MOAB, Utah — When trail cleanup and rock crawling collide. That was our day four at Easter Jeep Safari.
One of our favorite things to do here in Moab is the day we get to meet up with our friends from Tread Lightly! and head out to do some trail maintenance. After all, we use the trails so it is our responsibility — really all of our responsibility — to make sure those trails are in the best possible shape.
And this year, that trail was Hey Joe Canyon which is roughly 30 miles northwest of Moab. Right smack in the middle of the Utah desert and straddling the Green River.
The area used to be a uranium mine and the trail brought heavy equipment to and from the mine. In the 1950s, that trail road began to see some significant erosion, so the Bureau of Land Management planted a bunch of tamarisk between the trail and river, hoping to stem that erosion.
Unfortunately, that Tamarisk also began to overhang the trail and, these days, makes traveling the thing somewhat difficult on vehicles. In fact, the Easter Jeep Safari Magazine says "Moderate to heavy brush contact should be expected."
So we, along with several others, hit the trail with clippers and several electric reciprocating saws to trim back that tamarisk so the trail will be much easier to navigate.
Of course, getting to that tamarisk did require a fair amount of trail riding through a few obstacles. Hey Joe is a 4-rated trail that starts off rather innocent, but erosion in some spots, plus rock placement in the dirt with narrow turns, can be rough on those with stock vehicles out to help with the cleanup. We helped tug a few vehicles over some obstacles, but everyone made it in and out to help maintain the trail.
