Saturday April 16, 2016

Lots of Crowds, Training, Outreach,

Helped Getting An Injured Hiker Out.

Tent Caterpillars.

LIFE IS GOOD!

"HAPPY AS A MONKEY IN A MONKEY TREE" 

  

Besides being a picture of the new PATC  Trail Patrol person I was training this picture is there for the PATC or NPS trail maintenance folks to plan their trip to fix this blowdown.  Hikers can pretty easily weave their way through it until it gets fixed.

 A better picture of my student. 

 

 Old Rag was crazy busy with main lot full and 200 cars in the neighbors lot.   The video shows the line at the start of the scramble at around noon Saturday.

 

Stuff happens.   This hiker slipped and badly hurt her lower right leg.  She could not weight it. 

TRAIN TO BE READY WHEN STUFF HAPPENS

Many thanks to Shenandoah Mountain Guides, The Old Rag Mountain Stewards, SOLO,  Emergency Response Training, LNT, NOLS, Outward Bound and Red Cross, Adirondack Mountain Club for all the Wilderness First Aid training I have received over the years!  Please support our wonderful outdoor education resources by taking classes with them.    I am fairly sure that it is very hard to get too much training.

The  SNP staff was somewhat tied up with two forest fires and a missing hiker.   It was decided that while the patient could not put weight on her leg that she could make some progress under her own power.

SNP Ranger help arrived good Samaritans from the very beginning.   SNP Rangers and good Samaritans are awesome!

 

Some of the trip out was happy.

 By butt scooting about a half mile in the scramble,  using crutches for about a mile on the trail and then being carried piggyback by her male companion for the last mile of the trail the impromptu team finished a successful day around 2AM Sunday morning.  YAH TEAM!

TENT CATERPILLAR RESEARCH LEADS TO A GREAT RESOURCE

CAPITAL NATURALIST BLOG

Nethers had lots of tent caterpillars showing.   Researching them I found this great blog called Capital Naturalist follow the link below to read a great post about Eastern Tent Caterpillars and then maybe enjoy some of the other great posts done by this blogger.

 

http://capitalnaturalist.blogspot.com/2016/03/tent-caterpillars.html

 

Early Spring

 

 

 

Weekend of April 2-3, 2016

Spring is in the air.

 

 

 Notice the green leaves on the trees at the foot of Old Rag.

 

 

 The seasonal Rangers are starting back to work.   Stephanie is new to the Old Rag contact station.

 

 

 I saw my first Tiger Swallowtail of 2016.

 

 

The Red Buds were blooming.   I had an old timer tell me that when Red Buds bloom it is a good sign that the snakes will be exiting their hibernaculum. 

 

 My first bear sighting of 2016.

 

 

 Old Rag from Weakley Fire Road.

 

Oct. 17&18, 2015 Training and Patrol

 

SATURDAY AND SUNDAY OCTOBER  17&18, 2015

 

Steve Paul was one  of two Rangers that helped hikers  on the summit on Saturday.

Ray B. was my student.   He was finishing up his PATC TP new member training.

 

It was a pretty sunset on the summit of Old Rag on Saturday night.

 

If you watch the sunset from the summit you are going to be hiking part of the way back to your car under headlamps.

The line waiting to pay their entrance fee at the Old Rag Contact Station.

A cluster of the approximately 2,000 hikers who went up Old Rag on Sunday.

Thank goodness for the portable commodes and the company that services them when needed.   These resources mean that hikers are able to practice good outdoor ethics and Leave No Trace LNT.

The  fire road before the crowds are coming down it to get back to their cars.

 The summit blueberry pushes add nice red highlights to the Fall color.

The sun gets low in Sunday afternoons skies  as sunset approaches.

Sunday September 13, 2015

Wonderful cool clear Fall-like late summer Sunday.

Double Click On Pictures For Larger Image

Ranger Grant W.

A couple examining the map that includes the R and S markers after returning from their hike.

Some of the ground cover is beginning to color up.

A blow down across the Weakley Fire Rd not far from PO Junction.   I sent a note out about it from around 3PM and if you look at the  picture below I found it taken care of when I passed it on the way to my car around 8:30 PM

Blowdown from above is already all taken care of just four or five hours after I encountered it.

Fall Aster's

Sunset from the summit.

Dusk from the Saddle Trail slab that looks down on Byrds Nest Shelter

Twilight from the last view point just above the CCC Stairs on the Saddle Trail about half mile up from Old Rag Shelter.

May 16, 2015 PATC Trail Patrol One-on-One Training

A new ranger.

Judy S. the PATC Trail Patrol new member who I provided one-on-one training to this weekend.

Sunday September 29, 2013 Backcountry Interpreters

FALL IS HERE

  

Twenty minutes after I took this picture I met a Dad and his two daughters (estimated ages 4 and 7). It had become dark and they were hiking with headlamps.   They were coming up to have a late night dinner at Chez Old Rag Summit.   Their ceiling sparkled with stars including an absolutely gorgeous Big Dipper.   They would be serenaded by a wonderful symphony of tree frogs and other night wildlife voices.  The homely lights of Graves Mountain Lodge, Etlan, Culpepper and Madison glowed down in the valleys to the East.   Lights of distant cars would be seen moving high across the western horizons on Skyline Drive.  The American wilderness experience would shape the spirits of a new generation!  In wilderness is the preservation of our children!

A new generation of employees representing the long proud heritage of The National Park Service!    Sherri and Gwen (sp?)   I can not say enough good things about the wonderful salt of the earth NPS employees I have had the chance to interact with in the back-country of our National Parks.
       

 

 

HUMOR ALERT:  

GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN
Moms and Dads do not let your kids grow up to be politicians.

Note:  This was written at a time when the NPS was making sure no one was within National Wilderness Areas within their jurisdictions during the 2013 government shutdown.   Heard that technically folks could not even walk from Independence Ave. to Constitution Ave. across the lawn of the Capital Mall because the government says it is technically shut down.     Hmmm Constitution, Independence, the Peoples' Lawn, thought provoking?    I wonder what they are going to do about any climbers half way up the Nose Route in Yosemite, bivouacked on the Exum Ridge, or camping in the deep back country of Denali?  

When humans are involved things certainly can get complicated.   ;-).

End of humor and back to the simplicity of nature:

 

 

HOME SWEET HOME

An excerpt from the Summer 2013 finale of Old Rag TV's Summit Sunsets.

 

 

 

End Of July