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tedsti
07-26-2005, 09:06 AM
This trail is a lot of fun. They certainly don't miss any opportunities to take you up a hill. The trail is primarily sandy with some big rocks. I definitely could have used a little more tread on the tires for some of the climbs. Almost every intersection (there are lots of them) has signs with the trail name. There is plenty of trail to keep you busy for a weekend. We only saw 5 other bikers the whole weekend.

They also have a great shelter at the east trailhead. There are real bathrooms, covered picnic tables, the works!

There is a ton of camping just south of the trail in Hatfield, probably 400+ sites between 4 campgrounds. The only problem is that sites are small and they really pack them in. The whole campground was like a parking lot. The best of them was East Arbutus which still wasn't great. There is a big ATV trail near town, so everything pretty much revolves around that. When we pulled in at ~8pm on Friday there was only about 6 open sites between all the campgrounds. All the campgrounds in Hatfield are on Lake Arbutus and have beaches, however the lake is nasty brown!! When I go back, I will probably investigate other camping locations.

bigwheel
07-26-2005, 09:43 AM
All the campgrounds in Hatfield are on Lake Arbutus and have beaches, however the lake is nasty brown!!

I don't know the specifics, but the brown color MAY be natural, from the feeder streams running through certain types of swamp.

For example, Big Sandy Lake is brown, but that is because most of the feeder areas go through tamarac swamps. Where I grew up, we had similar conditions because of cedar swamps.

tedsti
07-26-2005, 10:27 AM
I wouldn't have thought as much about it except the campground descriptions all talked up the lake and beach.

I don't know the specifics, but the brown color MAY be natural, from the feeder streams running through certain types of swamp.

For example, Big Sandy Lake is brown, but that is because most of the feeder areas go through tamarac swamps. Where I grew up, we had similar conditions because of cedar swamps.