“Don’t worry, I’ve got a big job for you guys.”

Prophetic words from Graham Knell, North Van­cou­ver District’s Trail and Habi­tat Coor­di­na­tor. But not to worry, thirty-five Knee Knacker par­tic­i­pants were more than up to the chal­lenge of tack­ling one of our most ambi­tious Trail Day projects to date. The job? Build a new sec­tion of the BP trail in the Hyannis/Blueridge area. The exist­ing sec­tion had eroded into the nearby creek. This caused a double whammy: the trail was flood­ing during rains and in return, silt and debris was wash­ing into the water­way. Fixing this prob­lem had been on Graham’s radar for a few years. This day, it would be so.

So how do you build forty meters of new trail?

First, add lumber. Not enough to build a house, just a few stairs and a retain­ing wall. Second, add a large assort­ment of hand tools. Include one chain­saw. Orga­nize three teams to work on the lead-in stairs, the back-end wall and stairs, and the cen­tral path­way. Finally, drop in 35 caf­feinated, muffin stuffed, eager vol­un­teers for four hours.

Now with all the ingre­di­ents in place, start dig­ging. Make noise as needed. Create a bucket brigade to deal with a seem­ingly bot­tom­less pile of gravel. Use up steel rebar like it was free (well it was, kinda). Replant ferns to create that per­fect coastal rain­for­est set­ting. Add more border effects. Talk and chat about your injuries and var­i­ous runs, and every five min­utes, ask, “Does anyone have a <insert name of tool here>?”. Finally, when all is said and done, dis­man­tle and decom­mis­sion the old section.

After a test run, we all stood back to admire our hand­i­work. It was very impres­sive for a day’s work, but noth­ing that isn’t always expected and given with the Knee Knacker. Well done!

Andrew Wong

(Trail Day photos by Karen Chow are here.)