for the Siskiyou Hiker
As trail groups pursue new trail construction and status changes that require costly and lengthy environmental reviews, old trails that represent “shovel-ready” projects disappear
30 SEPTEMBER 2020 | AGNESS, OR. — It’s a mountain bikers dream, descending around 18 rugged miles from Hobson Horn to the wild banks of the Illinois River. Providing a “near wilderness experience,” the Hobson Horn Trail traverses some of the most rugged landscapes in Curry County. It’s isolated. It’s rough. And it’s gone.
A misadventure
In August, Nathaniel Chotlos decided to check out Hobson Horn, and the first few miles weren’t bad, he writes in an email. Chotlos is a Forester for the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest, SMC volunteer, and marathon trail runner.
As he descended, a section after those first few miles became a “practically impenetrable wall of fire-hardened brush. It was so bad that I spent most of the trip off trail trying to find holes in the brush to wiggle through.”
Soon, he was crawling because he couldn’t push his way through the brush upright, but he says “the sections of tread I saw were in surprisingly good shape.” But soon, he had to stop looking for the trail, and just move on.
“About 10 or so miles in, I finally did hit some areas with intact tree canopy, less brush, and some easier walking.” But those sections were few and far between, Chotlos found.
He skipped looking for Champion Spring, the one source of water depicted on the USGS map, and the trail got better as he approached the junction with the Illinois River Trail. 18 miles is usually a walk in the park for Chotlos, and he had expected to do the whole thing in a day.
“Overall, it took me two very difficult days of hiking to reach the Illinonis River Trail,” he writes. He was filtering water out of mud puddles. But hope is not lost.
An opportunity
“It would be a whole lot of work to cut the brush and open the trail,” he writes. “Most of the route would require regular attention to keep it from closing back up in a few short years.”
As groups push for new trails that require lengthy and prohibitively expensive environmental review processes, many trails like the Hobson Horn rest in peace, waiting to be summoned through routine maintenance and hard work.
Read more about the Hobson Horn Trail here, and check out the map on CalTopo. ###
