Hitch 6

Rock Crush Created for Filling Tread 50 cubic feet
Rock Water Bars 2
Rolling Dip type drainages 26
Trail cleared of tripping hazard rocks
and blasting debris 3000ft

Our final hitch started off with the unfortunate occasion of bidding farewell to crew member Mitch after he returned from the weekend with a broken toe due to a mishap while playing in an ultimate disc tournament.

We spent our first few days digging out the muck deposited on the trail below our first section of cribbing and installing one rock water bar that was tied into an extra large, blasting aided, drainage ditch. We also built a rolling dip with the help of Shane Sheldon who was visiting our crew for the afternoon. Needless to say making crush was an ever present necessary undertaking. Tyler departed for Arizona at the midpoint of the hitch to make Resident Advisor Training for his dorm. His presence was missed, along with his passion for swinging a sledge.

The middle part of the hitch was spent on the recently blasted upper section of trail from above deep gap to the wilderness boundary. In this area we filled in some craters created by the blasting to remove larger tripping hazard rocks, and walked up the trail throwing loose rocks off the trail. After the tread was mostly cleared, we started working on creating numerous rolling dips in the places we could get through the high berm to get water off the trail. During this time we had heavy rains that left a small river of water running down the trail. This gave us a clear indicator of where structures needed to be, and once built, showed that they worked properly.

Our last two days were spent packing out our camp and cleaning up our site. At the start of the last trip out for the day the mountain bid us farewell with a standard issue 20 minute thunderstorm complete with a torrent of precipitation that left so fast if anyone not caught in the storm saw is they would have thoroughly questioned our reason for being completely drenched. On the final day the remainder of the Mount Rogers crew, Marissa, Danielle, Matt and Toji hiked out the unwieldy steel box, lovingly dubbed the “Box of Pain” that served as our food container for the summer, and bid a final farewell to the Virginia Highlands Horse Trail.