Downey Creek — Wednesday, May. 6, 2015

North Cascades > Mountain Loop Highway

I showed up for the work party on the Suiattle trail today, but ended up getting shanghaied to the BCRT crew working down on Downey. I heard they were going to do some crosscut, so I willingly signed on. I was assigned to the sawyer team led by Gary, a patient and knowledgable ACL. We started by sawing thru a large log with a rootball at the edge of the trail. Separating the rootball from the trunk was the goal, as the BCRT team was going to move the rootball off later in the week. We then hiked up further, and ran into a huge old growth log laying all the way across the trail. Mike, our crew leader had decided this was too big and too unsafely positioned for a mere WTA volunteer crew. So what to do to make it better? We ended up cutting a nice notch large enough for a boot step and a handhold to help. This is done by making 2 parallel cuts the same depth in the log, then chiseling the middle out for the notch. Trading off the sawing and notching took awhile, but we had time to do a bit of rockwork (and what's a work party w/o some rock work?) before I had to hike back out. The rest of the crew is up there for a few more days, so it should be in good shape for the weekend. Lots of Calypso orchids, including a stand of white ones, trillium, flowering currant, and salmonberry in bloom along with yellow wood violets. The road going in is pretty potholed past the pavement.