusion that I don't like coming to and try to avoid at all costs.  I don't think that should be right?  I know that the ADT is more supported on the north side than it is on the south.  The longest day that anyone should be reluctant to have (due to availability of overnight amenities) is about 27.5 miles long in Nebraska. 

I managed to find my lodging folder.  But I'm thinking that my governmental reservations data will have to be rebuilt? I think I'll start that task later today, this time starting with local then county parks on up to the federal level.  I like overlaying as many maps as I possibly can.   Right now without so many of those,  my ADT file in Google Earth is about 90 megabytes in a zipped KMZ file.  I either expect that size to go up tremendously when I do this, or I'll save each state to the hard drive, which is probably the better idea.  At that point, I can just open them as needed and save on my computer resources that way.  Uncompressed, Google Earth has trouble opening files in the ballpark of 320 megabytes and up.

The odds of me finishing the diagnostic in the next two days are looking extremely slim.

2018/12/09

American Discovery Trail Data Re-Organized, Upcoming Logistics Diagnostic

I've reorganized my American Discovery Trail data using a standardized template that I use for ordering items in Google Earth Pro for every distance trail that I work with.  Under ADT's directory, it should be something like 00aa. for Delaware tracks, 00ab for alternates, 00b for data, 00c for mile markers, 00d for waypoints, so on and so on.  I'm getting ready to do a independent diagnostic on the trail's camping/ lodging logistics.

A westbound hiker has to be in Sacramento, California by 10/10 annually or they risk the Sierra Nevada Mountains becoming impassable.  All diagnostics that I've done so far are "true thru" documents.  That means that the mock hiker is true to the prescribed route of the trail, unless it's a threat to one's life, limb, eye sight or is legally impassable.  If the trail for some reason were to meet those conditions and that trail alert, or map update hasn't been published, then they can affect a by-pass at their discretion.  But for right now, the mock hiker will be routed in a more "perfect world."

So with 10/10 in the westbound direction being fixed, I'm going to apply my standard daily mileages for different types of terrain and see if I can get that mock hiker across the continent?  This is why I don't want help from anybody else's data.  Illegal stealth camping won't be factored in.  I want to see if my mock hiker can make it across without resorting to a 30 mile day (not even one).

I've got a feeling that it won't make it.  If what I hear is right, when one chooses which side of the loop that they're on, I vaguely recall the length of that trip to be 4,600 - 4,800 miles?  And I know that 4,800 won't do it.  And I imagine that it would probably take 4,300 to do it?  There's only 6 miles of difference between the north and south of the ADT's mid-west loop.

2018/12/07

My Places File Sizes

The "My Places" on my laptop's Google Earth Pro is about 417 megabytes in size with a KML file extension.  But I don't think that I can rely on that number because if I were to save it as a KMZ (a zipped file), it's coming up as 522 megabytes.  File sizes much larger than somewhere in the ballpark of 300 megabytes are too large to load in The Robot's Google Earth Pro app. 

I just opened one portion of the laptop's data.  It reads as 479 megabytes and opening it was successful.  Considering that I had to slim the My Places down by committing certain portions to be opened from the hard disk, I have doubts that I can do it again.  Looks like I'll have to save both sections sub folder by sub folder in order to get them to load again?

2018/12/03

Deer Gun Hunters

I want to tell the deer gun hunters in the Marietta Unit of The Wayne that it could be possible to attract North Country/ Buckeye Trail hikers away from the forest during this season, but only if something else happens on our end in the future. The problem that remains depends on what the National Forest Service draws on to the trail system by it's own means. The BTA and NCTA doesn't have any jurisdiction there. That's why its senseless to voice any opinions or concerns to me without dealing with the bureaucracy of the National Forest Service.  The end goal is unwinnable without that last 1/3rd.  And at present, I have no interest in initiating such a thing with them, so your on your own.