Results of Trail Work on 20th November - 2 Weeks Later
I managed to get out to the Royal today, and after all the rain we've been having, I took some photos of our two week old trail work on the Temptation Creek single track. It is massively improved compared to what it was last time, but there is still some work required (as we knew). Rather than being the unrideable mess it was last time, it could be ridden and it was good to see the rock-armoring and drains doing their bit. There are still some sections that are holding water though which might be a priority next time around.
Section 1
First, the section about half way between the rocky outcrop and the berm section. At the track work day, we narrowed the trail, forcing riders to one side which we then rock armored.
In the photo, the rock armoring is above the yellow sandy section at the top right hand part of the trail, at the top of the ledge. This was probably the muddiest part in the area, as the rock-armoring is now covered with the clay. Possibly some extension of the armoring is needed here to raise the trail slightly and provide more drainage into the left hand side of the photo (the part we have closed off).
Here is a photo of the muddy section:
And the section just higher than the muddy section, where the drain isn't quite doing it's job:
The bit of sand taking the sharp edge off the rock in the middle of the trail is holding up surprisingly well:
Section 2
The section down at the two berms was incredibly muddy and almost unreliable before we got to work on it. Again, we narrowed the trail down to force riders to the left hand side of the trail when going downhill, which gave us room to put a drain in on the right.
First, a photo looking down towards the first berm, still quite wet here, but there is nowhere to drain the water because of the existing erosion, so hopefully we can get some fill to top it up. Just a photo to record where the water was:
Now, with the berm just off the left-hand side of the photo, you can see that the trail is much firmer than it was last time without all the clay build-up.
I like the next photo, because you can see how much water the drain has captured at the top left hand side of the photo. Also, there was minimal pooling behind the buried sleeper that we hacked at with the pick-axe.
Finally, looking back up the trail, with the rock-armoring that we added beside the drain. It's holding up all right, although it seems that we might need to add a few more to the end of it, dug in deeply just to anchor the last few rocks a bit better.
Hopefully these photos give you trail design experts some ideas for next time.
Byron