Old Cabins Tune-up
December 06, 2009

The volunteer crew at Wilder Ranch works rain or shine, and the forecasters had been telling us all week that the rain would start on Sunday. In spite of that, it was dry, though a bit chilly, as we assembled in the main parking lot for our December workday. Judging from the number of online signups for the workday at Soquel Demonstration Forest (almost 40), we concluded that they must have promised beer and bratwurst for the volunteers. The best we could do with coffee and bagels was four.

Three of us, Jon Hudson, Greg Lydon, and Harvey Hartman, are Wilder regulars. Brad North was newbie of the month having signed up to log some hours against the community service requirement imposed upon him by the state agency currently in control of his life. That agency is Cabrillo College where Brad’s volunteer time earns class credit. We were happy to accept a ride to the work site locked in the perp seat behind Plexiglas and steel mesh inside the heated crew cab rather than having to endure the chilly morning air in the unprotected bed of the ranger’s pickup.

There being no urgent requests from park personnel, we settled on Old Cabins Trail for the day’s project. Old Cabins connects the top of Wild Boar Trail to the southeast sector of the Eucalyptus Loop crossing Peasley Gulch in the process. Its beautifully wooded singletrack drops 160 feet to the (dry today) creek crossing at the bottom before climbing 240 feet up the other side to the junction with Eucalyptus. Brian, our driver, dropped us at the Wild Boar junction promising to return at two o’clock, earlier if it looked as though the sky might really open up on us.

We started by hiking the three quarters of a mile to the Eucalyptus junction, the plan being to survey the damage then work our way back to our starting point. For the most part, this trail holds up pretty well. We last worked on it in January, and the trail itself is in pretty good shape. The puncheon bridge at the bottom still needs work. Without a measuring tape, we estimated that a twelve-foot four-by-six would be required to replace the broken stringer, not something that we could do this day.

The culvert under the turnpike just below the Eucalyptus junction was another story. Standing water had dropped a load of silt in the pipe. Evidently there was not enough drop in the outflow channel to remove the water from the pipe. Using the ‘Level’ app on Greg’s iPhone, we determined that the north end of the pipe was the lower and proceeded to improve the channel on that side of the turnpike. Rather than run a narrow channel several feet through dense brush to an abrupt drop, we opted to create a broad, shallow basin just short of the brush. We’ll have to check back in a year to see whether this will prove to be enough to draw off the standing water in the pipe.

The rest of the day’s work was conventional drain cleaning and improvement with a little light lopping where the forest was beginning to encroach upon the trail. With one eye on the clock, we were able to work our way back to the pickup point at the scheduled hour. But our white carriage was nowhere to be seen. We stood idly waiting until the winter chill inspired us to start walking. We had almost made it all the way back to the ranch before Brian came looking for us. Turns out that he had been busy rescuing a damsel in distress, a bicyclist injured in a fall.

Photo Harvey and Jon widen the drain while Brad searches for the culvert. The culvert has been found ! Brad opens the channel to move water away from the turnpike. A quick pause to see if the drain slopes away from the turnpike. Fungi pose for a group photo beside the trail.