Tread Lightly
Tread Lightly
Tread Lightly! – Bald Mountain Jeep Trail with VA4wdA (2026)
Even though I have been on tour for the past few months for my day job, there are certain events I am taking time off for. This is one of them. The annual Bald Mountain Jeep Trail cleanup project with the Virginia Four-Wheel-Drive Association has been one of my favorite events of the year. Going […]
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Tread Lightly
Tank Hollow Revisited – Again – For the 3rd time
They say, “the third time’s the charm.” The first time in 2022 a larger group of volunteers under the leadership of Scott Ammerman (then the local Regional Coordinator for Tread Lightly!) put a big dent in the pile of trash that had been dumped over the hillside off Tank Hollow Road. The second time, earlier […]
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Tread Lightly
Tread Lightly! – Spruce Knob Lake (AXFest ’25)
For the last three years the team at Mountain State Overland has worked in conjunction with Tread Lightly! to do a service project in Monongahela National Forest prior to their annual Adventure X Fest event. Since 2023 AXFest has been held at the Experience Learning outdoor education facility on the backside of Spruce Knob along […]
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Event Report
Tread Lightly
Behind Enemy Lines – Destination Defender, NY
It’s no secret that I am, was, and shall always be a “Jeep Guy.” As outlined in Season 2, Episode 2 of the Echoes of Adventure podcast, the LS LJ is my 8th Jeep. Since then I’ve added the ’06 LJ “stock+” build, which is the 10th Jeep I’ve owned (so far). In the family […]
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Three projects in one week: A tail of Collaboration, Cooperation, & Compromise
As a former student of linguistics, and someone who reads as much as he writes, alliteration has always been one of my favorite literary tropes. Alliteration is when the first letter of each word in a sentence or phrase is the same. So in the case of this article’s subtitle, “Collaboration, Cooperation, and Compromise” is […]
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Tread Lightly! – Pinnacle Creek with USF&W
While first in chronological order, the Pinnacle Creek project was the last one added to my list. This was a project I only had cursory knowledge of having been put in motion a few years ago. I heard it was finally happening during the West Virginia Motorsports and Adventure Travel Day event at the West […]
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Tread Lightly
Tread Lightly! – Tank Hollow (Revisited)
My buddy Walt was approached to take point on a return to Tank Hollow Road in George Washington and Jefferson National Forest outside Natural Bridge Station in Virginia. This was a project site I had visited back in late 2022 with a very hardworking team of volunteers. On that project we not only picked up […]
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Tread Lightly
Tread Lightly! – Bald Mountain Jeep Trail with VA4WDA
Every year around Earth Day the Virginia Four-Wheel-Drive Association hosts a project day on the Bald Mountain Jeep Trail. I first attended this project back in 2017 with John of New Horizons Overland. We did our typical “work hard; play hard” thing by incorporating a multi-day trip called “The Shadow of the Parkway” I had […]
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Opinion/Educational/Humor
Tread Lightly
Why I volunteered with the Foundation at Expo East this year
For the second time in just as many years I did not teach a single class at Overland Expo East (go ahead and gasp). Last year didn’t leave me with much choice. For those that don’t know, on the first weekend of 2023 I was hit by a car leaving me on the sidelines for […]
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Tread Lightly
West Virginia Tread Lightly! Day 2024
284 volunteers doing 1,136 hours of work, collected a total of 19,820 pounds of trash during the the West Virginia Tread Lightly! Day for 2024. Needless to say this year surpassed all expectations. Absolutely blown away by the volume of trash and tires that was pulled out of the woods. The night before the cleanup […]
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Event Report
Tread Lightly
2024 Adventure X Fest Tread Lightly! Project
When the fall air rolls in and the leaves just start to fall it’s time for me to get excited. I get excited for a few reasons. First, let’s be honest, I am not built for summer. Second, fall is east coast event season. Adventure X Fest in West Virginia is the first event of […]
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Tread Lightly
Earth Day on Bald Mountain with VA4WDA and Tread Lightly!
I moved a lot growing up. However, despite living in more than five states (some of them more than once) there have only ever been three states that have felt like “home.” The first is obviously where I was born: Massachusetts. Second up is Pennsylvania which is where I spent most of my childhood and […]
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Event Report
Tread Lightly
Spring Cleaning at AOAA with TREAD Lightly!
I’m to the point now where I’m less concerned with my own self-promotion and more interested in paying it forward. Some of that is due to the wisdom that comes with age. Now that I’m in my mid-40’s I just don’t see the point in playing the social-media game and trying to “keep up with […]
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Monongahela National Forest Tread Lightly! Cleanup
The first time I visited Monongahela National Forest was as a teenager riding in the back of a Chevy Caprice station wagon. I was down in the Spruce Knob & Seneca Rocks National Recreation Area as part of a summer camp adventure trip that would include two days of rock climbing at Seneca Rocks and […]
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Event Report
Tread Lightly
Bald Mountain Tread Lightly! Cleanup
Not going to lie. 2023 got off to a rough start. For those that don’t know I was the victim of a hit-and-run accident as a pedestrian in early January and have spent the better part of four months recovering from surgery. I was super bummed to miss out on a bunch of events earlier […]
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Event Report
Tread Lightly
Tank Hollow Tread Lightly Cleanup
Early December may not be prime weather for many outdoor activities but never the less a small team of volunteers headed down to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia to spend some time cleaning up some illegally dumped trash. In an ideal world there would be no illegal dumping, however generational bad habits plus a […]
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Trip Report
Trip Report: Shadow of Skyline + VA4wdA Earth Day Trail Maintenance Day.
A few weeks ago I received two things that when combined turned out to be one epic adventure. The first was a route called the “Shadow of Skyline.” It was developed by Greg (aka @greghenle) and he was excited to share it with me and get my thoughts on it. The second was an invite […]
Read MoreOpinion/Educational/Humor
Overland 101
Tread Lightly
Environmental Stewardship and the Overlander – A look at conservation, preservation, and responsible land use
There are a lot of misconceptions out there when the topic of the environment comes up. Discussions usually degenerate into an “us” (the 4×4 community at large) verses “them” (those tree hugger types) argument. The use, misuse, and abuse of public lands ruffles feathers on both sides. I’m not here to get preachy. To be […]
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