Upcoming Projects

    I came up with a logo for Adventurer's Project.  The green, of course, stands for greenery and the yellow stands for the sun.  The latter is very important because it gets hot here in Far SE Ohio, which our area includes 40 miles of the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent) in the Marietta Unit of the Wayne National Forest (The Wayne).  Hikers often underestimate their water consumption here.  And on the North Country Trail, it mostly stays above the 42nd parallel.  We're at about 39°N and our summers are more like Kentucky and Tennessee.  North Country is more like Vermont, New York State, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Northern Wisconsin, Northern Minnesota and North Dakota.  I'm certain they probably don't realize how hot it gets down here.

    Right now, I have some smog tubes (secondary air injection) on order for my 1987 Chevrolet G20 Sportvan.  They should be coming in tomorrow?  When I dismantled the former exhaust pipes, I realized that there was weakness in one of the exhaust manifold bolt holes.  Rather than wait for it to give way, I decided to replace the manifolds.  I have those now.  But I wasn't going to mess with trying to unbolt the smog tubes.  I'd probably round out their bolts if I tried and still not get them out?  I have new exhaust manifold gaskets, so this is going to be a complete replacement.

    The forest service has us doing some rather extensive modifications to the trail in The Wayne.  For one, every stream crossing needs to have ramps benched on both sides.  Benching is a part of trail maintenance where we have to widen, or re-establish the trail's tread, or the surface that you hike on.  More notibly, if you hike up a grade, that's "pitch."  But when building a trail, when the trail builders come across a hillside, but in the other dimension, leveling that out by benching, that's the "roll."  It has to be maintained every few years or so because of erosion.  And our off-road trail is so backcountry and narrow that it has to be done by hand manually with mattocks and Pulaski axes.

    The off-road in The Wayne for the most part was originally designed and built for the North Country Trail from 1983 to 1987.  By word of mouth, the NCTA struggled with getting maintainers from 1987 to 1997.  My impression is that for about 35 miles of off-road, they were working with about 4 volunteers if I had to guess.  10 miles of off-road per trail maintenance volunteer is 3x more than any one volunteer should ever have.

    There was a North Country Trail Association chapter in this area, but it was short lived.  The Buckeye Trail Association took over the maintenance and some of the routing administration in 2000.  But it took them about 5 years just to get the trail opened back up by mostly minimum standards.  So, I think I have to assume that some of the benching hasn't been maintained in 30 something years?

    In addition to being the lead for Adventurer's Project, I'm also the volunteer Section Supervisor for the Whipple Section - Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent), which is the south of what the project supports in this region.  My two biggest projects are in the ballpark of the present day Whipple Section, Point 03/ Big Run Rd/ Township Rd 414 in Independence Township and Point 05/ Brooks by McCain Hill & Bean Ridge Roads to Point 06/ Brooks by Cow Run Roads in Lawrence Township, both of Washington County, Ohio.  

    The trail in The Wayne has a mountain bike concurrency, but that's by no means unusual for Distance Hiking Ohio.  With the tasks that need to be completed, there are some hiking related safety issues to iron out.  But what I see in it with the mountain bikers is something cooperative and diplomatic.  The hiking world really doesn't understand, or doesn't fully understand when I get like this.  I have no idea if this will work, but I am sure that it won't if we don't try.

    In the ballpark of Whipple 03/ Big Run Road, I've been working to the east of there so far.  And the trail ascends up to the top a ridge, where it's roll has been leveled along it's side.  But it wasn't well built.  Another BTA volunteer and I had to use our Pulaski axes to chop away the south side embankment to widen the trail.  Then i came up to an area with a 500lb boulder sticking out of it and a big slip on the other side.  With authorization from the forest service, I either have to do extensive work trying to get that boulder out and repairing that deep slip, or I'll have to reroute the trail within 50ft of the original?  And in order to know if I can reroute it, I'll have to approach the area from the opposite direction to know for sure?  If it's unattennable, then we'll have to work with what we've got.

    Whipple 05 - 06/ the Brooks Rd area features the Little Muskingum River Flats where the trail right next to the river in it's flood plane..  You could say that this place is in the Sitka, Moss Run and Dart areas of Washington County, Ohio.  It has five distinct features to it.  There's the East and West Highlands, Embankments - East & West and then there's the flats in the middle of it all.  The West Flats are no problem.  But the east end gets narrow.  The river embankment gets tight and wedges the trail against it and the river.  We're having erosion problems on the river's side of the trail and we need to reinforce that bank with some boulders and rocks.  But the boulders and rocks have been washed out to  a point at the start of the west end, which is a mile away.  That's a long way to haul heavy loads, especially during COVID-19.  But I think I might be able to do it with a wheel barrel if I bench ramps  into 3 stream crossings down there first?  I estimate that I alone could haul 6 loads to the site.  But the problem is that there's nowhere to stage piles of rocks and boulders out there, so every time a load is delivered, the boulders have to be set then.  I think that's going to impede the "assembly line" if you would?  The good news is that one of my forest service liaisons and I did some work on this site last year.  And the high side embankment was easy to bench.

      On the project's side of things, COVID-19 has made in-person trail promotion rather unattennable.  i was supposed to execute a project that could strengthen some of our weaker areas, but considering the people still wearing face masks and complying with state recommendations, it's not worth the fuel or time right now?  Regardless of anyone's particular persuasion, it's just a really bad time and conversation over it for these purposes are an utter waste of time.  From my end of these, we just have no choice but to ride this out in other ways.  I suppose that since I don't know this area too well, that walking through these towns, villages and cities to get a rough feeling of what they're all about could be a good idea?  And I could possibly engage people, say one at a time?

Geo Photo Catalog

It might be 9 days before I can continue Adventurer's Project's "Geo Photo Catalog."  It has several applications.

Application #1: A photographic record of the trail to educate Buckeye Trail Association volunteers and a reference for future maintenance needs.

Application #2: Produce photos for trail adopter procurement.

Application #3: Social media content.  The photos will be released about 3 at a time in between other posts and help with fresh content during the cold days.

Application #4: Photos for Adventurer's Project's website.

Application #5: Pictures for trail promotion and volunteer procurement.

Application #6: Determine where we need to take pictures with better cameras.  Those photos can be used for trail promotion, the website and social media.

Adventurer's Project supports the Road Fork and Whipple Sections of the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent) in Noble, Monroe, Washington and Morgan Counties of Ohio.  The photos are taken about every 50yds or less in both directions.  Currently, the photos are being taken at my smartphone's highest possible quality.  As this region's off-road total is about 40 miles, it should produce over 2,600 photos.  That's far more than Buckeye and North Country's hikers have produced at the moment. 

On-road portions have been recorded via video with spoken locations from an automobile.  Aside from that, Google Street View covers some of this area.  So at this point, it's mostly about photographing about 40 miles of off-road paths on foot.  And I'm earning my 2020 North Country Trail 100 Mile Challenge, which I've missed other challenges like this in previous years.

The "geo" part pertains to enabling my smartphone camera's "locator" to produce geotags.  This process embeds the location of where the photo was taken into the properties of the file.  From there, software can be used to extract their coordinates and then embed them into placemarks into a Google KML/ KMZ file.  In terms of the maintenance record, volunteer users can follow the photos, particularly with the GIS/ GPS track of the Road Fork and Whipple Sections.  So, this is to see the trail's line with the photos on an application like Google Earth and probably ArcGIS products?

In previous years, the camera locator was on by default.  But I like to refer to geotags as "creeper tags."  It's unfortunate because people were physically followed by others when they downloaded their pictures and had the geotags extracted.  They could tell by the days of the week when they took their kids to karate class for instance.

But recently, to enable the geotag feature, there are two safeties.  One is that the phone's locator must be enabled.  When it is, this is what enables the smartphone's mapping and navigation.  The second step is to enable the locator a second time, but in the camera app's settings.  I find it to be a wonderful tool for the trail, but I tend to use it wisely.  As of the time of this post, geotags are automatically stripped by Facebook, but not by every social media company.  Presently, Adventurer's Project is only on Facebook and no other social media service due to insufficient manpower to admin more.

At last count, it takes about 1 hour to photograph 2 miles of off-road footpath here in what I call "Far SE Ohio," which is in the Appalachian Foothills.  That's that's about 4 times faster than it takes to initially blaze (painted navigational markers) one.  But still, the "stop and go" is harder on my body and I haven't scheduled this photographing over 7 round trip miles yet.

So, that just about sums up Adventurer's Project's Geo Photo Catalog.

Township Meeting Places

I think I finally found a resource that shows where the township meeting places are.  The bad news is that the addressing system sucks in many places this region.  I'll be lucky to get half of them right.  I've been working with four counties and I may have found some prospective parking places along the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent)?

NCTC vs NCNST

Adventurer's Project supports the Road Fork and Whipple Sections of the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent). When using the phrase "North Country," it refers to the moniker "North Country Trail," which refers to two entities working in tandem with each other. In this case it's the "North Country Trail Association (NCTA)," which has duties to the route and maintenance of the "North Country Temporary Connector (NCTC)," which covers the most of the on-road route and anything that isn't certified. And then there's the National Park Service, which administers the certified segments, or the "North Country National Scenic Trail (NCNST)," which are mostly off-road. Usually, when this moniker is used on some Adventurer's Project's communications, it stands for both indiscriminately.

However, if a location is stated on one or the other, then their more specific designation will be used.  In Far SE Ohio (including the NCNST in the Marietta Unit of The Wayne), the routing, maintenance and administration of their route is handled my the Buckeye Trail Association (BTA)

Seat Belts, Bluetooth Head Unit and CABL

I have two new aftermarket seat belts that came in the mail today.  One is for the front passenger's side and the other might be for the mid-row driver's side?  And I stopped by the auto parts store and talked to one of the employees about how stripped down the van's interior is.  I'm going to have to wire the stereo in from the fuse box and there are no pig tails for the front speakers.  He suggested that I use 16 gauge electrical wire instead of speaker wire to connect the four speakers to the Bluetooth head unit.  I purchased a roll of 100ft each for red and black coated wires.  That should do the connections for all four speakers and any electrical connections that I need to make.

I just stopped by the Washington-Morgan Community Action website and saw that there's a new brochure for the New Matamoras/ Macksburg Route.  It details the route in New Matamoras of Washington County.  Transit hikers will likely not board and disembark there because the closest the Road Fork Section - Buckeye Trail (North Country National Scenic concurrent) comes is about 4.6 miles from it.  But the Whipple Section comes to about 2.3 miles near the unincorporated community of Wade in said county.

This line runs on Thursdays only, so it's only good for hikers who come in from out of town (I really have to confirm that), or for resupply, particularly in Marietta.  Both Avenza Maps cut off New Mat, but it appears on the Guthooks Guides.  Unfortunately, I'm having difficulties finding a way to import custom digital mapping data into it.

Geo Photo Catalog, A Rough Year, Whole Circuit Challenge

The Geo Photo Catalog is a project for the Road Fork and Whipple Sections that I have already underway.  It involves taking pictures with my smartphone and camera app's locators turned on.  What does is it embeds the coordinates of where the picture was taken.  The idea, is to take them at every blaze, or where they're supposed to be according to the BTA's maintenance guide lines.  Because of the weakness of a smartphone's GPS antenna, they have to be taken when the sky is partly sunny or better.  And on Weatherbug, there's a difference between "party cloudy" and "partly sunny."

It's multifaceted program as it's purposes are:

1) provide the Buckeye Trail Association with a visual record of the trail

2) provide pictures for a Vacant Segment Showcase

3) to provide Adventurer's Project and the chapter it may become photos to use on it's website and social media, particularly in the winter.

Adventurer's Project covers the Road Fork and Whipple Sections of the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent) in Far SE Ohio, or generally east of I-77 and south of I-70.  Those sections are off-road at Caldwell Lake and in the Marietta Unit of the Wayne National Forest.

It's been a rough year.  Where to start???  The project had about 5 presentations and the public only showed up at one of them.  We have two volunteers ready to go, but with both there's some scheduling difficulties.  We might have another? 

I live in my motorhome in Woodsfield.  In December, I started getting physical therapy on my back.  That concluded in February, but my abdominals still need tensioned.  What I've learned is that I'm not in as good of condition as I once thought and now I'm unable to make the 13 mile one way trip to the nearest off-road portion by way of bicycle because the hills in this county are too much to handle at this time.

The electric warming hose that I was using for water to my motorhome failed and my hot water tank ruptured in a cold snap in February.  I had to get a motel for a couple nights, but this is when my car started acting up,  The RPM's were jumping.

In April, I finally saved up to get my car's clutch replaced.  I then added two bottles of "Guaranteed to Pass" in two tanks of gasoline to try and get the catalytic converters clean..  After the first one, it started to jump less.  But part way through the second, I wasn't satisfied it was doing enough.

  Sometime afterwards, I started to replace the entire exhaust because in the year prior, a mechanic told me that I was leaking oil and as it was dripping down the back side of the engine, that it could probably clog one of the catalytic converters?  Since the header pipe at the engine was bad and it was all practically welded together by this point anyways, I felt it necessitated a full replacement from "stem to stern."

It didn't alleviate the RPM's jumping.  I changed the oil valve gasket along with the exhaust, but that didn't do anything.  There's got to be something else?  Because then it wouldn't start.

I had it hauled to Hilltop Auto Services just outside of Woodsfield to perform a diagnostic.  They came back and said that the timing chain had gone and as a result, the valves were warped and the pistons were probably gone as well?

At that point, there was somebody in town who wanted to make my HHR into a jacked up, four wheel drive "Baby Grave Digger."  I paid for the tow truck from Hilltop to his house because it was a heck of a lot better than sending it 30 miles north to a junk yard.  But on the other hand, he had a old Chevy conversion van that I bought for $800.  It use to be a passenger van, but it's interior is stripped down.  I only have two seats in it.  And the passenger's side needs a seat belt, which is on order.

So, we're back up and running, but there's a few experiments to run with a rear wheel drive only, top heavy vehicle in The Wayne.  Most of its parking opportunities occur in a grass strip on the side of narrow, gravel roads.  But there's another reason to run these experiments...

The Buckeye Trail Association's board voted in the affirmative to have a "challenge" over the whole circuit in one weekend.  Basically, the BTA needs to be able to park cars every 3 miles or less in order to have hikers cover such distances over the 1,454 mile circuit almost virtually simultaneously at once.  Some of those vehicles could be RWD only's?  I have to come up with the contingency procedures in case it rains and their wheels sink?

Right now, I have 600 - 800lbs over my rear axle.  But I'll also be experimenting with a new arrangement of parking boards and a come-a-long, or hand winch.  With FWD, I would just place a board under each tire when I park in these places.  When I leave, I have about 2 seconds of thrust, the rest is momentum and that better get me out.

But with a rear wheel drive, the drive wheels are further back.  So the experiment is to see if four boards placed perpendicular in front of the boards being parked on would be enough traction to make it out?  My conversion van has one disadvantage that the HHR didn't and that's it's wheelbase.  The HHR could come out of a road side parking place forward, or back, depending on what was more advantageous?  The conversion van's wheel base is likely to be not as generous?  It probably has to come out in the forward direction only because of how tight the treeline is to the edge of these grass strips?  Without knowing more, that's merely speculation at this point. 

We have different grass strips.  Some are up hill, down hill and some are on flats.  We have to anticipate that these vehicles could be parked over night?  If so, will front reflectors be needed?  And if so, what color?

Regional+ Transit and 10 Miler Data

I was thinking about publishing data on regional, national and international transit along the North Country Trail.  Considering that the North Country concurrency with Buckeye is 917 of its 1444 miles, I might as well do the rest of Buckeye as well.  But I think that the BT is now in need of a new logistics diagnostic done at the generally 10 mile per day hiking rate.  I think that I last did it using transit and since that site is off-line, I think that the public needs to know how 10 miler comparable this trail is without it?

That's going to entail the updating of my Buckeye Trail custom tracks and map points.  I'll have to sift through the entire circuit's maps and map updates just to make sure everything is current.  And I prefer to do these in the winter if I can?  These are going to be courtesy of Adventurer's Project and available in the "Special Services and Map Repository" section of it's website.

The Regional+ transit data is going to be like a stripped down version of the Ohio Transit Hiker's Resource.  Local transit lines and services will be limited to getting from the regional, national and international amenities to the trail by much fewer ways.  In this case, it makes sense to do the non-transit 10 miler diagnostic first to so I know how to affect the local camping/ lodging situation (if I can).

This particular diagnostic will be on camping amenities alone.  The Buckeye Trail is a camping/ lodging dependent trail.  But lately, the market is demanding camping only.  If this diagnostic serves anything, it might serve to inform the audience that their demand is futile?

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.

Laptop Charger and Eastern Communities

Well, I left Home Port with a lot of stuff. But I forgot my laptop's charging cable. I watch movies on it nightly. The laptop probably has 2 hours worth of charge on it and I'm going to have to leave that be in case I need it for something?

My thoughts have been on the eastern communities along The Wilderness Loop of the Buckeye Trail (North Country partially concurrent) and how I'm going to establish Adventurer's Project there?

Adventurer's Project 11/18/2018

I responded to an e-mail from an anonymous person who expressed interest in the Buckeye/ North Country Trail in Far SE Ohio.  But with their being anonymous, I have reservations regarding adding them to the registry of Adventurer's Project's supporters.  I might do it, but it seems incomplete?  I should probably ask if they wanted to be on the list because I'm going to have to add an unsubscribe method to email communications anyways.

How long will it take until Adventurer's Project completes it's current mission?  I'm anticipating that question because I just believe that it will come up somewhere and sometime?  The answer is that Adventurer's Project's objectives are not time based.  That's because there's too many unknowns right now.  The effort is more achievement and evolution based.  Our current volunteer procurement ratio is 100 days to 1 volunteer.  And I think that we need to halve that.  But that's the sort of thing that you learn from year one.  Right now, the more time that I dedicate to trail promotion diverts from maintenance.  And we have to be real careful about that ratio.

I'm somewhat mathematic about the way that I do things.  I think that it confuses some in the hiking community?  But I'm not sure what to do about it.  Somethings about Adventurer's Project are very well considered.  You have to factor in the objectives of the Buckeye Trail Association and weigh them with the conditions surrounding the local area.

There is somewhat of a road map for this kind of thing.  Let's just say that I've seen and heard of a few good examples.  And I know more about some of the nuances of getting a BTA chapter started than my counterparts were probably aware of.

I'd like Adventurer's Project to have a more moderate collective disposition.  And this is one thing that I think my training of others in the months and years to come will be essential?

I worked on Adventurer's Project's website today.  We've been having problems with it and the e-mail systems recently.  I found some parts of it internally that were incomplete.  I just hope with them being fixed now that in the months to come that we get a better reception from the outside world.

A couple days ago, I made a post on the Buckeye Trail Association's Facebook group regarding deer hunting hours and how we could miss the hunters if we hiked at night.  That gave me an idea where I posted on something about that topic.  At that point I realized that I've been one of the most prolific night hikers on the BT and it gave me the idea that I should try some soon for content on Adventurer's Project's Facebook page.

I'm trying to keep what audience we have interested through out the winter.  It's not an easy task because there's less going on in the cold days of the year.  At the moment, I have 965 photos available, but I'm not sure that I'll be able to use all of them?  Just for guesses, I believe that I'll only need about 90 of them?

It's like someone gathering firewood for their one and only heat source in the winter.  During the warm days, instead of firewood, it's pictures and video.  Right now, I'm contemplating starting a YouTube Channel for Adventurer's Project.  Our pictures are hosted on the Facebook page, which is can be seen by those who don't have a profile.  But Facebook will "nag" them to get one.  I'm contemplating having another host for them, but it's got to integrate into the Facebook page to avoid redundancy on the volunteer end for us?  For that, we might need an Instagram account?

Benching

The best trail maintenance to get done from around 3/1 to 6/1 in Far SE Ohio is benching. This is when one uses a mattock axe to widen the trails surface horizontally along the roll of a hillside.  In the Marietta Unit of The Wayne, the Buckeye/ North Country Trail has about 36 miles of nearly continuous off-road trail in the Appalachian Foothills of Ohio. And there's a lot of benching to be done back there.

With a lack of expertise, that had to be learned this year.  And I'm not even on planning for the winter just yet. There is a few personal tasks things to get done around here first.

Adventurer's Project's Social Media and USGS Hydrographic GIS Data

I might like to get Adventurer's Project on multiple forms of social media, but we're a little short handed at this point. Many of the posts that I write to its Facebook exceed 280 characters, so, they're not really compatible with each other. But one day, it might be good to diversify our communications over several social media platforms in the event the Facebook goes terminal.

I'm working with the hydrography data for the Road Fork and Whipple Sections - Buckeye/ North Country Trail now. They all came unlabeled from the USGS, but I have the bigger streams along the trail renamed. Unfortunately, somehow, either I or Google Earth stripped its embedded information? Now, I can't tell if the remaining streams are creeks, runs or just some finger in the tree of these watersheds? I'll have to get a new copy of from USGS and try to overlay what I have named and go on from there.

The data needs to be reorganized and merged because that which is issued by USGS it's too demanding on computer systems.  And the LoMaps on my Locus Maps apps doesn't display much in the way of hydrogrqphy.

- The Whipple Section approximate to Point 07 (10/2010 map & guide) is 9.73 miles north of the Ohio River on the Little Muskingum River.

- The Little Muskingum River Flats between Whipple Section, Points 05 - 06 falls between miles 12.5 to 13.61 from the Ohip River.

The Road Fork Section between Points 20 - 22 (7/2011 map & guide) is along the Little Muskingum R between Miles 38.87 to 41.02 from the Ohio River.

- The upload of mostly surface streams along the Road Fork and Whipple Sections to the Locus Maps app on my smartphone and tablet is complete. This project has been sitting around in Google Earth for months

Digital Mapping

One things that Adventurer's Project does is supports the Buckeye Trail Association.  The chapters are requested to take on the mission of the BTA with providing outdoor recreation, education and access to the varied natural resources according to http://www.buckeyetrail.org/chapters.php.

I interpret that as the chapters could appoint a digital cartographer to be a liaison to the Digital Mapping Subcommittee. In our efforts, I would appoint myself at the moment.  Our digital cartography is already pretty far along.

One of the things that I'm working on is getting waypoints for everything mentioned in the Road Fork Section - Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent) map & guides.  When they were published in those paper documents, their distances mentioned were measured by a surveyor's wheel. As I understand, there's no digital equivalent for their positions yet.  Whipple's are already done.

I used Google Earth Pro's internet search and satellite imagery to plot as many places as I could find from the desk.  Then I made a list of the ones that I didn't find so that later, I could go down trail and waypoint them in person with a dedicated GPS.

Adventurer's Project's Facebook Page

The Facebook pages for the Buckeye, North Country and American Discovery Trails are set up to appear on 4th, 11th and 18th of every month on Adventurer's Project's Facebook page.

Reorganizing GPS Data, Trail Conditions, DR Mower

It just took hours to re-organize my GPS data.  The directory for Adventurer's Project is getting bigger.  I just mapped out the known bad roads that could access the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent) in the Marietta Unit of The Wayne (National Forest).  I know where some of the fords are and I know what roads not to take with an RV.

At present, there are still 13 known obstructions, or trees down on the trail.  There are at least 8 areas that still need weed whacking, but most of them are brief.  They look like they were places in the middle of a segment where residential weed whackers gave out and quit for the day.  Some of it looks like somebody might have just ran them right over the centerline of the trail without swinging to get the 4ft width. 

Benching is another story.  The work crews tell me that it's probably not worth getting a DR Mower for this area.  But in working with Road Fork Section's (volunteer) supervisor, I weed whacked everything he said the DR couldn't access and in my opinion, a lot of those areas just need short stretches to be benched wider (leveling the roll of a hill side).

Adventurer's Project's Facebook Page

The Facebook page for Adventurer's Project, promoting the Road Fork and Whipple Section of the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent) and the American Discovery Trail in the Mid-Ohio Valley is at https://www.facebook.com/AdventurersOHWV/.

Adventurer's Project's primary coverage area is:

Washington County of Ohio
Most of Monroe County, Ohio
Part of Noble County, Ohio
Ritchie County, WV
Wood County, WV

It's secondary coverage area is

The Eastern 2/3rds of Center Township of Morgan County, Ohio
The southern 2/3rd of Marshall County, West Virginia (including Moundsville)
Wirt County, West Virginia
Tyler County, West Virginia
Pleasants County, West Virginia
Wirt County,  West Virginia
Jackson County,  West Virginia
Roane County,  West Virginia
Calhoun County,  West Virginia

American Discovery Trail Promotion, Similarities, My Profile

I got permission to promote the American Discovery Trail at any of Adventurer's Project's events until December 1st from the president of the American Discovery Trail Society.  Ever since I've been in trail promotion, I've been corresponding with their Facebook group regularly.  The circumstances of Adventurer's Project are less like anywhere else on the Buckeye Trail and more like those on the American Discovery.

We hardly have any volunteers in this area.  American Discovery has never needed to count theirs.  The Buckeye Trail Association has assured me that there is next to nobody on their membership roster in this area.  I'm sure that the ADTS's is smaller, too.  Where Buckeye has chapters, the ADTS has state committees.  As far as I know, they really haven't been very organized yet.  So, I'm letting them learn from my successes and failures.

Recently, I unfriended some people from my personal Facebook profile.  The reason is that these people were on it so I could write about the Whipple Section at more length.  Now that Adventurer's Project has it's own page, I posted a link to it on my profile for about a week.  I just wanted to have my personal life back.  I don't want my personal views to reflect how I do business with the trails.  And so far, I just don't think that some people understand how structured I am and how necessary that is for me to sustain life?  Without structure, I am a mess.

Today, I uploaded the Buckeye, North Country and American Discovery Trail GPS tracks to my tablet. I'm not sure if I'm going to have my laptop at outdoor trail promotion events anymore?  The setting sun started heating up it's case and I can't afford to fry it's CPU at the moments.  The good thing about the tablet and the smartphone is that I can get them out of the sun easier and take them out when needed.

Hiking and Adventurer's Project

I was gaining weight and my doctor told me to make a list of things to do. One of those things was hiking. In 2009, I started hiking in the Cleveland Metroparks. It was there that I noticed blue paint Mark's on the trees.  I looked it up later and found it to be the navigational marker for the Buckeye Trail.

Back then, it was 1,444 miles long. I purposely skipped those parts in case I wanted to commit to it. In 2010, I did. 

On December 14th, 2014, I stepped up and became the volunteer supervisor for the Whipple Section - Buckeye Trail. Now, I've covered about 1,200 miles, but the demands on these usually keep section supervisors glued to their areas. So, I've been stalled on my progress.

But that's ok, I love what I'm doing.  Now, I'm on to Adventurer's Project. Being a section supervisor consists of mostly trail maintenance tasks.  Beyond most maintenance, the project also covers the Road Fork Section. 

Adventurer's Project currently is just that.  It's a project. But it's on it's way to becoming something that is more formalized. It doesn't have members, but supporters.

In an average year, the Buckeye Trail only has about 1 to 2 thru hikers. But last September, an unusual event took place and Whipple and Road Fork were forecasted to get five.

Any other region of the Buckeye Trail would have been handle it. But aside from low volunteer numbers, this region has some uniquenesses.

I know that some of you reading this are going to say that drinking from some of the surface streams is fine. Based on the location of past and present mining, my own unprofessional, amateur data might concur? But the National Forest Service (NFS) on one of its documents disagrees.  There are a few water systems that can filter heavy metals, but we've got to get the hikers weaned off the natural sources for the most part.

Adventurer's Project's chapter like functions were activated.  During that time, a hiker was concluding his journey at the end of the Whipple Section. Because his thru hike was "high profile," it included two events here...  a speaking engagement and membership drive.

Our support numbers in this region are very low. And I voiced my reservations to the BTA on both, but they were content to give them a try. I printed about 300 fliers and started posting them like crazy for the first one. But when I was resupplying water for two thru hikers at once, posting fliers for the second event became more than I could handle.

What we need is a local following. And since the hiking program hasn't really been cultivated here, we will be looking for supporters from the ground up. Literately straight off of the streets.

When it comes to BTA support, the majority of the hikers and volunteers live in either western, or Northern Ohio. For most of them, the trail in Far SE Ohio is the furthest place on the Buckeye Trail.

We do receive some support like the upcoming Road Fork/ Whipple Work Week, which will be from July 21 - 25, 2018 and its basecamp will be at the Little Muskingum Watershed Association in Ludlow Township of Washington County, Ohio (post office city is New Matamoras). Volunteers do not need to stay for the entire event and locals can just help on a day or two?  This is the event where we perform heavy maintenance with DR Mowers, weed whacking, and leveling the roll of the trail on a hillside.

It can also include pruning.

Also, we may receive some material support from the North Country Trail Association?

Otherwise, I have a lot of ideas and I'd rather discuss them with supporters in person.

If you have any questions, or would like to volunteer, please contact me at the following:

MD Edmonds
info@adventurersohwv.info
C: (740) 885-9644

Marietta Unit, New Matamoras Floods, Memorial Day Weekend 2018, Auxiliary Batteries and Whipple Maintenance

- Apparently, New Matamoras floods less than Marietta.  Marietta's problem is that it's near where the Muskingum, Little Muskingum Rivers and the Duck Creek that meet the Ohio River there.  If there's a big enough storm, all of its water is going to converge on the city.

- This is Memorial Day Weekend 2018.  Today, I did some rounds looking at campground capacities and reporting them to the Buckeye Trail Association Facebook group.

- My auxiliary/ house batteries are somehow disconnected from both the generator and the cab's alternator.  But I'm able to charge them now by jumping them with my car.  It takes about 1hr 15min to get them full.  Lightning is in the forecast for tomorrow, so I plan on tracing their power lines.  It's possible that they all need to be replaced?

- The maintenance priority on the Whipple Section is blazing.  We may have a marathon runner/ thru hiker come through.  He's going to need the trail's navigation to become more efficient. 

What to Do Near Road Fork Section 05/19/2018

Last week, I was securing my project's place at the Backhome Appalachian Arts & Music Festival for us to do some trail promotion at the Wetzel County Convention & Visitors Bureau in New Martinsville, WV.  When I was at the CVB, I got a copy of their visitors guide.  Our 2nd priority is increasing the foot traffic on our portion of the Buckeye Trail (North Country concurrent).  Our corner of the trail is just about the furthest place for most of Buckeye Trail hikers to drive to.  When I show up to TrailFest for just one day and drive back to Painesville, they sometimes look at me like I'm crazy.  So, judging by that, I think it's logical to assume that they might prefer to overnight in the area.

The question that I try to answer is what are they going to do when they're here.  Most of them are not going to hike an entire summer's day.  They might want to get out and do something?  But it's a double edged sword too as this might give me clues as to where I can post a flier, or lay down rack cards and brochures?

I know volunteers who maintain a segment because it's their place to get away and find peace.  But that doesn't speak for me.  And if everything that I've gone through in the last 3 years doesn't result in a sizable increase in the annual numbers on our extent of the trail, then everything that I've gone through is in vain.  The BTA can give us a Work Week, North Country can send weed whackers and DR mowers all they like.  But in the end, those bodies are the only thing that matters.