Technically...

36,000,000 of Montana's acres are federally administered land. 270,000 more acres are administered by the state. All told, Montana's public lands comprise of over one third of its entire area. All of this is to say that describing my current position as a trails tech to a Montanan needs no further explanation. Describing it at home (in Michigan), on the other hand, requires a description of public lands, a distinction between the types of lands, a patient confirmation that no, trails are not just built by people walking on them, and that no, I am not, in fact, a lumber jack.

Trails, at least nowadays, are intentionally constructed, and not without considerable effort. So I've decided to get technical and give you the skinny on trail construction.

First: Clearing

Trails have to suffer through windy snowy winters and mother nature shows no mercy. Trees criss cross the trails making them impassable. The solution to this crisis is a lot of chain saws and a lot of hiking.

Second: Brushing

National Forests have huge swaths of land to manage and little funding to manicure all of the many miles of trail sweeping the landscape.So naturally, the trails return to seed after a reasonable amount of negligence and it takes a lot of lopping, sawing, and overcoming boredom, to bring them back to their former glory.

Next Up: Tread

So this is where we get down to business, really. Digging tread is how the magic happens. This is when you take a raw section of forest and turn it into an adventure for many people for years to come. It is exciting to be a part of and it also has the generally positive affect of giving you huge biceps and occasional cases of tendonitis. Digging tread is a labor of love and the payoff for the effort is worthwhile. So here is how you dig tread. First, you scout out where you want your trail. It is best for the trail to keep an even grade across a side hill to avoid being rutted out by rain. Once you have the general idea about where to put your trail you flag the route. Then you start clearing the corridor. This means clearing a 10 foot wide swath of forest to make way for your anticipated trail (by whichever means you have- generally a chainsaw). And then, of course, you bust out the pulaski, and you start digging!

And of course: Structures

Structures are the best part of trail work, in my mind. They bring out the artist, the engineer, the thinker, the communicator and the architect in this psychology/spanish major. Of course, they can bring out a number of other beasts, if you let them. Structures are daunting and fulfilling, particularly when you are depending on natural materials, such as boulders, smaller rocks, large and small trees, etc. We had one project this year which required us to carry over 100 rocks over a half a mile! Nuts...again with the biceps and tendonitis.... Anyway, structures, from bridges to turnpikes, retaining walls to check dams, make me feel like I'm at the top of my game. One day I hope to at least visit one of the many structures I've gotten to build, and see if they are holding up to the test of time.

That's trails! And that's a wrap.