Cherokee Hiking Club
198 Crews Drive, Benton, TN 37307

Trail Maintenance
Falls Branch Falls Trail

Monday, February 25, 2008
Monday, May 30, 2011
Thursday, July 28, 2011

The Falls Branch Falls Trail (FS Trail 87) is a short 1.3 mile trail from Rattlesnake Rock Parking Area off the Cherohala Skyway. The trail follows an old forest service road for the first mile or so, then steeply drops down the mountain side to Falls Branch Falls. The falls is about 55 feet high and quite spectacular.

Monday, February 25, 2008: Ken Jones, Rick Harris, and Robert Thomas cleared blowdowns off the Falls Branch Trail from the Skyway down to the falls itself. It was a beautiful day, about 60 degrees and sunny.  The main project was clearing out a big tree which had fallen over the trail just before the Falls Branch creek crossing.

Trip Leader: Ken Jones 

Time Spent from Leaving to Returning: 4 hours (4x3=12 hours of maintenance work)

 

 

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Monday, May 30, 2011 - Falls Branch Trail - Five hard workers including Pam and Kent Mathews who are responsible for this trail got out on this hot day to clear the Falls Branch Trail in preparation for the BMTA and Cherokee Hiking Club hikes this coming weekend. We cleared about 6 trees from the trail and brushed out the trail, so now the trail is in pristine shape. While working, two groups of hikers came by. It is obvious this trail is getting quite a bit of use. One of the trees was a huge 24" or so buckeye which took Ken Jones and Rick Harris about 1 1/2 hours to cut out of the trail with crosscut. See pictures below. Also, a vidio of the work trip and additional photos are on Facebook on Brenda Harris's account. I will attach the video to this page soon, once I figure out how to do this. Volunteer hours are below:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Pam Mathews	5	5.5	10.5
Kent Mathews	5	5.5	10.5
Ken Jones	2	6.5	8.5
Rick Harris	1	6.5	7.5
Brenda Harris	1	6.5	7.5
Totals	14	30.5	44.5

Thursday, July 28, 2011 - Falls Branch Falls Trail - We worked again today on the Falls Branch Trail. We mowed the weeds within the trail corridor for the first 3/4 mile of the trail that is routed on the old Hemlock Road. We also dug in a number of water turnouts to better control some long standing erosion issues. One of these turnouts was a major construction to eliminate a large ponding issue in heavy rains at a road blocking berm. On one side of this berm where most hikers were walking, the erosion had progressed down to solid bedrock. There was also a 3' berm on the down slope side of the trail/roadbed. We were able to dig a drainage trench about 30' long and right through the 3' berm to provide a fix for the water issues. This segment of the trail should be in good shape for controlling erosion issues now, but will need continued monitoring of conditions in the future. It was great to have you and Stephen Eren work again with us today. Here are the volunteer hours for this work trip:

Name	Travel Hours	Work Hours	Totals
Ken Jones	1.5	5	6.5
Rick Harris	1	5	6
Bill Hodge	1	5	6
Tazz Reid	1	5	6
Roger Taylor	1	5	6
Kyle Atkins	1.5	5	6.5
Bobby Mitchell	1.5	5	6.5
Joanne Mitchell	1.5	5	6.5
Peter Reiber	1	5	6
Totals	11	45	56