Photo from Summit County Mountain Bike Allliance
With Memorial Day this year comes the full-fledged start to mountain bike season in Summit County, and local leaders are excited for a strong summer after a 2020 when the community was affected by novel coronavirus regulations.
“That’s what I’m exactly excited about: the return to normal,” Maverick Sports Promotions Event Director Jeff Westcott said Friday, May 28. “This season is pretty much a 180 (degree turnaround) from last year, when we could only proceed according to the current guidelines. This year, we were encouraged to plan for normal and scale back if necessary. And that’s a different vibe ‘if necessary.’”
The Summit County Mountain Bike Alliance on Thursday, May 20, hosted the first of an expanded calendar of events this summer that will include twilight trail work, mountain bike skills clinics and dig days. The.
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I walked through a tidy residential neighborhood for a solid mile before pulling out my phone to check the GPS. As I tried to get my bearings, a man standing in front of his neatly manicured lawn glanced at me in surprise. In my dirty hiking clothes and tent-pole-festooned pack, I must have looked out of place.
I was on the northern section of the Oregon Coast Trail (OCT), and, it turned out, this neighborhood was indeed officially on the route. After climbing a short, steep sidewalk, I came to a trailhead leading to a forest path that ended up being my favorite part of this section.
Appalachian Trail Chaplain Chris “Bone Spur” Estus, as seen on the Appalachian Trail in New Jersey in May 2021. | Courtesy Chris Estus
A United Methodist Church chaplain recently began an assignment offering pastoral and personal support for those trekking along the 2,193-mile Appalachian Trail.
The Tennessee-based UMC Holston Conference named Chris “Bone Spur” Estus, who oversees a ministry to help those struggling with substance abuse, as their ninth Appalachian Chaplain.
In an interview with The Christian Post on Wednesday, Estus explained that the position involves him being “loving, listening, and [a] non-reactive presence to people along the way.”
Estus, who got his hiking nickname Bone Spur due to having a bone spur in the big toe of his right foot and being a San Antonio Spurs fan, began walking the trail on March 26. The Appalachian Trail is a hiking trail in the Eastern United States that runs from Georgia to Maine.