A beautiful day here. Finn and I went out with our friends Paul and Calder Stewart to steward some trails on Mount Gardner. We were working on Hand Logger's Trail which runs from the top of a cul-de-sac of West Side Road over to where a trail ascends from the end of Windjammer Road in Bluewater. Hand Logger's Trail is part of a trail network that encircles the mountain at around the 400 metre level, meaning that it is relatively level for most of the way. We were out today clearing some branches that had fallen during the winter, moving around some bucked up timber and working on a couple of really wet spots that benefited from having the water channelled to avoid it pooling on the trail. We built a small new section of trail around a persistent swamp and started to clear a new trail beside a significant creek that flows on the west side of the mountain past the old mine shafts.

Calder and Paul have been stewarding the trails around there for the past few years. It's a quiet job they do, largely out of the sight and knowledge of most anyone who uses those trails, but you can really see their work on sections of the path that seem welcoming, or especially aesthetically lovely. We're not slashing and burning roads up there, but rather working in concert with the land itself to build very natural places where flow wants to go, whether that is the flow of water or the flow of feet and bike wheels.

It's just a gorgeous way to spend a Sunday.

On the way home as dusk was falling, the spring air rang out with the referee whistles of Varied Thrushes calling to one another. Spring is truly here.