South Mountain - Emmaus

Paging trail boss for Emmaus

There are a few us daytimers that would like to pitch in and help repair/address the wet areas on the lower trails at Emmaus. Could you post-up or PM so we connect in order to find out what we can do. I understand their are special considerations because of the conservency and I heard rumors of even a possible re-route/lengthening of the trail. I'dl like to take advantage of the weather in that the trouble spots are very obvious now.
I've got a fair amount of experience in sustainable trail building and a few hours of work could fix at least a few spots.

So I rode South Mountain for the first time on Easter. I stayed on the alpine(orange) trail the entire ride. Boulder (blue)trail looked insane. I didn't pay much attention to the red trail. I'm looking for some feedback as to how difficult those two trails are in comparison to alpine. Also, what is your preferred route? For example I went counter clock wise through alpine. The uphill was tough, but the downhill made it all worth it. I loved flying through all the rocks at the beginning of the down hill section. :cornut:

Thanks in advance,
Chris

Yesterday, after the decision to call off the group ride was made, at around 5:30 I decided to give SME a go on my own, as the rain had let up to just a drizzle. (I would have called off the group ride too, given the conditions at 3:30 or so).

Anyways, having not been there before, I fired up my EveryTrail on my Android, and attempted to do the whole outside loop, going clockwise from Alpine St.

Went out last night at SME. Lower 1/2 of the mountain is snow free and fairly dry (cistern trail) but watch out when get above the first trail kiosk. It goes from no snow in site to a good 4-6" of heavy, wet, non-pedalable (don't know if thats a word) snow...kinda freaky!

Some riding is better than no riding!

:ihih: Was able to hit the snow this past Sunday afternoon. Enjoy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYHfeEnWS4I

Interesting- keep your eyes open and you may see something unusual-

http://www.mcall.com/news/local/all-a4_5burbs.7138924jan06,0,5201437.column

Watch out for a Racoon that was hanging out in the middle of the trail during the middle of the day yesterday. He seemed a bit out of it which isn't a good sign. I encountered him on the new trail about 300 yards in off of Alpine Street on Sunday.

Ok, here are the GPS Results I recorded from our ride last night. Its almost complete, my battery died @ 6.7 miles and our ride was about 8.5 or so total.

Full elevation details on every inch of the ride can be found here:
http://bit.ly/VIEIt
Just hover over the elevation line graph to get detailed info anywhere allong the course.

Enjoy! I will try to gps sals and lehigh in the coming weeks if I remeber to turn it on.

jason

hello ,i need help getting to sme from easton im new to the area and i heard alot about the riding in pa .
thanks in advance for any help given .

It is that time of year again in Emmaus, time for some new trails! If you are interested in helping, please e-mail me @ smc@bittergravity.com. Merry Christmas!