South Carolina's Palmetto Trail takes you "from the mountains to the sea" on a 420 mile cross-state tour. Designed primarily for hikers, mountain bikers and equestrians are allowed on some sections. The trail began in 1995 as a grass-roots effort by four people sitting around a kitchen table in Columbia, South Carolina, and the first passage (sections are called passages) was opened in 1996. As of 2006, well over half of the trail miles are open, with the longest continuous stretch extending 170 miles. Each "passage" is designed to be easily completed by hikers in a weekend, and maps of the entire trail and of each passage are available on the Palmetto Trail website. The trail is administered by a private, non-profit corporation.
We were assigned to reroute a mile section of existing trail from private land on to Francis Marion National Forest land. In the section shown above, this entailed digging new tread on a century-old dike built to terrace rice fields, and also building a bridge. Using stringers and decking removed from bridges on the old trail section, we constructed a 26 foot bridge across this stream. Notice the cable from the come-a-long winch attached to the log at the bottom of the photo. Troy and Max are hand cranking the winch as Woody, Ted, and Dave watch the first stringer inching its way across the water.
The finished bridge has a ramp on the left to allow bikers easy access to the bridge. The ramp was created by Woody, a true magician with a chain saw, who painstakingly constructed a jig and then sawed the two stringers on an angle - a great deal of work, but an elegant and practical solution to the height difference.
The ranger in charge, John DuPre, had determined the new trail corridor and flagged the route. Then
firefighters had been sent through with chainsaws to cut down the trees and bushes. Next our crew "swamped out" the corridor, placing all cut materials unobtrusively into the woods. Finally the task of digging the new tread began as seen here with our extraordinary co-leaders, Bonnie and Phil leveling a high section and moving the dirt to low areas.
All organic material is removed and mineral material serves as the final tread, providing a safe surface for hikers and riders. In this photo, Jane, Bonnie, Dave, and Donna put the final touches on the trail surface, and then patient Carole will follow and lop off any remaining roots.
