Working On Amy’s Trail

The day had started off cold, but as the sun broke over the tree line, the temperature warmed up to a comfortable fall day. We heard from the crew from Oregon State University that had been helping to flesh out the plan in the woods for the community created memorial of Amy’s meandering trail.

We were given the safety rules and regulations along with the over-view of the process and equipment was picked out. The trail had been a hub of activity over the past two years with many hours put in from volunteers and staff. Days off regular work was busy with full days of wrangling the forest for the trail.

Step one was tagging the proposed path, it was Amy who began this venture several years ago and the original flags that she planted still show the beginning of the trail to the first benchmark. From the original proposed path, crews worked to slash the small trees and brush back away from the eventual trail. The Single Track Machine that was seen in a recent Washington County Small Woodland tour was brought in to carve the trail out of the forest so we got to see the beginning of what a walkable forest path could look like.

On this day that I was able to be a part of, the twenty or so of us began at the beginning of the trail and worked the grooming process of the raw gash made by the Single Track.

There were clippers, loppers, hoes, rakes, weed wackers and saws running to groom the path. Debris was moved away from the edges, berms and potholes were smoothed. At the end of the day we had about half of the trail ready for groups to traverse safely through forest that Amy had taken into her heart. There would be one more day of hard work to get the rest of the trail ready for the dedication that was set for October 9.

Before heading into the forest for this project, I envisioned this as a trail of tears (and this did happen many times during our conversations with other workers as we remembered and shared stories of Amy), the memory of Amy was so close to all of us while we headed into the woods that were her passion project. Once on the site, working side by side with others that Amy had touched during her time on this earth, it became more of a prayer and a tribute to the force that was Amy Grotta.