Crew members

Rebecca Wanagel
Bob Hoyle
Martin Knowles
Paul Kamps
Bernt Ericsen
Jim Hollatz
Donna Hollatz
Rick King
Suzanne King

Packers

Harold and Pat Wiese (Magic, Archie, Sugar, Belle)

Sorry, no pictures of rick. He obviously was the one behind the camera but I know this incredible work is his doing too.

For those of you who don’t know, last season in december of 2021, a massive snow and wind storm hit the shelton area. It blew down an awe-inspiring number of trees that were in severe stress from the june ’21 heat dome. We had many saw crews working there to free the skok trail from the grasp of many hundreds of downed trees. These bridge railings were part of the casualty but we could barely get through all the trees and most certainly didn’t have time to fix the railings too. That’s why they got done this year.

An example of some of the damage.

All better!

Brushing is a constant, never-ending need on this trail but rarely gets tended. Donna and suzanne worked as a brushing crew and got the first ¾ mile of the 140 road free from encroaching alders and maples. Really important for the longevity of the trail.

Meet belle. She is super cute. She is working on learning to be calmer around people and activity.

I really enjoyed finally being out on the trail with pat too! Magic is really her baby, but I’ve always only seen harold on magic. Magic is such a strong leader. Calm, strong, smart and experienced. I found out magic is 24 and they’ve had him since he was only six months old.

This was one side of a stock blocking tree we had to clear.

The other end. Bound between two trees and suspended.

Bernt and Paul were their own team, working on the upper part of the lower skok and the lower part of the upper skok. That is really fun to say. The upper skok is the one that heads up into the onp and to sundown pass, sundown lake and six ridge trail (which connects to the north fork skok). Gorgeous country up there.

Due to the height of the trees (too low for stock but too high to cut), we had to clear out a bunch of stuff and cut from up on the hillside to release it. Sorry, I don’t have an after picture, but it is cleared to stock standards now.

Paul getting ready to work on clearing the stock ford at rule creek (upper skok). They cleared the first mile of the upper skok, to where the big “natural” footlog is. Rule creek is right before that and has had its stock ford blocked for a long time.