Dear Volunteers and Trailblazers,

Tanja and I wanted to reach out to you about plans for trail building this spring.

The corona virus has certainly put a crimp in our plans. Keeping safe and maintaining social distancing is the most critically important thing we can do to keep ourselves, those we love and our community safe. This will preclude any group trail building efforts for the time being.

That does not mean however that we can’t be out on our trails while modeling good and safe behavior. 

Here are some “rules of the road (or trail)” that were developed by the Maine Land Trust Network that identify some very practical and commonsense behaviors while on the trails.

Just because we can’t be together on working on the trails does not mean all trail work needs to stop.

You can all help by taking some time to clean up the trails while you are hiking. Branches that have fallen across can be moved to the side. You can also help us monitor the condition of the trails so we can set up and prioritize our work plan once we can once again work in groups. If you see any damage, large blow downs or other issues please let me (Joan) know. Tanja is a full-time nurse at SMHC so you can only imagine how her schedule has been co-opted to prepare to care for patients, so I’ll take the calls and/or emails.

We already know that the bridge built last fall leading to the Kennebunk River shifted dramatically during the recent high water so no need to call about that. We’re working on a plan to deal with that.

I know some of you like to work individually and are comfortable doing so. We may have some repair work that could be done by a single person or a small project that several people can work on one person at a time over a period of time. Let me know if you are interested and Tanja or I can let you know what we might need done. The main thing is to get out and enjoy the trails and stay healthy.

Although we may not be able to get together physically for a while, Tanja and I might try to set up a virtual Zoom meeting where we can get together remotely to talk and strategize about future plans and projects. If you would be interested in something like that shoot me an email at [email protected].

Thank you all for everything you’ve done. We can't wait until we can be together again soon to continue working towards our trail vision for ACT in 2020!

Stay safe and well,

Joan Hull and Tanja Schoenbrod