What in Blazes??...A Real Thing That Actually Exists

Finally--after being scheduled and shut out several times over the course of the winter--my co-overseer and I made it up to "our" section of the Appalachian Trail for a work trip.  This part runs some 4 miles south from Pine Grove Furnace State Park in south-central PA.  In fact, the midpoint of the AT currently falls in our section.

The purpose was a trail inventory of man-made features and improvements, to help justify future budget requests.  Plus we did a little blowdown clearing, pulled the leaf blockages out of a couple of culverts, and last but not least, cleaned the Toms Run privy where apparently paperless users had wiped their sh*t on the walls.

Anyway, The Real Thing That Actually Exists:

Image credit Gary

Next trip will be a blaze painting excursion.  There are a number of sections along "our" trail where the blazes are a bit sparse.  Plus I tend to be blaze-happy, leaning toward too many rather than too few...because I've been on the route-finding end where a dearth of blazes was most frustrating.