Cadillac Crew Fixes Up A Rough Stretch of the AT Near Bear’s Den

By Karen Brown, et. al.

About an hour outside of DC is a favorite section of the AT near Bluemont, Virginia. Hikers can start North from Rt. 7 at Snickers Gap and take a pleasant 5 mile out-and-back hike highlighted by wonderful views at Raven Rocks. Add to this, ATC’s beautiful Bears Den Hostel and the Bear Chase Brewery just a 15-minute Southbound walk from the trailhead and you can understand why this section of trail gets plenty of use.

That’s where the Cadillac Crew comes in!

District Managers Rob Lamar and Chris Brunton (Trail Boss) let our Crew Leaders Dan and Ellen Feer know their priorities: all along this section of the trail, the tread is beaten down exposing rocks which make hiking more and more difficult. Hikers walk off the trail to avoid the rocks shifting the trail downhill, and causing even more problems. The Crew has been giving this part of the trail lots of attention, and it’s definitely a work in progress.

After settling in at Bears Den, managed by Glen Breining, on Friday night we were ready to deal with those rocks and the widened trail the next morning. Saturday’s weather was comparatively balmy, moving toward the high 30s with sunshine, as Chris Glembocki led us to a section about a mile from Snickers Gap. To get at the rocks we used our pick mattocks and rockbars, but it was a battle to pry them from the still-frozen ground. If they wouldn’t budge, sledge hammers broke them apart (we only broke one sledge hammer this trip). The holes left by removing the rocks needed to be filled in and the organic duff needed to be scraped off the tread to make a lasting trail, so some of the crew made gravel to fill in the holes, and a fallen tree with its root ball exposed marked a likely spot to find the mineral earth we needed to make the surface smooth. Cat Randall filled many buckets and almost everyone took a turn carrying dirt. It was good to take a lunch break and enjoy Kirsten Elowsky’s hot chocolate. Slowly the rocks and roots were removed and the trail moved back to its original location. Bucket after bucket of long-lasting mineral earth filled the gaps and gouges we’d made. In areas where the rocks were too large, we built up the trail with rocks and gravel, and blanketed it with mineral earth. 

Passing hikers have remarked at such a difficult way to spend the day. But working outdoors alongside old and new friends on a lovely day is fun! We always take plenty of breaks and go at our own pace. And after leafing in the sides of the new tread we feel real satisfaction with the transformation in just a few hours, and it’s a real treat to see the reactions of the hikers who went past us in the morning when they walk over the new trail in the afternoon. Some even volunteer to help on a future trip.

Back to the hospitality of Bears Den: a crackling fireplace, hot showers, guitar and vocals from Alice DeCarlo and Ian Page, Happy Hour treats, Steve Phillips’s free-for-all crossword puzzle, a dizzying number of potluck dinner offerings, and the usual uproarious card games. Some of us, like the furry residents Mata Hari and Chiang Kai-shek, curled up in our beds and snoozed to be ready to hit the trail again on Sunday for another few hours of work.

So thanks to Karen Brown, Maria de la Torre, Alice DeCarlo, Kirsten Elowsky, Dan Feer, Chris Glembocki, Bill Greenan, Neil Hopper, Jonathan Kauffman, James Martin, Don Oellerich, Ian Page, Cat Randall, Tysha Robinson, Steve Phillips, Steve Taylor, and Kate Walker for being the solution this weekend. We love to mentor new trail maintainers, we love to meet new people. If this sounds like something you're interested in, reach out to Dan and Ellen at ccrewpatc@gmail.com. We’ll send you an invitation for our next trip.