Cherohala Skyway Trail System

The Long Branch Trail (FS Trail 103) is a trail within the Cherokee National Forest in the Tellico Ranger District which connects North River Road up Long Branch to the Cherohala Skyway. The trail is 2.6 miles long and rises about 1200 feet from the North River to the Skyway. This trail goes through a burned out area. It has not been maintained for several years until now (summer 2010) and is requiring a lot of work to reopen the trail.

The Sugar Cove Trail (FS Trail 89) is 2.4 miles long and rises 1650 feet from North River Road to the Unicoi Crest Parking Area on the Cherohala Skyway.

The Hemlock Trail (FS Trail 101) is 3.35 miles long and rises 2040 feet from North River Road to Hemlock Knob just east of Eagle Gap on the Cherohala Skyway.

Monday, July 19, 2010: BMT Section 18a - Fodderstack Trail - It was raining hard again this morning, so we called Bobby Mitchell and cancelled his bush hog work for the day. By the time that Tazz reached the Ranger Station the rain had stopped, so we decided to drive up the Skyway and do what we could on the overhanging limbs. On the way up we stopped at the upper Long Branch Trailhead to look at the trail. It turned out to be more look for the trail, with weedeaters in hand. We finally found one tree with a blaze several hundred feet in from the parking spot, and cleared to this tree. This will at least give us a start on finding the trail with the chainsaws on Thursday. We went on up to Beech Gap and used the weedeaters to cut the overhanging limbs to Cold Springs Gap. This work will make it easier for Bobby to mow the road at a later time.

Thursday, July 22, 2010: Long Branch Trail - We worked yesterday on logging out the Long Branch Trail. This trail had not received any maintenance in a number of years and was very overgrown. We split into two crews working from the upper and lower ends of the trail. The upper crew sawed something over 100 trees and the lower crew sawed over 50 trees. One portion of the trail on the upper end passed through a dead pine area with dozens of trees down across the trail. For the day I would estimate that each crew cleared about 1 mile, leaving about 1/2 mile in the middle to complete the log out work. The day was very hot and humid, and several of us ended up dehydrated when we didn't pack enough water. Tazz got stung a couple of times when he sawed too close to a yellow jacket nest. The upper crew totally lost the trail in an old clear-cut and had to bushwhack down to Long Branch and head downstream. Thank you for bringing us in some water and packing our gear out. This had to be my hardest day ever working on a trail. Next week I plan to pack in over a gallon of water to stay hydrated.

Thursday, July 29, 2010: Long Branch Trail - As you are aware, we were able to finish the logging out portion of the Long Branch Trail by completing the middle section. The trail is now clear of blow-downs but needs to be brushed out to become a usable trail. We will schedule a brushing-out trip for August 12th. No dehydration issues this trip. Here are the hours;

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	6	7.5
Tazz Reid	1	6	7
Roger Taylor	1	6	7
Bobby Mitchell	1.5	6	7.5
Bill Hodge	1	6	7
Totals	6	30	36

Thursday, Aug 12, 2010: Long Branch Trail - We managed to brush out the length of the Long Branch Trail. Long, hot and exhausting day. Some weed trimmers played out, and some volunteers played out. The only things I see left to do is to work on the one root ball that has taken out part of the trail, remove one tree from the lower section and to re-blaze the trail. Here are the hours;

Bill Hodge - 10 hours - 1 hour travel
Tazz Reid - 10 hours - 1 hour travel
Bobby Mitchell - 10 hours - 1.5 hours travel
Ken Jones - 10 hours - 1.5 hours travel
Roger Taylor - 10 hours - 1 hour travel

Thursday, September 9, 2010: Long Branch Trail - We were able to complete the work on the Long Branch Trail. We removed the one new tree from the trail that had fallen since sawing the trail out. Our largest project was removing the huge root ball in the trail. This project took quite a bit of effort but ultimately we were successful, and then we repaired the tread. The Long Branch Trail is now maintained to standard (no small feat). The hours are as follows;

Bill Hodge - 6 hours worked - 1 hour travel
Roger Taylor - 6 hours worked - 1 hour travel
Tazz Reid - 6 hours worked - 1 hour travel
Ken Jones - 6 hours worked - 1.5 hours travel

Thursday, September 30, 2010: Hemlock and Sugar Cove Trails - We had enough people to send saw crews down from the Skyway Trailheads on Hemlock and Sugar Cove Trails. Unfortunately we didn't get either trail completely logged out. The crew working on Hemlock Creek Trail lost the trail on the upper end and had to bushwhack down to the creek to find it again. The crew working on Sugar Cove (yours truly) managed to saw into a rock just at lunch time. This left the lower mile of this trail with about 8-10 trees across the trail, with about half of these being over 12" diameter. Both trails are in need of brushing out, and Sugar Cove has about 200' of tread work need at about 3/4 mile up from the North River Road. We need to schedule more work on these trails in the future. Here are our volunteer hours for the day:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	6	7.5
Jim Holland	1.5	6	7.5
Tazz Reid	1	6	7
Ed Ley	3	6	9
Totals	7	24	31

Thursday, October 7, 2010: Hemlock Trail - We worked on brushing out the upper end of the Hemlock Trail yesterday. We started work from the Skyway, and found the spot where the trail bears to the left with a large tree across the route. We were able to follow and brush out the trail for the next 3/4 mile. At that point we totally lost the trail again. It was in an area with a lot of trees down and the extra sunshine had developed some vicious briars and undergrowth. I believe that I found the trail continuing on the ridge, but there were so many trees across it that we had to bushwhack off the ridge and come out the bottom to the North River Road. We plan to continue logging out and brushing out this trail next Thursday. Here is our volunteer time for this work trip:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	8	9.5
Tazz Reid	1	8	9
Totals	2.5	16	18.5

Thursday, October 14, 2010: Hemlock Trail - We continued working on the Hemlock Creek Trail yesterday. One work crew came in from the bottom and started brushing out the trail at the steep part where the trail leaves the stream. The other crew came in from the Skyway working on log out and brush out, continuing from the points where we had left off on previous trips. Rick sawed approximately 60 trees off the trail, stopping at the top of a knob just north of the gap where the trail turns steeply down to the creek. There is still some saw work left to do for the steep portion and a little on the ridge line. The crews also completed the work to brush out the trail from the point where it leaves the stream to the Skyway. The trail still needs to be brushed out for the potion along the stream. Volunteer hours are below:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	2	8.5	10.5
Rick Harris	1	8.5	9.5
Ed Ley	3	8.5	11.5
Tazz Reid	1	8.5	9.5
Roger Taylor	1	8.5	9.5
Bobby Mitchell	2	8.5	10.5
Totals	10	51	61

Thursday, November 4, 2010: Hemlock Trail - We attended the monthly safety meeting on a rainy morning. We decided to postpone the work trip for Hemlock Creek Trail due to the hazardous conditions trying to saw on the steep grades with poor footing. We also attended a CPR refresher class that was scheduled at the last minute. After we left Tellico we sawed 2 trees off the Basin Creek Trail in the Ocoee District. Those hours are turned in separately to Steve Biatowas.

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	2.5	4
Tazz Reid	1	2.5	3.5
Totals	2.5	5	7.5

Monday, November 8, 2010: Hemlock Trail - Ken Jones finished the logout work by sawing out the remaining blowdowns in the middle of the trail. Greg Kirkland refreshed the blazes in all of the problem spots. Here is my volunteer time for the day:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	8	9.5

Thursday, November 18, 2010: Hemlock Creek and Sugar Cove Trails - We had a large work crew that was split up to brush out two of the North River Trails yesterday. The work crew for Hemlock Creek Trail brushed out about 1.5 miles of trail. This completed maintenance work on the trail and it has now been maintained to standards. The crew working on the Sugar Cove Trail started at the North River Trailhead and brushed out about 1 mile to the half way point of the trail. The current status for the trail is that the upper half has been logged out but not brushed out; the lower half has been brushed out but not logged out. Here is our volunteer time for this work day:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	7	8.5
Tazz Reid	1	7	8
Bobby Mitchell	1.5	7	8.5
Roger Taylor	1	7	8
Bill Hodge	1	6	7
Philip Gooch	0.5	6	6.5
Jim Sirmans	0.5	6	6.5
Totals	7	46	53

Wednesday, December 1, 2010: Sugar Cove Trail and Conasauga Falls Trail - We started work logging out the Sugar Cove Trail from the North River Road. It was snowing on us and the area had received 3 inches of rainfall the day before. We sawed on tree before reaching the stream crossing about 1/2 mile in. The water at this crossing was running fast and deep. We scouted our other spots to cross downstream and upstream and could not find a good crossing. We decided to give up for the day, and check out the Conasauga Falls Trail after lunch. This trail was in good shape and we only had to clear small stuff from the trail. Here are our hours for the work day:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	4	5.5
Bobby Mitchell	1.5	4	5.5
Totals	3	8	11

Thursday, February 17, 2011 - Sugar Cove Trail and Annual Chainsaw/Crosscut Review Course - We started the morning with 8 volunteers attending the annual refresher for chainsaw and crosscut saws. We really appreciate you and Robert putting on this new class for us. I think that we all appreciated the safety discussions and reminders in safe saw and axe use. Following the class, 4 of us went out on a work trip to finish up the Sugar Cove Trail maintenance. We had a saw crew and two weedeaters to complete the remainder of the trail. The saw crew completed the lower 1.25 miles to tie in to the upper portion that was logged out last fall. The brush out crew started about 1.25 miles in and brushed out another 1/2 mile to a point where the trail started to become steep. This trail becomes excessively steep on the way up to the Cherohala Skyway, and this steep portion may be decommissioned at a later date. Here are the volunteer hours for both the class and the work trip:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	7	8.5
Tazz Reid	1	7	8
Bobby Mitchell	1.5	7	8.5
Roger Taylor	1	7	8
Ed Ley	3	2	5
Philip Gooch	1	2	3
Carey McHugh	1.5	2	3.5
John Kalabus	2.5	2	4.5
Totals	13	36	49