Big Trail Building Summer
Part 1
Words by Riley McIntosh.
Date: 2008-09-03
I’ve spent many hours building stunts for the NWD movies but I haven’t actually produced a tonne in the way of trails to enjoy on a daily basis. I took my girlfriend for a little helicopter tour this spring and while flying back into Nelson I had a very simple idea: Why don’t I build a really long trail close to Nelson that is accessible by both truck and helicopter? 
Looks like a good spot for a trail.
So we banked the heli over, checked out a few of the peaks surrounding town, and I quickly decided on one. An obvious choice, over 7000 feet tall, with a view of town and a nice alpine ridge leading into the trees.
I took a ski tour up there in May, touring along on sun crust in hot conditions, and I got some perspective on how the ridge ran over to the peak. The idea was firmly entrenched in my brain, but I had to wait until the snow was gone in late June so I could start hiking the route. From the helicopter everything looks so easy and obvious but once you’re on the ground the scale of the landscape becomes much more daunting. 
What's better than riding through old growth?
What excited me most was that the trail would descend from the alpine down into the sub alpine, into a mixed forest, and finish in an old growth cedar and hemlock stand. 
Hey Bro, 'come ride some gnarly ass trails instead of those baby’s butt smooth trails down on Van Isle.'
I invited my brother to come up for the summer and help me build the trail. He’s just finished grade 11 so I figured it would be a good time for him to get out of Duncan and check out another zone. Come ride some gnarly ass trails instead of those baby’s butt smooth trails down on Van Isle.
By mid July we'd spent 15 days building the trail and had gained 1’800 vertical feet, working from the bottom up. I bought a quad in the spring so we can access the trail easily, using crazy old mining roads we’ve discovered criss-crossing the mountain.
The same fine craftmanship you'll see in New World Disorder Films.
I’ve also got into using a GPS, something I’ve found very useful. I’ve taken points along the route, and am just building from point to point. Each point represents a significant feature, mostly height of land, but also viewpoints and places where we can get the quad close to. On the topo map it looks like our trail will be about 14 kilometers long and descend 5500 vertical feet. That’s plenty I figure.
It's not cheating if you are building.
An interesting thing about the mountain we are building on is the mining history. Way up there in what seems like the middle of nowhere we have happened upon mineshafts, core samples, old building sites, partially buried ore cart tracks and even bones…
We’ve been taking our bikes up on the quad and trying out sections as we build them, and playing paper rock scissor at the end of the day for who gets to ride down. I’ve been winning lots lately and the trail has been getting better and better. My favourite section is one that is carved through an old mine site. You pass by a hundred year-old cabin and there’s a snake run down this old excavation. We’ve built a few berms out of the tailings from the mine, and its good digging, tonnes of material that was previously dug out a century ago.
'...any time you get going super fast there’s a corner ahead.' Photo ~ Kari Medig
The bottom section of the trail is called ‘Bear Den,’ because I saw a black bear crawl out of a big cedar stump. Bear Den is very low angle, but really fast. It’s one of those trails you barely need to brake on, and any time you get going super fast there’s a corner ahead, so you dump speed that way. I’ve ridden it probably ten times now and it’s been getting faster and faster.
Our goal was to finish the entire trail by late summer which proved to be quite impossible. But whatever happens we’re going to try as hard as we can to finish it, within reason.
I’ve got another epic heli biking trail picked out near Nelson that I want to get a decent start on this summer. My plan is to get the heli to flip us up there and then spend three days building the first alpine descent, and then the fourth day walking out. I’ll take a GPS point where I want the trail to finish, and then we’ll just hit ‘goto’ on the GPS and hope for the best. Like I said from the air or from across a valley the terrain looks simple enough but when you’re wandering through the trees it’s much more daunting. 
Built for humans not just pro riders.
Back to the job at hand, we’ve got five kilometers of trail to go before we are at the top. As far as equipment goes it’s been the usual chainsaws, Pulaskis, rakes, and loppers. My new idea is to buy a commercial level brush saw to mow down all the rodo and other snaggle that grows above 5000 feet around here. We’ve been using the Dakine Builder Packs and they are great. My favourite feature is definitely the ability to carry the powersaw on my back.
That’s what I’ve been up to this summer, check out more riding pictures in Part 2.
Riley McIntosh
Anyone else ready to pack up the car and track Riley down? Anyone ridden this trail beside Riley? Speak up...
Big Trail Building Summer Part II here
Stumble this!
Tweet this!
