Roller Coaster Appalachian Trail Blazes
Well, I just got back from a weekend trip on the Appalachian Trail. We did a section called ?The Roller Coaster?, and when we realized we were running out of daylight, we decided to bail short of our goal.
The blazes on this section of trail were pretty poor. I was having a extra bit of problem because all the leaves had recently fallen, and there had yet to be enough traffic to show the trail. When you add to this the (sometimes) misleading blazing and the fading paint on some of the blazes that are spaced entirely too far apart, you have a recipe for disaster by headlight.
Let me send a message out to all you summer maintainers and fair weather blazers. The AT is used more than just in the best of weather. People might be using the trail when the leaves have just fallen or during a rainstorm or they might be trail-breaking in the snow. They might also actually be traveling southbound too.
The only sample of blazing that I have found to be entirely satisfactory is up by Quarry Gap shelter, up in Pennsylvania. The maintainer, Jim Stauch, seems to take great pride in keeping up not only his shelter, but the blazes north and south of it. Not only are the blaze sharp and bright, but he has also painted a darker color around the blazes, where necessary, to make it easy to not get lost in the dark. As far as I know the PATC does actually seem to want to keep people on the trail instead of bushwhacking. Thanks Jim. It was a pleasure hiking your section.
[Picture over at Whiteblaze.net of some unrelated hikers at Jim's shelter. Does not do this nice shelter justice]
Someone right now is saying something about how hard it is, and If I don’t like it, why don’t I pitch in and help. Well, my better blazing rules do slightly conflict with the official PATC’s rules [pdf]. I am, however, planning to do a little freelance “guerrilla” blazing in a particularly extra bonus crappy undisclosed section of the trail.
Standard Mischief’s rules for blazing a trail.
Use the proper paint.
Please try to imagine someone navigating your trail in the dark, in the cold, in new fallen snow, or during a rainstorm. Do you have enough blazes? Are they clearly marked? Ignore any rubbish of keeping the trail “wild”. Half as many blazes isn’t gonna make a difference in the “wildness” of the trail. Remember, you have all those privies, and all those “Hiker Hilton” shelters. I don’t even really care if you paint a stripe from Maine to Georgia (or should I say Georgia to Maine, but then you would have to change all those patches and logos). I just hate unintentionally bushwhacking thanks to someone trying to preserve the wilderness aspect of the trail.
Use offset “Garvey” blazes, except on switchbacks. When you think about it, a Garvey blaze would be easily misinterpreted if seen by someone coming from the other direction.
Mark your switchbacks with a double blaze near the turn. If you mark only some of the switchbacks, don’t be surprised where at the single blaze you have unthoughtfuly provided, people march straight off the trail. Don’t be surprised when they curse at you either. The one place, last weekend, where I cursed the maintainer out, there was actually a trail in the leaves made by other people who made the same mistake I had.
Imagine you are standing at a double blaze. Can you see the next blaze from where you are standing? Remember, the trail that seems obvious to you in the summer, might not be so obvious in inclement weather.
Be particularly careful about the above rule when the trail passes over an area of rocks or scree. Particularly if you have also failed to use the Garvey blazes. I was once walking the trail over an area of dry lunchbox sized rocks. Everyone was walking on the rocks, so there was no trail evident. I hit a non Garvey double blaze and I could not see the next trail marker from where I stood. I only found the trail by dropping my pack to mark the double blaze and hiking around in circles until I found the next blaze. Not fun.
You can’t effectively blaze a trail southbound when you are traveling northbound.
Sometimes the best place to paint a blaze is on a rock. Please remember though that sometimes the rock might be covered with snow.
In rocky country, please consider the use of cairns in addition to blazes.
Obligatory Wikipedia links, in case you have no idea what I’m talking about:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trail_blazing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appalachian_Trail
