2018 Trail Care In Review

While I haven't mentioned it much, I have still been heavily involved in the maintenance of the trail network here in Cornubia this year. I try to keep some interest bubbling along in the mtb community by helping to organise and run the days, sometimes with great results and sometimes not so much.....

Clearly, I don't do it all myself and I wouldn't even dream of trying to claim that. We have a great group of guys that live in our street who put in waaay more time than they should, but by doing so, we get some great outcomes with the standard of trails we have here.

The wider mtb community is largely indifferent to trail care (despite paying nothing to use the trails infrastructure) with a very small percentage of participants actually giving up their time to help build some cool trail. I am not bitching about it any more, just pointing out that there is a small group of regulars (with the odd random blow in) who do pretty much all of the work. This is common to all of the trail care groups here in South East Queensland and probably Australia wide.
Unfortunately. 

We still get pretty good support from Logan City Council with the supply of rock and road base whenever we request it. Higher level engagement seems to have fallen off a cliff this year though. Maybe the internal turmoil is to blame for that.

The RATS Cycling Club is a big supporter of our efforts. They purchased our trailer to house all of our equipment (which they purchased much of ) and they sponsor the BBQ and drinks that we put on after each days work is completed.
"What do clubs do" I hear asked.
Well, they support our sport.

This year volunteers put in 178 hours here in Cornubia Forest. In that time they moved approximately 10 tonnes of rock and 8 tonnes of road base (all by hand) during works on

  

  Wallum Froglet trail......

Ginger Gully trail..........

Birdwing Access Trail.........

and finally, Jack's Track..........

I am hoping we have some new faces along to trail care next year. The regulars have worked long (7+ years now) and hard during their involvement with Logan Community Trailcare Alliance and it would be great to have some relief on the horizon. We honestly could do sooooo much more and make the trails a far better riding experience if folks would just give back a little.

I am up-to-the-eyeballs busy and still spend a considerable time away from home with work, so if I can manage, surely others can put themselves out a little bit too?

I might go for a ride........ see you in 2019.

Cheers.

That Time Of The Year

Yes, it is trail building time again !! 

You may remember the last few years we have worked like slaves each Saturday for 15 weeks or so turn out a new mountain bike trail here in Cornubia Forest. Well, if not have a look here and here.

The next stage in our masterplan went into action this morning as a fully paid dig. Yep, thats right. We have obtained grants that are paying for Pete from Trailworx and 10 labourers from charity group Boystown to craft the trail out of the hillside that we have carefully marked out.

And it couldn't be going better. We cleared the corridor, then Pete  punched out about 300 metres(yards) of the 1200 metres of trail that we have to build, all on the first day!!

We are scrambling along behind him, trying to clean up the untidy bits. But it is bliss to see how easy a small excavator makes things.

This is what it is looking like so far.

This trail will give a whole new feel to Cornubian expeditions. Come along on Saturday the 8th of February for the huge tidy up day, then ride it, talk about it and enjoy the free BBQ and drinks.

Oh, yeah. Put your thinking caps on as well. We need a name for this trail and we don't have long to come up with one....

Boo-Yeah!!!!!!!!!

Got My Mojo Back !

I haven't been feeling much love for trail building for the last few months. In fact, you could say I was over it big time.

Today, we had a regular planned repair day on the lower section of Wallum Froglet trail to fix some of the minor "blues" that we made before we had a solid understanding of trail building principles. That is not to say that anything was too sketchy or poorly built. Over time several sections would have deteriorated into ugly rutted puss.

So, we took responsibility for the mistakes that we made, manned up and got it done.

I must say it was actually nice to be on the business end of a mattock, shovel and rakehoe at various times this morning. The business end of a wheelbarrow....not so much!

Creating something out of nothing with a bunch of like minded mountain bikers is soothing for the soul. I really appreciated the fact that the guys who turned out this morning shared my vision for the trail and they did a fantastic job adding features to the trail that will be there long after I have parked my last mountain bike.

Massive thanks go to Geoff, Andrew, Kev and Aaron for your efforts today. May "Trail Karma" pay you back tenfold.

And me? I can hardly wait for the next trail care day now......

Cheers.

Never Work With Children or Animals

In a final post regarding the opening of Ginger Gully I would like to present Andrew's view of the opening day. Yes, I am banging on a bit about this but honestly I put so much effort into this build(as did everyone that came along) not to shout it from the blogospere.

Official opening of 'Ginger Gully' from SEQ Trails Alliance on Vimeo.

You will see my kids and might even catch me trying to stay off camera for everyone's betterment. The numbers of rider that turned up (at our request) was very impressive and everyone looks like they are having a great time...apart from the little fella on the blue bike who clearly thought he was going to DIE!

We have been promoting our trail building efforts in a positive light, trying to encourage more participation and the proof is in the pudding. Pretty much everyone loves the trails.

So, fast forward to the next Saturday morning and our monthly trail care day where we do minor repairs to existing trails. After having about 60 people at the free BBQ we hoped there might be a flow on effect at the trail care morning, a mere 6 days later. 

Well, (insert tumbleweed emoticon here) we had a massive turn out of 5. Yep, thats right, 5. Three regulars, one new bloke(thanks Kevin) and one 12-14 year old boy who was actually at the trail opening day and decided not to do his usual ride but to come do some digging this week(thanks Ryan). I had to run off after just one hour to get to my kids sporting commitment, leaving just 4. Riding the trail a few days later and not surprisingly almost nothing had been done. Three small fixes of the ten to twelve that were on the list. No slight on the guys that were there. They just couldn't do it in the time allotted.

So what is the answer? Somehow we need to engage the volunteers so that they feel a connection and want to come back. Unfortunately we are working with a local government organisation that is setting an inflexible standard and our volunteers(me included) feel excluded from any decision making. Yet we provide ALL of the elbow grease that makes the build happen.

Maybe the volunteers need to be more charitable as well? Social commentator Hugh Mackay puts the case for "giving back" very eloquently in this conversation with the ABC's Richard Fidler. I find that Hugh puts into words the feeling that I have had for the last couple of years and couldn't articulate, even to myself. Don't worry, it isn't religious but please take the time to listen. It is thought provoking stuff.

Or perhaps W.C. Fields famous quote of "never work with children or animals" should be expanded to "Never work with children, animals or volunteers". Actually, it may not be that catchy.......

Cheers and thanks to all of the guys and girls that put so much personal blood, sweat and beers into making some freakin' awesome trails. 

You know who you are.

Ginger Gully

Here is one to take you into the weekend. 

It may not be the coolest, raddest, ripping, stylin' mountain bike video that you ever saw but it s one that was made by us on the trail that we built, so its kinda special to me.

Enjoy Ginger Gully.

Even better, be there at 11am Sunday for the official opening with BBQ and drinks put on by the local council, then ride it (and the rest of Cornubia) with us.

Cheers.

**Sigh**...Done.....

After 15 weeks and 662 hours of labour, we are finished! Thank you to all who assisted in the birthing of "Ginger Gully". 

An extra special thank you to all of the regulars......

Derek

Andrew

Steve

Andrew F

Toby

Master Trail Builder- Shane

Geoff (or Gee Off!)

Neil

CHAMPIONS, ALL!

It is time to hang up the tools and RIDE!

Thanks to Floody for the photos. Appologies to the regulars that weren't there for the final BBQ and photo shoot.