MakePeace, A PBX Hike

[Teegate]

All,

Back on February 4 all of the members of PBX received this email from Bob about our next trip.

Make peace with yer maker boys, we’re going to Make Peace! We’re gonna parley and grovel, beg and shovel, and use the best diplomacy we know--at the big wildlife management area known as Makepeace Lake. Yes, 11, 250 or so acres or roamin’ and groanin’….lets go see it!
We’ll meet at 9:00 AM on Saturday, March 3rd, on route 322 jest about 2 miles southeast of route 559 by Weymouth Furncace. It’s a clockwise trip through some tough stuff and some light sandy stuff. Just about 6 miles assuming we don’t wander too much. If you have not been working those lungs and legs, get ‘em pumping and rip-roaring ready to explore!
Let me know if you’re coming…..we’ll look for ya.
Happy Trails…….bob

Obviously, for various reason we did not make the hike on March 3rd but we did make it today. By 9:15 we were on the move heading to the unknown. Actually, Al (manumuskin) had warned us about the serious brier problem in that area but we plunged on anyway. How much of a problem can a little brier be??? What does Al know?? On this hike was myself, Jessica, Bob, Gabe, Scott, Jeff, Chris, and Paul who is not a member of this site.

Within a short while I found this geocache laying in the open near a tree. With the primitive pen I was able to put my chicken scratch on it letting them know PBX was there.

Relaxing and amazed at how easy things were going.

Jeff showing us his balancing skills. They are quite good BTW.

Then things started to change. Jessica was the first to wish she had listened to Al.

Gabe taking in the sights.

Next, the briers lit into Paul.

Jessica

We stumbled on what I believe is an old loading dock for a sawmill.

This is the other side of the loading dock.

Pegs for a tree stand of long ago.

Paul liked this and asked me to photograph him with it.

One of the many wet area's we traveled in.

Anyone home?

And when I arrived at our vehicles at the end of the hike who would guess that Jessica would be the first one there. She really was a trouper today as you will see in the video's that will come. It was over 7 long miles with intense briers in many places we traveled.

Usually after the hikes most of the participants have a small after hike party. I usually skip them but today Jessica and I decided to stay. We traveled to a remote location and Jessica sampled Scotts wacky juice.

Our route.

Video's to come.
Guy

 

[Teegate]

Video's.

This is a wonderful wet Savannah we crossed. Jessica has a really hard time in them because they are all water. It is basically like dragging your feet when crossing them.

More soon. Update: Maybe later tonight or tomorrow.

 

[dragoncjo]

Good to see you guys leave the core for a trip. Any nice cedar swamps?

 

[bobpbx]

Good to see you guys leave the core for a trip. Any nice cedar swamps?

There were cedars, but they seemed to be scattered here and there. Once in awhile they would be in a line several deep...but I did not see any forming a classic cedar swamp. A very unique area of open, sandy knobs surrounded on both sides by impenetrable briar and blueberry. The blueberry were the largest, meanest ones I have ever seen. I'd say 8 feet tall on average.

There may be some classic cedar swamp over by the back of the lake. That will have to be another trip.

 

[Teegate]

I will work on the quality of this video.

This video shows the vicious briers we had to deal with yesterday. At the end of the video I put the camera back into it's case but forgot to turn it off. So when the screen goes dark listen for my almost face first fall into the briers.

Guy

 

[bobpbx]

Vicious briars!

Chris and I crawled about 150 feet on our knees in that one patch of blueberry and briars to get out to that road.

 

[Teegate]

We actually had it easy in the back with 5 people going through before Jessica.

 

[Hewey]

The hike was Heaven or Hell. Heaven being the wide open, smooth walking through the pines with the lichen covered sand floor and Hell being some of the worst briers I have ever been in! Make peace is a great piece of woods. This was only the second time I have done any exploring in the pines south of the core area. It is nice to expand or horizons. No matter how hard or how easy the going is PBX hikes are always a blast!

The first body of water we came too. Gabe determined it was man made due to a berm.

A tree we came across with a cool looking moss/lichen growing on it. Not really sure what it is named?

Almost looks like a coating of cotton candy.

A real close up.

A tributary of the Big Ditch.

The massive savannah we hiked through. Very nice!

Part of the crew taking in the awesome vista!

A beautiful Gum/Maple swamp we passed through.

Gabe, Jess and Paul making their way through the swamp.

Bob in a spung that Gabe wanted to check out.

The shooting hut. This hunter was vary distructive to the surrounding woods. He cut down a few trees around his blind. One being a large pine we determined by counting the rings to be over a 100 years old.

Even though we a had a few really difficult stretches it was a great time. The tailgate is always a nice end to a long day. Scott spoils us with his wine, sharp provolone, long hot peppers and sausage. Guy, it was nice to have you at the tailgate.

Chris

 

[dogg57]

Nice Thread everyone! Thanks for sharing

 

[Teegate]

Great photo's Chris! Both Jessica and I enjoyed them all.

Guy

 

[jburd641]

I'm curious, do you guys ever take a machete for briars or is it purely climb, push, and wind your way through?
Great pics by the way.

 

[jburd641]

One suggestion that worked pretty well for me...leather gloves. Hot or not, they really saved my hands when I was in briars.

 

[woodjin]

I always do leather gloves and sun glasses. A machete would be too time consuming. you just push your way through or crawl under. It was a great hike!

Jeff

 

[Teegate]

I fixed the video in post 5. Just choose HD when you watch it. I finally read youtube's instructions.

Guy

 

[bobpbx]

Chris, look at the Bushy Beard Lichen at:

http://www.crms.uga.edu/lichens/files/Lichen_12_Guide.pdf


Usnea strigosa
L Bushy beard lichen; Old man’s beard

 

[bobpbx]

It really is a nice area to explore, though tough going. I think Gabe is right when he says this was perhaps the delta area of a huge river. The sandy knobs (or dunes) we continually fought our way onto were the sand bars of this huge river from the ice age. I hope Mark the Spung Man comes on and gives us his take on this.

Many of the knobs have lain undisturbed for a long time—there is no practical way to get to them, or to get off them! This wall of greenbrier surrounded each one.

 

[bobpbx]

Many times we found pine trees on top of the dunes that had literally decayed in perfect symmetry. The pine knots were not kicked out of place at all. This is really something to see.

 

[bobpbx]

This is a long stretch of clearings that was right out of the fifties, but is now hard to get to.

Remember the banana bikes? Found at the very end of a waypoint we called “LinkRay”.

Part of the crew in the first big savanna, checking something out (explore, it’s what we do!).

Big Sky New Jersey. The public goes rushing from the suburb to the mall on route 322, with no clue this is here.

Gabe is partial to this spung. That is him in the distance. We now call him Okeebeetoe. It’s Indian for “he who ponders spungs”.

 

[RednekF350]

Well, where shall I begin.
I had a few preconceived notions about what I would see and experience on this hike and the end result was a very pleasant surprise.

Because this area is a well known WMA, I thought we would see a lot of evidence of human presence and some of the negatives that go with that. We actually found very little trash and the trash that we did find was actually old and interesting.
The savannahs were beautiful and pure and the woodlands were rugged with a dense understory. The more pleasant parts of the actual physical hiking were the walks along the dune ridges. These were open and a welcome respite from crawling through the briar.

Toward the end, Gabe wanted to check a few spots of interest and one of those provided my best pic for the day.

The after party was top shelf. I am slowly teaching these boys and girl how to eat Italian style . I don't have an ounce of Italian in me but I learned all of my game cooking, butchering, sausage making and wine making skills from Waterford Italians over the last 29 years.
Most of the PBX already knew how to drink but with additional, intensive hands-on training, they are even improving on that !

Thanks for time well spent everyone.

Scott

The din of 322 couldn't put a damper on our first stop.

The Big Ditch when it was still little.

1970 discards. Bananna seats baby !

Savannah vista.

Gabe's inquisition.

Our most feared leader Bob.

 

[bobpbx]

Scott, thanks for a great tailgate. It was top shelf--really. Everything you brought was great, and I really loved the long-hots. Along with the good beer, wine, and Paul's soda bread, it was a perfect tailgate.