new trails, new art

It's been a slow week lately, not much going on in the way of trips into the wooded areas. Melinda is doing better but she still has a long way to go before her bike will see any action. The doctor says no exercise including walking for at least 14 days and she's just on day 6.
We've spent alot of time walking the plant isles of Lowes, Home Depot & Evergreen the last few days and everytime we go, we buy an arsenal of plants and flowers. One of these days maybe we'll win the beautification award in Kingsport but that's probably just wishful thinking on my part. One look at my neighbors yards would send the judges running before they even got to our yard. I have to give all of the credit to Melinda, she's the one with the vision, drive and talent that makes our yard look the way it does.

Last weekend our mtn bike club had the pleasure of hosting an IMBA trail workday at Steele Creek Park. Two IMBA representatives came in town for a couple days and put on a workshop and our project was to re-route a section of trail at Steele Creek Park that pretty much stays flooded due to it's close proximity to a creek.

Before: The old trail to the left and the new projected trail mapped out with orange pin flags on the right.

After: In just a little over 3 hours the new section of trail was ready to ride and the old trail was given back to nature.

IMBA showed us there is more to closing a trail than just dragging downfall and leaves over it. All the trees that were removed from the new trail corridor were dug up roots and all and replanted in the old trail bed. It was very difficult to tell where the old trail was once the work was completed.

In other mtb club news I finally submitted some new artwork to the local bike shop/screen printer to get the new club t-shirt printed up. If your interested in one give me a shout asap, I only ordered 55 and I expect them to go pretty quick.