I spent a good part of the day at Perry Lake behind this bad boy:

A “DR All-Terrain Mower” borrowed from the Corps of Engineers.  The goal was to reclaim part of Section 1 on both sides of 66th Street that had become overgrown during the summer.  I made at least two passes over about 2 miles of trail or more than 4 linear miles total.  Much of this part of the trail was in open areas and thick with lespedeza – yet another non-native invasive species that seems to thrive everywhere.  The guy I was assisting did the tree pruning and re-blazing.

There is actually a 5-6 foot wide path now, though it won’t stay that way for long.  Areas like this require a lot of attention but there are 29 miles of trail here and too few people to do the work.Afterward, we were off to Golden Pizza in the town of Perry for one of their yummy combo pizzas and a caffeine fix.