By: USMC0369 Mood: other Date: 05/15/2008 14:52:49 Music: radio chirp...

Recently the online group I belong to (outside of MJS) adopted one of the more difficult trails in the San Bernardino National Forest designated 3n93.  More commonly called Holcomb Creek.  This is a black diamond trail and very popular amongst a variety of OHV users.

Last summer we had three huge fires that ripped through the SBNF and destroyed thousands of acres of woodland.  Many of the OHV trails used are within these boundaries.  The burned areas are mostly closed to the public.  Giving the Adopt-a-Trail groups time to work on them, get them ready for public use.  3n93 probably won't be re-opened for 2 years or so because of extensive damage to the forest.  The thick scrub brush that keeps many on the trails has been burned away.

Once the scrub brush was burned away, there were things found on the trail that nobody realized were there before.  On 3n93 we found an entire Ford Bronco that was completely hidden by the thick brush.  Our last trip to 3n93 was to remove this vehicle and clean up the surrounding area.

It was a fight getting it up there, difficult to attach the straps to it and not have that piece pull apart.  But we finally did get it up onto the trail.  We cleaned up the drag marks too.

There were some pieces that were cut off so we stacked them up and drug those behind another Jeep.  Problem was they kept coming apart as we went over obstacles.

  After putting that little sled back together about 20 times, we said to heck with it and just loaded the tailgate on our YJ.  This worked much better.

So that was our fun on the trail, working to keep it open for others to use.  I'll probably be posting things like this each month as the trail gets more and more work done to it.  There are a lot of washouts to fix, trees to remove, illegal trails to block off...things like that.  I hope you are able to work with your BLM, National Parks, National Forests to help ensure your trails are available for public use for everyone.  If you don't know about any programs like this in your area, do some investigation and see what you can find, and where you can volunteer.