Trail Evolution

Some trails stay the same, but more often than not around here they evolve. Maybe that will change now that we have some dedicated trail systems going in down in BC with the School Forest and Avalanche. And we'll have the Christmas Mountain system going in this year south of Petoskey. But up closer to home my personal trail network and the single track at Boyne Highlands exist within a patchwork of different land ownership. Pieces of property get sold or developed. Some get logged. In that case the trail often gets moved, or if it does get reopened it often feels like a new trail with different light and lots of choppy trail surface. On the home front our trail has seen a lot of changes in the last 20 years. The creek section has been gone for a long time. The 95 acres got sold last year, and the new people seem nice enough. They said we were more than welcome to keep riding through, but they have sheep herding dogs and one of their 10 acre fenced fields is directly on the trail that cuts through the big field at the top of the hill. So now we have two options: The Pond Hill loop is the easier of the two. About 8 miles and not super hilly, but no pavement.

The H3 (HQ/Hughs/Hoogland) loop is hillier. It consists of my trail, Hugh's trail, and the Hoogland Preserve. Also about 8 miles, but with some more climbing and more single track. But you need to ride a bit of pavement to connect them. Down Troup Rd, through Surfwood, and a little bit of M119. It's nice to have an option at home I guess, you can do an easy day or climbing ride depending on the mood and/or group. The single track at Boyne is evolving as well. It's growing too, well over 20 miles of trail now. The whole system is kind of shifting west and north. This was my ride from yesterday:

It's all still a hand built patchwork of trails. Benson has them all mapped out on Trail Forks now, and it's definitely getting them used more which is good. They need to get ridden in order to become established and packed down. With the social distancing and no work going on due to the pandemic, they are getting cleaned up really well this spring too. The trials heading out towards Stutsmanville have always been a little hard to see/follow. I'm going to tackle those next. Planning for a lazy Sunday after the long ride yesterday. Probably just an easy spin and maybe some yoga. Over and out.