Set for Summer

It's been a bit quiet here of late, we've been very busy round the Park making it ready for a summer of riding, plus with the great weather, we've been riding quite a bit too! Mix in a bit of festive celebrating and time gets by on you, so here's a update on what's been going on since November.

Trails.
All the established tracks have had the trail corridor cleared, the grass controlled and generally tickled up.
All the new tracks can be ridden, parts of Miners track and AYUNC track are soft in a few places so exercise caution.
The last berms on Frank'N'Furter and Anti Disestablishment have been sculptured and it shouldn't be too long before they can be ridden hard.
Signage will be going up soon for a fun loop of some of the Lower Tracks.
All tracks have been signposted and a map has been produced for club members.

Scolly boys ready to zoom zoom

Nathan railing this berm

Skills Area
This has been on the cards for some time, and it was a great moment when we cleared the proposed path.
We have materials to make about 20m of the close to 90m of boardwalk planned.
The giant Berm that will also be a giant natural Wall-Ride has been cut and is seasoning nicely. In fact it is child's play to ride!
Holes have been dug and the first piles for the board-walk have been completed.
There are a number of great picnic spots here and a BBQ and table are available on site.

Pest Control
With the wet spring, everything is growing, the natives, the weeds, and it would seem the pests are growing too. There are numerous Possum bait stations around the tracks in Yellow containers and sometimes in margarine style containers, please don't eat them. We have also had the annual migration of mapgies and we have trapped them already - ha ha! Native bird life is very noticeable and we regularly see wood pigeons swooping around the whole valley, especially round the house and the Skills Area.

So come out for a ride, contact us to make a time.
Happy Trails
Mr Haven.

Rain and Mud but the Show Goes On

We have just had our November Dig Day and whilst we still got on and did a lot of good work overall for me it was a bit frustrating, the weather didn't play ball at all. However because it was a long weekend, we kind of made up for it on Friday.

It started out well, working on clearing a slip on the gum road, then down to the next gum road where I promptly got the digger well stuck in the mud. Thankfully after many attempts and many hours of swearing Allan and I pulled it out with the truck in the wee small hours of the night. The Digger was caked in mud!

On Thursday night or rather early Friday morning it rained quite heavily, not quite sure how much, our weather station rain gauge has been playing up, the test tube back up had about 20mm of water in it, with the weather station saying 10mm. But either way it was enough for there to be puddles on the ground and enough for me not to be able to take the digger on any of the new tracks. Basically the risk of undoing all of our hard work to date it with heavy treads and soft soils. That and I only like to get stuck once a weekend.

But that's not to say there wasn't plenty of work to do! Much to the dismay to the Berm Queen, although I have to mention it was at her prompting, I piled up many large piles of dirt to be made into berms on both Frank'N'Furter and Anti Disestablishment, at last count seven of the baby corners now have berms ready to begin seasoning to match the many existing berms. On top of this, I piled up more dirt on the newly widened corners on the climb on Frank'N'Furter to make the descent a lot more fun.

Berm Queen in Action

After this, I decided to have a break from Diggering and go and try out the Rock Breaker on the cliff on the As Yet UnNamed Climbing Track. Unfortunately, I couldn't get the tool to fit in the slot (hur hur.) So after consulting the manual (yay for the internet,) and Colin that evening it seems that I had received the wrong size tools.

So with that setback it was back to Diggering and I was beginning to scratch my head about what to do next. I piled up some mounds of dirt on a couple of straights on Anti Disestablishment to be somehow made into mini rollers. Wasn't sure how, but I was sure it would work out. After this I decided to explore an old trail Col and I had built way back in the day and had meant to get back to but didn't. It was a bit overgrown but the bench was still there and it didn't take too long to get it back into shape. The biggest issue was avoiding all the Onga Onga which has sprung up. It was interesting to see how we had progressed in trail building particularly in corners as this was a bit short and steep by our new standards, we will come back soon and put the new learning into this corner. I struggled to find the rock cliff which stopped us last time as nature had come and taken over and everything was green and lush, but soon I was extending the track, the plan will be a nice sweeping set of corners to connect to the rest of River Track.

While I was beavering away, Lisa was working hard clearing the trail corridor on the Upper Tracks and then into the berms I had freshly piled up. A solid six hours of work!

Before

First Stage, need to dry before compacting

We decided to call it a day early and I felt good about the progress made, most of the recent tracks was essentially at the hand finishing stage and would now be off-limits to the Digger so it can bed in nicely for Summer.

Colin popped in after an assault on Mt Oxford and we were planning what we would do over the weekend. Unfortunately again it rained heavily overnight and much more than Thursday night. Again this pretty much meant no Digger on anything new. So Plan Z was brought out, and Col started to blade out the line for the proposed Skills Area.

I went off to vainly try to get the rock breaker to work then heading in to town to get the right size tools. Lisa and Luke planted out Anti Disestablishment with natives. I return and get stuck into the cliff with a now working rock breaker, but it wasn't terribly effective. Three hours later I had made a difference but not a significant one, in fact it was probably more effective with the digger. My shaken back and wrists would attest to this. So I head back to be Col's rock and rake boy. Col also hit a bit of a snag with another cliff face that was resisting the Digger. However after an afternoon of toil Col makes it through and we call it another day.

After

Before

More rain overnight but not as much as previously, but this still writes off any Digger Action on fresh tracks. So we head back to the Skills Area. At the end of the cliff section Col was working on, the plan was to build a great big timber wall ride, however after pulling off all the tangle weed and vegetation we discover that Mother Nature was one step ahead of us and left us a great big natural one for us! With a bit of tinkering on both the entry and exit, we should have a great big wall ride and a great big berm for people to play with. Of course the sun breaks out mid morning and turns into a lovely day and one where I got quite badly sunburnt!

We also bladed out the entire course for the skills area which we hope to get under way and potentially finish by Christmas 2011. Without giving too much away, we used the awesomeness of the Digger to collect all the random huge rocks around the area to be put to use as a rock garden. There will be whole lot of other tests for safe skill development...

Rock Quarry

Almost Finished. Big Rock has been moved

AD in Foreground, River Track in Midground, Wall Ride/Berm in Background

3x Rollers on AD. Don't really show up on Camera

New Culvert

We had another go with the rock breaker in another rocky area, with Colin confirming that it was pretty useless, so we may have to re-think our route in that area as well. From here it was driving over the mini rollers with the Digger which worked pretty well, and putting the culvert in on Anti Disestablishment and that was job done for another Digger weekend. Not a lot of new track completed however almost all the current tracks are at a hand finishing stage and should be ready to shred by Christmas.

We hope to see you over Summer
Mr Haven.

November Dig Day 12 November

It's the second Saturday of the Month and it's a Dig Day.
Meet at the car bay - follow the pink arrows from the Haven sign.
If you don't know where we are, email info@havenmtb.org.nz for a map

On the cards for this Dig Day:

• Digger Action
• Hand sculpting big beautiful berms
• Raking out the new tracks.
• General Trail maintenance
• Planting and releasing of natives.

Stay for as long or as short as you want.
Bring a bike and some food/drink.

October was the Month of the Digger

October being a special month with five Saturdays prompted me to want to try and get the Digger out each weekend, well I made it happen. The weather didn't play ball the whole time, but it wasn't too terrible.

New tracks built:
Anti Disestablishment - Finished
As Yet UnNamed Climbing Track - Just under half way
Miners Track - extended & Finished
Eagles Nest - turning bay, stage 1 Finished

The recent great weather and wind had dried the new tracks sufficiently to allow me to head back to the AYUNC Track. At start of play I had made it to the third corner and fourth traverse. On the way up, I fixed up the odd bit of storm damage and then got stuck into more trail building.

I started to encounter a lot more rocky terrain and this slowed me down, I still managed to get a few dips and climbs and wiggles on my traverse. I found what I thought was the perfect quick corner, however as these things tend to be, it wasn't quite as perfect as I first thought and it took a lot longer than expected and still needs a bit of love.

On the fifth traverse, again it was pretty rocky and with a bit of  a nervous time with loose edges and what felt like steep sections on the digger, I came to a major rock face, that I couldn't quite break through. Instead of doing something foolish, I decided to head back down and to tidy up the corners as well as clean up the mess from the traverse above. One of the side effects from building trails above each other, is that crap goes downhill. It does mean a lot of cleaning up each session, but it will be built soon!

Col came over for a visit as I was widening one of the corners and as I was getting a bit tired on the digger, he took over and soon finished this and another one, so they are all ready for the finishing touches by hand. We also fixed up a chicane that didn't work and then went for a hoon with the digger to Frank'N'Furter, where Col fixed up our worst storm damage in about 30 mins, which was a great relief!

So as I look back, and having ridden all the new tracks, it was a great month for diggerage!
Over 3 kilometres of new track have been built, and that's just one way!
They are also pretty good to ride now, and they will only improve as they settle in and harden up. I can't wait for the natives to bounce back and take over.

Here are the  before and after shots from the worst damage from the storm on Frank'N'Furter

Here is a new leaner pine that happened after the storm.

And here is the AYUNC Track in it's glory and to the right, the 4WD Track & Miners Track.

The rock breaker and digger are booked already for the next Dig Day, we will need plenty of people to rake the new stuff, work on the trail corridor on the old stuff and to plant trees. Plus you can always ride your bike! 

We hope to see you out here over Summer soon.
Mr Haven.

Miners Track Complete

Another weekend and another super session with the Digger.

A quick update on the storm of last week, thankfully everything has drained nicely and firming up again, we will start repairs on the next dig day (12 November.) The water receded very quickly thanks largely to the outlet on Lake Ellesmere being open. On the seal road, there was standing water over the wheels of cars during the day, but by evening it had gone.

Here is a during and after shot of the same location.

So back to Miners Track, I decided to get the digger again but couldn't use it on any of the recent tracks with them being too wet, the digger weight would just undo all the hard work, I had already completed a bit of a recce and the 4WD track was OK with no slips and the top of the land had drained nicely. There was forecast rain during the day on Friday and then good all weekend. So away we went.

The journey up the 4WD wasn't pleasant, I was terrified, it was super steep and the digger kept tipping and slipping. I'm pretty sure I freak out much much earlier than any potential trouble, but it wasn't fun especially as it was my first time up there. But we made it, a few more grey hairs, but safe and sound.

We had the forecast rain during the day and so I got stuck into a corner that we were coming back to on Eagles Nest, basically it had a bunch of huge rocks we couldn't break, so I was going to try and dig them out. After not much success, it started to rain quite heavily and I wasn't a happy chappie at all. I clambered over the rock and headed out to where we had got to on Miners Track.

For those who don't know Gold Valley supposedly had gold back in the mid 1880s and a bunch of Adits and a vertical shaft were made on our land. This benched "road" was access to the vertical shaft.I got a wee bit further than Col had made a turning bay for the quad bike and with it still raining I chucked it in. Curses to the weather gods.

The next day was as forecast, the existing tracks were a bit slippery but as I got into virgin territory, it was nice and dry and good to work in. There was a good news/bad news situation working with an existing bench that had overgrown over at least 15 years. With it being a rock wall bench, there wasn't too much dirt that had built up over time, so if I dug up too much soil, I hit a lot of rock from the original track that took ages to get rid of, and so I had to get used to working off-camber on a downhill at the top of our land with a nice drop off the side. With a reasonable high centre of gravity and no suspension it took some getting used to, but once I did, I flew through the work. A few sections of tangle weed and some bigger broom were the only things that really slowed me down. 

It got kind of boring following a "road" being used to making wiggles and making fun diversions, but it was awesome being in another area that I have never visited. By the end of Saturday I was about 50m from the end and in an area that Colin and I had explored from a couple of years ago. The bench wasn't as visible in this section, so it was easy for us to think it was a track here already but not 100% certain. If we had kept bush bashing for another 50m we would have hit the road section.

One of the main reasons for me wanting to get this track completed was so that we could clear our boundary lines of broom and thus end our friendly letters from ECan about getting rid of it. Plus it should be a blast to ride, being pretty much downhill all the way, it affords some stunning views of Lake Ellesmere, the Pacific Ocean and of the Southern Alps, a magical land indeed.

I think I may have found a relic of the mine and potentially the mine itself, with a faded sign with an arrow and a vague trail heading up to the rock face. Definitely worth an explore!










 On Sunday morning I broke through to the fenceline, bliss! I then decided to clear a nice turning circle, which would make it nice for the quad bike and trailer to park up, clear the necessarily broom from the boundary and set up the area for the AYUNC Track for when it would meet up and then where the proposed downhill track will go as well. It all went wonderfully. I discovered an old channel that fed a wee pond, which was quite deep, which was a very welcome surprise. I may have found a spring as well, as moving through the bench, I seem to have found a water source, that bubbles up from the ground. Fingers Crossed, it may be able to be used to irrigate the far end of the property.










After a hearty lunch, I finished by tidying up the corners and killing more broom and heading up to the next major challenge. In my head Eagles Nest will continue from where it is to Miners Track. The catch is the top of the mine is a very narrow and large cliff face and with our property boundary, we have just about 2m of space and very steep and potentially quite rocky for about 100m. I managed to build a track to the start of the steep section and decided to wait until more experienced heads and hands were at hand before progressing further. It should work...

And here is Miners Track in all her glory, 571m of mostly downhill with some killer views and nice regeneration going on!

On Monday, I made a turning circle at the end of Eagles Nest, tidied up some corners and then heading down the 4WD track which was much more comfortable than heading up. I then did some community service, opening up the drains on Gold Valley Rd and clearing a slip on our neighbour's land, since their digger is feeling poorly at the moment.

Not sure where to next week, potentially back to AYUNC, if it has dried up enough, maybe some maintenance, back onto Frank'N'Furter or maybe Eagles Nest! So much choice!

Mr Haven.