September Meeting Moved to Community Room
Our monthly meeting will be in the Community Room behind the Public Library in Foresthill. As always, the meeting begins at 6pm and ends at approximately 7:30.

Mumford Bar
We had a mixed-use group make the trip down to the Mumford Bar Cabin and climb the twenty-two switch-backs back up on August 17th. Russ and Diane Melanson, Lynette Baird and Sherri Osborn ran, Sue Hodge and Tim walked, and Larry and Lore Clarke rode their horses. We passed each other on the trail, but the mosquitos at the cabin made it hard to stick around and socialize. The trail is in great shape, except for the washout about 1 mile from the start. Mark Lambert from the Forest Service will be attending our meeting on 9/10 to help us organize the repair effort. We will try to get the repair done in October.

Picayune Valley Outing
At the meeting we will also be planning a trip to French Meadows and hike into the Picayune Valley to see the petroglyphs and fall color in October. The hike is not as steep as most of the canyon trails and is one of the most highly recommended places to go.

Mosquito Ridge Trail
Brian Diebold was unable to guide us on a tour to his mine, due to a death in his family. We forged ahead by ourselves and had a great trip on the Mosquito Ridge Trail down to the Middle Fork of the American. This is rumored to be a good place to go fishing in the spring. The trail is gradual switchbacks on a fairly steep sidehill and is a little bit slippery due to shale and leaves. It doesn't appear to get a lot of use. The trail that branches to the right going down leads to the ruins of the bridge. Going to the left leads to a nice camp site and we had fun looking for gold in the river which is low and temperate this time of year. We never did find any mines. It's a hefty hike back up to the top, but the kids are seasoned hikers by now and did just great.

It turns out that Brian has mining claims on the Middle Fork and the North Fork of the Middle Fork. He had been intending for us to go to the North Fork of the Middle Fork which is a much shorter trail. Brian promised us another tour after mining season ends in October. He also said he would be interested in bringing some of his local maps dating back to the 1800's and showing many old trails that do not appear on current maps to share with us at one of our meetings.

Youth Outings
Summer is over, but the kids went on some really fun trail outings. Here is a couple of pictures.

Board Elections Coming Up
We're going to have elections for the Board in November. Please consider serving on the board. We aren't a hierarchial group and being a board member isn't a lot of extra work, but it benefits all of us when new people contribute their energy and ideas by serving in a leadership role for a year or so. If you are willing to give it a try, please tell one of the current board members (Sherri Osborn, Stephanie Williams, Sue Hodge or Mike Winslow.)

Foresthill Trails Alliance                      PO Box 468, Foresthill, CA 95631

http://foothill.net/fta/                        email: fta@foothill.net