VERMONT — At 273 miles long, Vermont’s Long Trail stretches the length of the Green Mountain State. As with the Middlebury Area Land Trust’s Trail Around Middlebury, this historic hiking trail depends heavily on the work of volunteers to keep it maintained.
The Bread Loaf section of the Long Trail is an 11.4-mile segment in Addison County that extends from the Sucker Brook Shelter in Hancock north of Brandon Gap, over Worth Mountain, across the Middlebury Gap and through the Breadloaf Wilderness to the Emily Proctor Shelter near the summit of Bread Loaf Mountain. This spring, volunteers will return to their section for their first workday on May 15 and will meet in Ripton or at the top of the Middlebury Gap.
David Morrissey is the newly designated trail maintenance director for the section and will direct a team of about a dozen volunteers from Addison County in pruning, removing blow-downs, maintaining water bars and drainage from the trails and repainting the Long Trail’s signature white blazes. After the spring workday, the group will arrange several more spontaneous trips throughout the summer where work is needed before a second organized trip in the fall.
On April 25, Morrissey will attend a Trail Maintenance 101 workshop with the Green Mountain Club in Waterbury. There, he will join other sections from around the state in learning best practices for trail maintenance.
“I use the trail often and spend a lot of time out there, so this is a fun way to give back in a fun, direct way.” he said. “I’m just grateful that the resource is there for us all to enjoy.”