Hikes

Final Report of the Hikes Committee

Natural Bridge Appalachian Trail Club

Committee Organization–

committee of 9 other people to help with the planning.

  • Everyone on the committee scouted hikes and helped with the planning of what hikes to include in the schedule
  • One couple (both nurses) volunteered to put together the first aid kits
  • One person volunteered to prepare Google maps to go with the driving directions
  • One person volunteered to contact potential nature/history hike leaders
  • co-ordinate volunteer recruitmentVolunteer recruitment for hikes is a huge task

Hikes – October, 2009Committee started looking at what hikes to include on the schedule.

  • Emory & Henry was a good location in that it is centrally located to a lot of the A.T.
  • It was less good in that it was not really close to any hikes.
  • We initially started with a 50 mile radius around the campus as our area of consideration for hikes. We extended a little farther south on the A.T. to include Laurel Fork Falls, which we thought would be popular (correctly). We also extended the A.T. sections that we were offering a little farther north to include more A.T. sections that were not included in the 2005 Johnson City program.
  • We ended up cancelling the hike on the farthest north section because only one person registered for this hike.
  • hikes program included 190 miles of the A.T.
  • Nobackpack trips for the following reasons. The longest section between road crossings was 15.8 miles, which could be done in a long day. Most people come to A.T. conference for more than hiking. They want to attend the evening programs and interact with other hikers at dinner and around campus. It is difficult to find hike leaders for backpacks. There were a few comments from people who would have liked to have had a backpack opportunity.
  • Included some “in & out” hikes on the A.T.
  • others that were part A.T. and part side trail to give opportunities for shorter hikes on the A.T. than were available in A.T. sections and/or avoided long shuttles and key exchanges.
  • For non-A.T. hikes, we limited these to nature/history hikes, hikes with a special feature (such as a waterfall, good viewpoint, lake, etc.)
  • We paired down our initial list to 65 hikes, which were offered 1 to 6 times each.
  • 18 different nature/history hikes
  • 28 were A.T. section hikes. In a couple of cases we had 2 moderate sections and also combined them into one strenuous section.
  • We thought (incorrectly) that the A.T. sections south of the High Country would be about equally popular with the A.T. sections north of the High County. It turned out that the A.T. section hikes to south were more popular than the A.T. section hikes to the north. We are not sure why – it could be because they were simply first on the list of hikes.
  • 2 wineries close to the A.T. and Virginia Creeper Trail. So we included hikes with wine tasting at the end. These were very popular.
  • We scheduled at least 2 hikes every day that were suitable for families with young children. Several of these included a water feature, such as a falls or a lake where they could swim after the hike.

The only real problem that we had with difficulty level was the easy hikes. We had quite a few complaints that the easy hikes were too difficult to be called easy. The problem areas were steep rock steps (difficult for older folks especially those with knee problems) and short segments of steep grades even it overall there was not much elevation gain. This is a fairly major problem that future conferences need to deal with. Possibly there should be two easy categories -- one without steep rock steps and short segments of steep grades.

We ended up with 160 hikes on the program. (5 of these were added after registration started because of the demand for specific hikes). On Saturday thru Wednesday, there were 25 to 27 hikes each day. On Thursday, we originally had less hikes (17) because the number of people that hiked on Thursday in Vermont was much lower than other days. However, Thursday hikes filled up quickly after registration started and we added two additional hikes. On Friday there were 9 hikes, which seemed to be about the right number. The longest hike on Friday was 11.8 miles and that hike only had one person plus the leader that actually went on the hike. 19 of the total hikes were key exchange hikes that needed 2 hike leader/co-leader pairs.

I used an excel database to track the data for every hike. This allowed me to sort the data in different ways to prepare the various reports needed.

We limited group size on all hikes. Hikes in federally designated Wilderness were limited to 8 participants (maximum group size of 10 including the leader and co-leader). Nature/History hikes were limited to 12 because it is hard to hear the information that is being shared with a larger group. Some hikes had a limited size based on parking space at trailheads. Those hikes not limited by these factors above were limited to 18 for shuttle hikes (convenient number for organizing carpools for the shuttle) and 20 for loop or “in & out” hikes.

We had hike departure times of 7:30, 8:00, 8:30, and 9:00 AM and 1:00 PM. We asked hike leaders to be at the hike departure area 30 minutes before the hike. 7:30 AM is the earliest time that you can start the hike and give time for folks to have breakfast. A few people on the longest hikes suggested that they would like to start earlier and handle their own breakfast. This is something to consider for future conferences. We suggest that you do not have more than 10 hikes and excursions leaving at the same time. We had 13 at 8:00 on Saturday morning and it was too much chaos. Some past conferences had some 10 AM start times, but we thought people would rather start earlier rather than later in Virginia’s hot, humid weather.

We did not cancel any hikes until the June 15 cutoff date for hikes pre-registration. At that time, we cancelled 3 hikes that had only one person registered for each. The hikes chair e-mailed/phoned the 3 people affected telling them they needed to choose a different hike. In one case where we could not reach the person, we put a note in their registration package. We also cancelled one hike on the morning of the hike when the 3 people registered had all cancelled the day before. All other hikes when out as scheduled.

The following table shows a summary of the hikes program as it was planned and what actually occurred. The hikes listed under “A.T. Sections” include only point to point A.T. Section Hikes. The hikes listed under “Other” include hikes that are part A.T. and part side trail, in & out hikes on the A.T., and hikes entirely on other trails.

Capacity / # Registered
June 15 / # Actual
Hikers
Saturday / Easy – Other / 104 / 77 / 80
Moderate – A.T. Sections / 78 / 52 / 50
Moderate – Other / 82 / 58 / 62
Strenuous – A.T. Sections / 102 / 88 / 93
Strenuous – Other / 48 / 14 / 10
Total Saturday / 414 / 289 / 295
Sunday / Easy – Other / 72 / 69 / 70
Moderate – A.T. Sections / 90 / 60 / 56
Moderate – Other / 148 / 104 / 79
Strenuous – A.T. Sections / 112 / 43 / 46
Strenuous – Other / 36 / 18 / 18
Total Sunday / 458 / 294 / 269
Monday / Easy – A.T. Sections / 18 / 17 / 10
Easy – Other / 84 / 73 / 70
Moderate – A.T. Sections / 96 / 80 / 73
Moderate – Other / 50 / 49 / 46
Strenuous – A.T. Sections / 60 / 48 / 46
Strenuous – Other / 56 / 32 / 32
Total Monday / 400 / 299 / 277
Tuesday / Easy – Other / 120 / 102 / 86
Moderate – A.T. Sections / 90 / 59 / 70
Moderate – Other / 112 / 85 / 75
Strenuous – A.T. Sections / 82 / 56 / 62
Strenuous – Other / 8 / 8 / 8
Total Tuesday / 446 / 324 / 306
Wednesday / Easy – A.T. Sections / 18 / 12 / 6
Easy – Other / 112 / 100 / 83
Moderate – A.T. Sections / 44 / 41 / 41
Moderate – Other / 166 / 128 / 132
Strenuous – A.T. Sections / 76 / 47 / 41
Strenuous – Other / 28 / 10 / 11
Total Wednesday / 436 / 338 / 314
Capacity / # Registered
June 15 / # Actual
Hikers
Thursday / Easy – Other / 62 / 62 / 56
Moderate – A.T. Sections / 62 / 39 / 62
Moderate – Other / 50 / 48 / 40
Strenuous – A.T. Sections / 84 / 79 / 65
Strenuous – Other / 28 / 19 / 16
Total Thursday / 286 / 246 / 239
Friday / Moderate – A.T. Sections / 90 / 76 / 76
Moderate – Other / 38 / 33 / 20
Strenuous – A.T. Sections / 26 / 25 / 12
Total Friday / 154 / 134 / 78

We did not have enough easy hikes, especially on Sunday and Monday.

The hikes that filled up first during registration were the A.T. sections that were 5 to 7 miles with less than 1000 feet of elevation gain.

Strenuous hikes other than A.T. Sections were not popular with hikers except for hikes to Mt. Rogers Summit and a loop hike in the High Country. We had several strenuous loop hikes that included part A.T. and part other trails like the Iron Mtn Trail and Virginia Creeper Trail. Very few people signed up for these hikes.

One of the things that we emphasized with hike leaders was to evaluate the people before leaving on the hike to try to make sure that everyone was physically capable of the completing the hike that they were registered for. While we had a few people that were much slower than the rest of the group, we did not have any serious problems with people attempting hikes above their ability, except on easy hikes.

We had great weather on Saturday and Sunday and then afternoon thunderstorms during the rest of the week. No hikes were cancelled because of weather, but some hikes got wet in the afternoon. A few hikes that were planned to go to the top on Mt. Rogers decided not to go to the summit because of thunderstorm activity.

Hike Table Organization – We decided to organize the table of hikes geographically. Both A.T. Sections Hikes and other hikes were included in each geographical section. (Sections were Tennessee, Virginia from Damascus to the Mt. Rogers High County, Mt. Rogers High Country, etc.) Because of the size limitations of a sheet of paper, the number of columns in that table needs to be limited.

The term “hike number” can be confusing in the context of hike planning for the conference. For the purposes for this report, “hike number” is the number of a unique hike that is offered several times during the week. “Departure number” is the number of the hike on a specific day and time. Departure numbers are a combination of the day offered and the hike number. For example, departure number H315 is Hike 15 on Sunday, July 3.

The table needs to have one column for hike number and one for hike title and description. There must be 7 columns (one for each day of the week) to show the departure numbers and times in the days of week when the hike is offered. There is space left for four additional columns. We decided to show type of hike (shuttle, key exchange, etc.) combined with a designation to show family hikes and nature/history hikes in one column. The other 3 columns showed miles, elevation gain, and driving distance. The other data that we thought some people would want was estimated total time for the hike and group size limit. Since there was not more room for more columns, these were included with the hike description.

We included departure time along with departure number in the columns showing the days of the hikes. They did not do this in Vermont in 2009 and we thought that caused an unnecessary amount of confusion at the Hikes Desk at the conference.

Timeline for Finalizing Hikes Schedule – We had a rough draft list of hikes completed prior to February 2010 when we started recruiting hike leaders. The schedule was finalized in August 2010, which was the original due date that the Steering Committee had set for having everything ready for the registration system contractor. It turned out that we did not need to have the schedule finalized until October 2010.

We prepared two slightly different hike schedules – one for the website and one for the conference registration mailing sent out by ATC. The website version had a larger font size and longer hikes descriptions. Because of space limitations, we decreased font size and the detail of the description of the hikes for the registration supplement that was mailed to ATC members.

Volunteer Recruitment – Recruiting volunteers was by the far our most time consuming task. I spend about 700 – 800 hours recruiting and communicating with volunteers over a 1½ year period. I strongly recommend that you have one person (other than the Hikes Chair) dedicated to recruiting and coordinating volunteers. We had 160 volunteers by conference time and keeping this organized so there is as little confusion as possible is a big task.

We started recruiting volunteers for hikes in February of 2010. The main reason that we started so early was that we expected and large portion of the hike leaders to come from the Natural Bridge Club and we wanted to give hike leaders plenty of time to scout their hikes before the conference. (Most NBATC members live about 200 miles away from the Conference location.) We kicked off volunteer recruitment at our Club dinner meeting in February with a table set up at the meeting where folks could look at maps and sign up to lead hikes.

Volunteers came almost completely thru personal contact with potential volunteers. We sent pleas to various newsletters and mailing lists, but very few of the volunteers came from these sources. About 40% of the volunteer hours worked at the conference came from NBATC members; 25% from other SW Virginia Clubs; 15% from local folks not affiliated with the SW Virginia Clubs (including Tennessee Eastman & other hiking clubs in Tennessee, Forest Service, local teachers, etc.); and 20% from A.T. Clubs from other regions.

Almost all volunteer recruitment and contact was done via e-mail. Every time someone volunteered, I asked if they knew anyone else that might volunteer and I contacted the people that they suggested. It often takes 2 or 3 e-mails to a potential volunteer before they respond, but persistence pays off. Some local people were not willing to commit far in advance and I put them on a list to contact later. These repeat contacts often resulted in a volunteer committing to help. A few of the volunteers came from the ATC volunteer system.

I tried to reply to all contacts from potential volunteers within 24 hours. When someone committed to lead hikes or work at the hikes desk, I replied with an e-mail showing the specific hikes or shifts that were assigned to the volunteer. This e-mail also included information about the conference and registration. The information sent with this initial contact changed over time – as we got closer to the conference, more information was available that the volunteer need to know. For hike leaders and co-leaders this e-mail also included an attachment of “Hike Leader Responsibilities”. I sent this attachment in “pdf” format since most people have Adobe Reader or other software that can open “pdf” attachments. There are a few people that had trouble with the attachment and these had to be sent on the mail.

It is very important to have a system in place to track volunteer data for the entire conference very early in the conference planning. Many volunteers work in more than one area. For example, people helping with registration on Friday and Saturday often lead hikes later in the week. When we started volunteer recruitment, each committee kept track of their own volunteers. We did not get a conference wide system in place until about 2 months before the conference and this resulted in a lot of extra work to convert volunteer data from one format to another. Names of hike leaders and co-leader were included in the excel database with the data for each hike. This allowed us to sort hike data by leader or co-leader. We used another excel database to track volunteer info such as e-mail address, phone number, t-shirt size, etc.

Hike Leader and Co-leader Volunteers – Our objective for the hikes program was to have a Hike Leader and Co-Leader for every hike. When a hike leader volunteered, I asked if they could find their own co-leader. If they did not think that they could find their own co-leader, I matched them up with someone else. In our local Club hiking program, we do not have co-leaders but the conference situation is different – you are hiking with people that you do not know and they are often less experienced or less fit hikers than we usually see on local Club hikes at home. When I was recruiting leaders, I thought that having a co-leader on long, strenuous hikes was most important, but the easy hikes were where we had the most problems and a co-leader was needed to stay back and help a weak hiker.

It is much easier to find hike leaders and co-leaders for long strenuous hikes. Most people that volunteer to lead hikes are strong hikers and want to do strenuous hikes. But many of the people attending the conference want easy to moderate hikes. The best leaders are needed on the easy hikes because this is where the weakest hikers will be. It takes quite a bit of persuasion to get volunteers for the easy hikes.

We planned some hikes as “key exchanges” because of the long driving times between two trailheads. These hikes were assigned two hike leaders and co-leaders each.