Up here, we’ve got supplies, forest roads, and infrastructure.
But down in Moonshangle Thickets, there’s—thickets.
This entire slope makes up about 3 acres.
It seems like a pretty manageable space, but it feels much bigger than it is.
This maze of rhododendrons and mountain laurels eliminates any shred of visibility, so it’s
easy to get disoriented.
This flag line allows us to think a trail through before building it.
How do we make this trail rideable, and fun?
Can we make our run last longer?
What’s the best path to keep our bikes from skidding sideways down the hill?
Since most of Moonshangle is a steep hillside, we need to find places where the terrain mellows
out, and try to connect them together.
We’ve been referring to these spots as natural bench, since they’re as close to bench cut
hillside as exists out here.
We’re also trying minimize landscaping.
Actual trees, like oaks, maples, and pines we can always route the trail around.
But we’ll need to merc a few rhodos and laurels for the cause.
Early settlers had a name for thickets like these.
Laurel Hell.
There are thickets in the Smokies where mountaineers would take days to cover just a few miles.
Some would keep going, in hopes of breaking through to the other side, only to run out
of supplies and perish.
Thickets like Jeffery’s Hell, and Huggins’ Hell are actually named after those unfortunate
mountaineers.
Luckily, we were able to flag this slope without renaming it Seth Hell, or Alex Hell.
Step one, clear corridor.
That means dragging out dead wood, pruning—a lot, and ripping out entire shrubs where needed.
We’ll come back with a chainsaw to clear dead trees off the trail, but most of this
stuff is small enough to hack with a machete, or hit with the electric saw.
It
took an entire day to clear our flag line, and we made it pretty much to the bottom of
Moonshangle.
I was by no means able to make an accurate map, but this is pretty much what our trail
looks like.
For the time being it’s an out and back, which means you need to turn around at the
end.
Eventually we can continue the trail back uphill, or connect it to another route.
But we still have more work to do before we can really call this a trail.
Now that our corridor is cleared, we’ll focus our efforts on the ground.
First, we’re removing all the loose debris like leaves and twigs.
Underneath all that is glorious loam.
Loam is like velcro for tire knobs, and as a medium for riding downhill it doesn’t
get any better.
But it’s a massive bummer to climb back up.
Even knob deep in fresh loam, traction isn’t the issue.
It’s the resistance.
Deep loam will eventually gas even the most seasoned XC racer, so for sure, we’re gonna
be gettin’ our hike on when it comes time to go back uphill.
With the debris is raked off the trail, we have a clearer picture of what needs work.
The
steep downhill sections can remain rooty and loamy for the time being, but as we move along
the hillside, the tread becomes off camber.
Certain routing decisions will make little sense right now.
Like super sharp turns immediately after fast sections, but it’s all part of the plan.
We’ll add berms, rollers and jumps in due time.
We started out in Laurel Hell, and made our way through to plant flags.
Then we cleared off the trail and took care of all the stumps.
Then in the interest of time, we did the absolute minimum for the sake of rideability.
Introducing Berm Peak’s newest trail, Knob Deep.
For run number one, it’s only right that we take it from the top.
The timer is going to tell us how long this downhill run really is.
Right before the maim frame is one of the few spots where pedaling is necessary, and
we may be able to eliminate that with a berm.
After that, your cassette is screaming.
Here’s another spot we still need to pedal through, thanks to hard breaking through
the turn.
And after one glorious minute of mostly continuous downhill, we turn around and pedal back up.
Well, we pedal as far as we can anyway.
Moonshangle has the space and grade to build just about anything we want including additional
downhill mileage.
So, it’s a new era on Berm Peak and we’ve got no place else to go anyway.
Thanks for riding with me today, and I’ll see you next time.