Want to Learn More Skills? Attend one of our Upcoming Workshops!

Late Fall 2007 Trail University Workshops at Bear Mountain

Contact: Leslie Rapparlie (rapparlie@nynjtc.org) for more information (201) 512-9348 x 28

Trail Construction: Building Over Bedrock: The art of stone pinning
Dates: October 26-29th (come out for all days or for just the weekend)
Instructor: Peter Jensen
Close to where the new AT route joins the old, the trail will wrap around a ridge which is a smooth bedrock ledge for nearly 60 linear feet. Here, for these four days, crews will be anchoring a two to three foot tall crib wall onto numerous steel pins for that entire length while enjoying leafless views down onto the Bear Mountain Bridge, Anthony’s Nose, and the Hudson River. Most quarrying will be done prior to the weekend. Allowing participants a unique opportunity to learn and perfect skills. Participants must have volunteers on stone work trail crews before and get permission to participate from Construction Manager or the General Project Manager (see above).

Trail Construction: Stone Step Construction for Beginners
Dates: November 3rd and 4th
Instructors: Jon Paulson, former SCA crew leader and Yosemite National Park Trail Crew Member
Participants will learn how to build stone steps on the western side of Bear Mountain, a short distance from the Summit Tower. Several different methods will be employed to build a two foot’ wide stone staircase in beginner-friendly terrain on the mountain’s gentler south side. Instruction and tips will be given to safely move stone with minimal effort and impact to the environment.

Advanced Trail Construction: Stone Crib Wall Construction
Dates: November 10th and 11th
Instructors: TBD
If you missed these workshops in the fall or in year one, this may be your last chance in a while as the 2008 season has mostly stone steps planned. Participants in this workshop will learn to build dry stack stone retaining walls (a.k.a. crib walls). In addition to key structural and design requirements, participants will also learn how to use stone shaping tools to cut rock to desired shapes and sizes.

Advanced Trail Construction: Stone Cutting and Shaping
Dates: November 17th and 18th
Instructors: Eddie Walsh and Matt Townsend
This will be the inaugural workshop to take place in the dramatic “boulder fields” uphill of Hessian Lake. Stone cut and split during this workshop will be used as five foot wide stone steps that wind between bus-sized boulders and under dramatic rock ledges. By learning how the stone prefers to break, participants in this classic Bear Mountain workshop spend time learning how to split boulders into usable steps and smaller boulders as well as how to delicately shape stone.

Advanced Trail Construction: Stone Paving
Dates: December 1 and 2
Stone Paving, also called rip-rap, or pitching, is a technique used to create a durable walking surfacing that can withstand heavy water flows. On Bear Mountain it is used below large rock slabs and in areas where intermittent streams flow through a wide area of hillside. Essentially, it is the construction of a stone patio like structure across the walking surface. Tools used include basic rock moving tools, shaping tools and occasionally rock saws. This work differs from other construction work on the mountain in that the stones used are usually smaller and easier to handle.

Advanced Trail Skills: Rigging and Highline Basics

Dates: December 1 and 2
Learn the basic safety and operational methods of using highlines to move large stones. This workshop will take place in the lower boulder fields above Hessian Lake, weather permitting.

Fall 2007 Update

What a long and terrific summer. Full of workshops and the Biennial conference, volunteers on Bear Mountain have been busy. And now we are looking forward to another exciting fall. We had a lot of help and support this summer. Thank you to all those volunteers that came out and sweat with us in the grueling summer heat.

Now, with our focus on autumn, we are looking forward to the crew from the Appalachian Trail Conservancy to join us. Led by Ted Wilson, this crew of seven to eight has been working on Bear Mountain since the founding. This season they will spend 3 weeks camping and building new trail for the project. Most crew members are from the eastern side of the country but the most traveled volunteers, Edward and Alan, will join us from Great Britain. The skill amongst this group ranges from beginner to experienced, but all are hard workers and eager to learn. The newcomers are like every volunteer we see here: quick and willing to learn and have fun!
With their first two weeks completed, this group has completed a great amount of trail, including six stairs. This dedicated team came together to learn specialized skills together, their stone cribbing skills are equal to the masters’. Ted’s crew has been working to connect the work from this summer’s Biennial Conference to the waterfall area just before the boulder field and North face section of Bear Mountain. So far, the ATC crew has built sixty-eight and a half feet of trail with an average crib wall height of two feet. This gives us a total of six hundred sixteen square feet of trail. Not to bad for “beginners.”

With just one more week left of work with the ATC, we are looking for more individual volunteers to come and complete the work. We also look forward to having SCA crew leaders; Mike Johnson, Erin Anderson, and Jon Paulson return to the project. With the temperature cooling down and becoming generally more pleasant, we look forward to an autumn that will be just as busy as summer!