SMNDFBR - Working ON the Weekend

Everybody's mowing on the weekend, everybody needs a little trail maintenance. Everybody's pruning up the branches, everybody needs a sharp handsaw.


Photo Credit: Kris Sonderup
This week for the SMNDFBR we took the show on the road and headed out to Branched Oak Lake's area 7 to help out with the THOR trail day that was going on out there. Branched Oak Lake is the nearest "real mountain biking trail" to Lincoln, if you don't count Wilderness Park, but it seems like it's not gotten a lot of love the last few years for one reason or another. Hopefully with a little help from fellow mountain bikers, hikers and trail runners we can start to turn that around. It wasn't too many years ago that it was a regular stop on the Psycowpath Racing series and it's a trail commonly used for the Cornhusker State Games MTB race. If all goes well we can bring the trail back to it's former glory and get a few more wheels on the ground on a regular basis.


Armed with pruners, rogue hoes, mowers and hand saws we dispersed and started tackling the maintenance that needed to get done before the ride.


It wasn't too long before we found ourselves a bit out gunned by a fallen tree blocking the trail, we attempted to push it over so that we could drag it off to the side of the trail but it would not budge.


Luckily Joel had brought a chainsaw and we were eventually able to make short work of Mr. downed tree.




Pruning and tree chopping done, it was time to reroute some of the really eroded portions of the prairie section. I've never personally mowed an open field before today but to tell the truth it's actually a bit easier than mowing the lawn, you don't have to empty a bag nor turn every 40 feet and walk back the way you just came. Mowing a field you just point and walk with the occasional slight turn left or right but no real backtracking, all mowing should be this simple.




With a decent amount of people showing up for the trail day it went lickity split and it was time to change gears, put away the tools and grab bikes.









Not much for story this time around, just some trail maintenance followed by good riding with some great people. Next week the ride should be back to it's regularly scheduled programming, come on our and join us. Weather should be getting better and the trails are already in perfect shape, couldn't ask for much more of a reason to get out and ride than that.

SMNDFBR - Trimming the Bush

Hard to believe it's only February with the last two Saturday's we've had. Last week 60s and this week 70s, I sure hope the warmer weather sticks around and we have less moisture and hotter days this summer than we did last year.


We changed things up a little bit this week and met out at Van Dorn a bit earlier than normal so that we could get in a quick ride and then help the Friends of Wilderness Park with their trail day.


The earlier time meant that the frost was still on the ground for the start of the ride, this turned out to be a good thing as the trail was still frozen on top.



Looks like the parks department has been out doing a little work of their own, the trail under the bridge on Pioneers has been clear cut, smoothed out a bit and covered with wood chips. I'm hoping this practice is just to help with soil erosion and not a sign of things to come for the entire trail within the park, it'd be a shame to take the wilderness out of Wilderness Park.




Had another good group again today, mostly the usual suspects but we had one or two new faces as well. Love the core group we have for this ride, great group of people but we always have room for more to join in if you haven't made it out yet but are curious about the ride.


Made it about half way through the east side before our luck ran out and the frost melted and the firm trail started turning into muck. I think if a person was to wait until the afternoon sun had a chance to work it's magic on the trail, the dirt would be almost perfect around 2-3 in the afternoon. There isn't a whole lot of moisture in the park right now but the frost leaves just enough in the mornings to make the very top layer too soft to ride until it dries a little during the day.



Safely back on firmer trail it was time to turn around and high tail it back to meet up with the Friends of Wilderness Park and get down to some trail maintenance.



Met up with the rest of the group of trail workers out at the 1st street parking lot where we picked up our tools and a quick run down of what we were doing.


Gary came prepared and even brought his own tools.


Time to get down to business.





A little trimming, a little sawing, a whole lot of sweat and a few hours later and we were all done for the first of what I assume to be many trail days. Couldn't have asked for a nicer day either, we got a lot accomplished today but after the floods of last year, there is still plenty more to be done. Even if you don't come out for the Saturday morning rides you should consider following the Friends of Wilderness Park on Facebook and coming out and helping them get the park back into tip top shape. The park could use your help.

Next weeks SMNDFBR will have a special guest, someone who was there at the very beginning of the ride when it was on Wednesday and then Tuesday and then Thursday before finally, maybe, settling on Saturdays. That's all I'm going to say about that but if you're a fan of the rides from way back, you'll want to make sure and come out next week.

Mother Nature Wants Me To Be A Responsible Human Being

I knew that there was a trail day today, even gave a serious consideration of going but then I decided I was going to be a selfish douche waffle and just get up and go for a ride instead. Watched the forecast and got everything ready the night before, that's how set I was on going riding and shirking my responsibility to take care of the trails that give me so much enjoyment. Got up, got dressed, had the bike in hand rolling out the door when I looked out the window... and it was drizzling, M*&ther f&*ker! The plan was to ride gravel so I wimped out and decided I didn't want to deal with wet gravel/mud today so I put everything back and almost climbed back into bed I was so frustrated with all the moisture we've had this Spring/Summer so far. After my frustration subsided I remembered about the trail day and decided  that since I was already up and my attempt at being worthless was thwarted I would head out to Swanson and be the responsible human being I should have been all along. Mother Nature decided that she needed me working rather than playing today... although I'm not sure why standing in the drizzle in Swanson sounded any better than riding in it but it did. I realize that the previous statement makes me sound somewhat like a schmuck but at least I was honest about my schmuckness and in the end didn't shirk it completely.


Not a bad turn out for being such a miserable day, while it wasn't necessarily hot or sunny the humidity was kicking already and you could tell it was only a matter of time before it rained.


Time to do work!



Haven't actually been up behind the detours but I've seen the pictures and it looks like a real mess, hopefully at some point some of it is salvageable up there.


Big, loud trail eater, much nicer than needing to do it all by hand. Even after cutting the initial passageway there is still plenty of hoe/ax/pruning work to be done however.


Doesn't look like much now but a few of these trail days and we will have a trial where this jungle now resides.


Some of the neighbors came out to see what was going on, guess we were making quite the ruckus out there, none of them volunteered to help out which is really a shame with all those legs we could have put him to work. He might not have been much help but he was a lot nicer to work around than the mosquitoes that were out there, even with mosquito spray I ended up with a few bites. I suppose when you're in that kind of humidity doing manual labor it's not long before you sweat off most of the spray's effectiveness.

Already signs of progress after just a few hours, only had two hours to give before I had to get back to the apt. managed to get in a good solid hour and 40 minutes before it decided to dump on us... figured that was my sign to drag my soggy butt back home just a tad bit earlier than planned. Lots of work left to do up there, hopefully they can make a dent in it today but I have a feeling there are going to be more days to come.

Walnut Creek Trail Day

Had another trail day today down at Walnut Creek, it's really starting to come together and once we can get some bikes through there I think it will get even better.





Wasn't much of a crew today just two of us but Jeff brought down his awesome older Bronco so we tried hauling out a fairly large tree that is destine to be turned into a log feature.


The permanent bridge is in now and it's rock solid.

Added a new section of trail, still needs some work but I know it's ridable because we rode the entire loop once we finished with the dirty stuff.


Remnant of an old deer stand, most likely from when Omaha didn't quite stretch this far out.


Those are some big nails, they look secure in the tree but I don't know that I'd want to climb on them with wet or muddy hunting boots, they'd make a really nice gouge in the shin when you slipped off I suspect. For the most part the trail is in at Walnut Creek now, just waiting for the official word so that we can get some wheels rolling and packing things down in there, should be a fun little trail.