Guides Gone Wild

Just Start Showing Up: Paula Burton, NEMBA's Trail Blazing Trail Builder

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Back in July, I posted my episode with Nicole Freedman, the executive Director of NEMBA, and she was the one who introduced me to Paula Burton, a long-time mountain biker, NEMBA CT chapter founder, and instructor for NEMBA Trail School.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a chance to meet Paula in person at the trail school I attended back in June, but we did connect over Zoom for an article I was writing for the NEMBA Single Tracks newsletter.

We hadn’t been talking for long before I realized that Paula was just the kind of guest I love, love, LOVE to have on this podcast - a real person doing really integral work that is constantly improving the outdoor experience for newbies and weekend warriors like me!

Paula’s been riding since before mountain biking was really a “thing”, and she’s got tons of stories to share that serve to highlight how far we’ve come in outdoor representation in the last 30+ years…. but also how not everything has changed quite so much.

Enjoy this special Friday Funday Feature!

NEMBA (New England Mountain Bike Association) - https://nemba.org/

IMBA (International Mountain Biking Association) - https://www.imba.com/

And a few more fun links:

Building your Biking Bucket List? Paula’s recs:

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Jen:

Welcome to the Guides Gone Wild podcast. What is Guides Gone Wild, you ask? This is where you'll fill your ears and minds with the stories of everyday, extraordinary women who will inspire you to take your outdoor adventure game to the next level. Whether you're starting your journey from the couch or the trailhead, this is the place for you. So let's get a little wild. Let's get a little wild.

Jen:

Welcome to Guides Gone Wild. This is Jen, interrupting my usual lack of episodes these days to drop in a little Friday fun day feature. Back in July I posted my episode with Nicole Friedman, the executive director of NEMBA, who introduced me to Paula Burton, a longtime mountain biker. Nemba Connecticut chapter founder and instructor for NEMBA, connecticut chapter. Founder and instructor for NEMBA Trail School.

Jen:

I didn't get a chance to meet Paula in person at the trail school I attended back in June, but we did connect over Zoom for a profile article I was writing about trail school for the NEMBA Singletracks newsletter. We hadn't been talking for long before I realized that Paula was just the kind of guest I love, love, love to have on this podcast A real person doing really integral work that is constantly improving the outdoor experiences for newbies and weekend warriors like myself. Paula's been riding since before mountain biking was really a thing in quotation marks and she's got tons of stories to share that serve to highlight how far we've come in outdoor representation in the last 30 plus years, but also how not everything has changed quite so much. Anyway, I'm going to let you listen in and come to your own conclusions. Apologies for my less than ideal audio.

Jen:

I wasn't planning to air this so I hadn't futzed around with my settings before I push record, but you should have no problem enjoying it all. Let's bunny hop right into it, with Paula Burton, I'm thinking, who suggested this first. So I interviewed Nicole Freeman a couple weeks ago for a little podcast that I do, and she was like, oh you should, maybe, if you want to get more involved in Numba, maybe you can start contributing to single tracks. So she put me in touch with Chris and I had also talked about the fact that I wanted to do trail school at the end of the month, and so I signed up for that and I think maybe you were originally on tap for that I was originally, and then, well, there was a whole.

Paula Burton:

you know how these things happen, but anyway I had a conflict I couldn't get out of for that weekend. So I can't do trail school this year, but I've done it. I don't know four or five, maybe more than that. So yeah, I don't know off for quite a while.

Jen:

Yeah, well, and I think one of the reasons maybe she suggested I talk to you cause, like when we we were talking, I shared the story of like I had just gone to a trail like volunteer day up in Maine, um, near this property that we own, and it was just a very interesting experience because very well-meaning, great group of people um, you know, it was a pretty big group. There was only one other female, we weren't on the same team and I wound up like in the woods with these guys I'd never met before. All of them were beginners too, but it was just a very interesting experience because, like they're all like shooting the shit about all the trails they've gone, all the places they've gone to ride and whatever, and I'm just like sitting there with my you know thing raking out culverts, and like it was just like what is this? Um, and you know whatever, I'm j Gen X, so I'm used to being treated like that.

Jen:

But it just struck me as interesting that like I don't know as far as we've come, it's just a weird it's still a weird scenario when you're just like the only girl in the room, which I think I'm imagining at a lot of trail events. I don't think this was a unique experience, I guess, is my point. So I was like it would be interesting to just I don't know, I'm like I would like to kind of explore that a little bit. So what I'd like to talk to you about for this kind of article interview type thing I want to write up for that it's just also about like how you even got started in the first place, cause I'm not sure have you ever written, have you ever presented that to this whole group as a whole?

Paula Burton:

I you know I might have mentioned it to people. But yeah, I can explain.

Jen:

Yeah so let's start at the beginning. So I guess. Okay, you know, I mean mountain biking has been around for a long time, but it's definitely been growing lately. You know more women have been getting into it. But, like I don't know, when did you get into it and why? Um, or are you not even into?

Paula Burton:

it? Oh no, I'm definitely I, actually I, I, I'm big into mountain biking. I work as a guide at Thunder Mountain. I have been leading the trail schools. I lead rides. I started a chapter it was Tonic Valley chapter in Connecticut. I've been on the NEMBA executive board for a number of years, although I stepped back from that this year. So the mountain biking I had a. Well, I've always been a bicyclist. You know, from time I was like five years old there's all these pictures of me on these, like you know, kids bikes and then when I was a teenager, my brother got seriously into sort of road riding and I, you know, I would follow him around and he would fix the bikes and I always had a bike with me wherever I went in college and so forth. And this is I'm. I'm 65, so there really wasn't anything called mountain biking in those days.

Jen:

And I'm not that far behind you and, honestly, I can remember most of my biking days.

Paula Burton:

It's kind of the same, so yeah yeah, you know, when we were kids, we would just, you know, like ride around the woods. We didn't call it mountain biking, but that's the precursor to it. And then I, I would say, in the early nineties, I had a friend who said, oh, let's go mountain biking. And I'm like, oh, I don't have the right bike, blah, blah, blah, blah. And she arranged for me to sort of get a bike where you pay a little bit each month. So I had a mountain bike and we would go out and ride in Trumbull, connecticut, which is like the most technical place on earth. I don't know if you've ever heard of it?

Jen:

No, but I know that there's a big swath in the middle that's super rocky, so I can imagine that. Oh yeah.

Paula Burton:

Yeah, and I was off the bike more than on, and we would ride in the stream and we would cut, we would do everything like now we tell people not to. But yeah, we grew up, you know. Okay, so we grew up, the sport grew up.

Jen:

You were leaving nothing but traces.

Paula Burton:

Right, right, right, exactly, and the and the trail part of it. I, yeah, or, I don't hike so much anymore, but I was a huge hiker. I've done all my 4,000 footers. I'm still very involved with Appalachian Mountain Club. I help run a hiking camp that goes out west every year and when I was, I was also very involved with Appalachian Mountain Club in the 90s. I was, you know, like, on the direct board of directors and I was a chapter president and all that.

Paula Burton:

So I, when I was doing all that hiking and we do have a section of the Appalachian trail in Connecticut I'm like you know what the coolest people are, the ones actually building the trail and I want to get myself involved with that. So I, you know, I just started showing up and and they have different workshops so I would learn different things. I learned a lot just from being there. But I remember I don't want to name any names here, but the way you were talking about being a little isolated we were going out to scout out a new section of the, of the trail we won't say which one here and I was told to sit on a rock and eat my lunch. My lunch, no, I want to see what you guys are doing. How are you, how are you laying out the trail? Because, see, design, trail design is my thing and I just said, well, I'll just eat my lunch while I'm following them.

Paula Burton:

And I listened very closely to what they were saying and you know, I asked a lot of questions. I probably was kind of annoying, but you know I learned, and that was with some very, very good trail designers. So, you know, then I kind of got my thing out and then, you know, like I said, I started to mountain bike and I found out about NEMBA In Connecticut. We were only one chapter at the time. That was in the early 2000s, and I told the president of the chapter at that time we need to do trail work because you know, I'd been doing it with Appalachian Mountain Club. I had tools, I knew how to run the chainsaw. You know I've done all that stuff by that time and he was just like he was okay with it, but he wasn't sure why I was so confident about it. I'm just like, well, I'm just doing it.

Jen:

So, actually, building trails at that point, or was it just kind of like everybody was kind of like banditing? And then it would get established, if it was fun or whatever.

Paula Burton:

A little bit of that, but we were really. We were building trails fun or whatever A little bit of that, but we were really. We were building trails. We had permission to build it and I was good at getting permission. I'm very good at convincing land managers to let us go in and build trails.

Paula Burton:

And then IMBA had a traveling educational crew that would come to your house in your area in their station wagon filled with tools and they would help train the people and yourself. And I hosted them twice, Jen and Chris, and it was amazing. It just blew my mind. I was like, oh my gosh, all these things that I, all these questions I had when I was working with the AT guys, like all of a sudden it made sense. You know the way they were explaining it and you know why. You know what causes erosion and how to build things sustainably, how to make it good for multi-use, and you know, by that time I was mountain biking quite a bit more. I'm like this is it? This is really what I want to do. So, yeah, so then you know, eventually I got more involved with the trail building and trail schools, sort of at the club-wide level, got invited to a couple of those and Phil Kyes, our you know former director.

Paula Burton:

He really encouraged me to take on more of a leadership role and start teaching people. I am by vocation I was a teacher for 30 years so I have that skill that I can break things down and communicate what needs to happen and also to manage groups, because you can have a lot of people kind of standing around with a lot of opinions. You know these trip yes, yeah, it's that opinion thing and a lot of people don't know anything. I mean. I mean maybe they know something or they know a little bit, or they've heard something, and that's great and I'm glad, but it doesn't mean somebody else who's had more experience doesn't know a little better, right?

Jen:

So for somebody who's actually observing is like, well, maybe you can put the rock there or maybe we should just create an area that the water goes away from the trail. Yeah, yeah, no, it's, it's. It's an interesting dynamic. Um, and it's fascinating to me that you started out, like with hiking, trail building. Like it's funny because you know you joke around here like, did anyone build a trail? That what you know it's like okay, what's the shortest distance between here and there? Let's put the trail right there. You know, sometimes when you're hiking, that's the way it seems, which obviously you can't do on a bike. So how, um, as you started learning about, you know, as as I'm sure, the trail, the 818 amc trail, people started to try to probably remediate some of the early trail that was like built in a riverbed or whatever stream bed.

Jen:

What are kind of the fundamentals that cross over, you know, when the Venn diagram crosses of trails for hiking and trails for biking? What are the, what are the constants and then what are maybe different from one to the other?

Paula Burton:

I would say they're very similar trail corridors, as far as you know. We're going to brush it out, you know, four feet wide and eight to 12 feet high. If you have horses it's got to be a little higher. And also treadway hardening. We do it a little differently, like if we, if we have to do a boardwalk, we tend to make a ramp or or use rocks. The hikers will have perhaps a step up. That's not as easy to negotiate it, you know. So there's some subtleties there.

Paula Burton:

Rock work I learned a ton of rock work in AMC. One thing that we could really probably do more of from them is use bigger rocks, bury them further in the ground, and in fact EMBO always emphasized that you got to have the big rocks. I find mountain bikers want to use something like this size and they'll just frost even a year or two and then you'll be back to having a whatever's going on there and actually as trails as a whole, because I'm actually involved with the Connecticut Greenways Council, so we work with a lot of different trail groups and user groups. There's sort of been an evolution in the trail building community as a whole to make it more sustainable. So really looking at those grades and making it so that when you have corners or whatever, you're going to get people to go around the corner and not cut them and that kind of thing. There's a whole bunch of techniques you can do to do that. But I think the hiking community has really picked up on that in the past like five to seven years.

Jen:

Yeah, for sure, yeah, yeah. No, it definitely does, so I guess. So it sounds like trail school. I mean, trail school was kind of something that Inba was doing, it sounds like, and then Inba took and made it a little bit more localized or kind of enhanced it for our area, I would imagine. Right, and do they have it every year?

Paula Burton:

They do try to have it every year. I would say that personally, I just started doing trail schools, like in my area. I had it for my chapter because I have Connecticut chapter, then we have the Fairfield County chapter, then we have Houstonic Valley. I would go and do like two hour presentations to town officials because I was trying to get permission to build. We had some things at local state parks and the club wide one, which is was originally sort of a two day intensive and it usually had camping and a variety of other sort of activities surrounding it, had been going on quite a while.

Paula Burton:

I think I don't remember the first one I went to. It may have been at Highland Mountain. They had one there and they had, oh, pittsfield State Forest. Yeah, that was so. That was actually back in the 2000s, so pretty much every year. I don't think we had one in the COVID year, which was 2020. And then, of course, you know, pk passed and we had all this change up in our in NEMBA directors and all but organized a few for those years 21, 22 and 23 and also taught at them. So the club-wide one generally has three basics. So we'll have a design and assessment, maintenance and then the building aspects, so we circle everybody through all three parts, and then usually the second day would be something more advanced. We split up into groups and maybe one group would do rock work. One group might be building a boardwalk that kind of thing know.

Jen:

On those two day ones, I mean you are really taking people from from nothing raw forest to potentially you know, understanding how to build out at least what you want to.

Paula Burton:

Yeah, and I mean a lot of that too is organizing and safety. You know, like, how are you going to organize your people when you get out on the trail? People are volunteering their time and you don't want them just standing around and you want them to feel they're doing something useful and that their efforts are needed. So having, you know, backup work to do, and then you might have kids or people who can't do a certain activity, you know, maybe their back hurts or something. So you don't want them lifting rocks.

Paula Burton:

So you have to have sort of a variety of levels and, depending on what you're doing, you need to make sure in your leadership that you have the skills you need. So if you have a rock project, you're going to need someone who can lead the rock project. You know, if you have, depending on how many people you have. You know a lot of times we get four or five people and we've been doing working on the kind of the same trail and you know they kind of know what to do. But if you're trying to bring in more people or you have sort of a joint day with the local friends group, you will need to have all this sort of figured out in advance to have a successful day and we talk a lot about that in the trail school curriculum. Yeah, that makes sense.

Jen:

Cause I think that's, you know, like anything else, the prep work. The more you prepare, probably the smoother it goes. But it's like not what people want to really think about. When they think about we're going to build a trail, you know, they're like grabbing all their tools and their rigs, they want to cut, cut stuff and move stuff and whatever. And it's like, oh yeah, oh, they're very enthusiastic. Yeah, I always tell them not just you and your buddy like okay, let's think this through, so that's, that's good, it's not a marathon.

Paula Burton:

It's a marathon, not a race. Yeah, not a race. That's what I always tell people. Yeah, exactly. So you know and you know, and it can be a marathon. I mean it can take. I built, designed and built the trails, with help, of course, from people. At George Waldo State Park in Connecticut there's about seven miles of trail, took a couple years. You know we would go. You know we'd have a number of work parties and I'd have various groups. At one time I had a bunch of teenagers who were on some kind of community service not not the good kind of community service, you know. I mean all community service is good, but they had it was. You know, they had to do it. It wasn't their senior project. So that was an interesting group. But you know they did quite a bit and it was good. I enjoyed having them.

Jen:

But yeah, that's where you, being a teacher, probably helped, because everybody all the rest of us adults would have been like oh man, I didn't really talk about the safety thing.

Paula Burton:

So we always have what we call the tool talk, and you know, because tools have a lot of points and they can go in various directions, so we have to carry them a certain way, we need to assign the tools so we get them all back at the end of the day. You know, if we're using saws and we need to give people distance around us when we're digging, if we're using saws and we need to give people distance around us when we're digging, and then the power tools should only be used by people who have, you know, power tools certifications or they've taken a chainsaw course or whatever. So you know, that's an important aspect, I think, of trail school and should be of any workday.

Jen:

Yeah for sure. So and then I guess, like kind of taking that thread further, just from like social safety, like we talked about before, like being the only the only other in the group at a trail day, like are there any? Are there? Is there anything that you do differently now or that you try to encourage people to integrate into their experience, to make it easier to get these folks involved and want to come back? Because obviously I'm sure the reason that NEMBA wanted you involved in the first place is that you know representation matters and seeing somebody who is kind of like you that's actually doing the thing, makes it more likely that you want to do the thing, and so you know what are kind of the things that you started doing, or telling people to do, or encouraging people to do, or thinking would help with that.

Paula Burton:

Well, there's a variety of things, I think you know, as you I always try to have, have sort of an atmosphere from the beginning that we're all working together on this and you know, like I was talking before, you may need to adapt, even for new people just don't know what they're doing, you know. So maybe put some experienced people with the new people and also make it clear what the chain of command is. I mean, I don't want to sound so formal here, but can I tell you a little story? I'll tell you a little story. We won't say, uh, we won't say where this happened, okay, yep, so I was in charge.

Jen:

I'm not saying anything.

Paula Burton:

No, no secret okay I'll just be very general about the specifics, but I was in charge of a work party and we had to build the bridge. Now, I know nothing about carpentry, okay, but I found, uh, a mountain biker who, you know, could frame houses. It was a pretty big bridge. It had 24 foot wide what they call stringer. So that was a big piece of wood. Yeah, no it was like a piece of wood project.

Paula Burton:

Yeah, yeah, no, it was a project. So we had to have people with certain skills, All right. So we, and we got permission to go through the gate with a pickup truck and we had a bunch of people there to bring the wood in. So all that was great, Okay. And, and the carpenter guy was fantastic, he, you know, they're building the bridge. So I had to, you know, make sure all that was being coordinated, blah, blah, blah. And to to put the bridge in, we had to build trail on either sides, you know, for the bikes to come through. So that's what I was.

Paula Burton:

Uh, I had maybe, I don't know five or six guys and myself I think I was the only woman that day and we had built up one side. It had a really nice, smooth rock work. And then we started working on the other side and one guy in the group, new to the group and we'd been very friendly he started saying I'm a landscape architect and these rocks don't belong here. I was just like, okay, I said, well, I tried to review the goal, Okay, so we've got to make it smooth. We're not trying to. You know, landscape the place. We just have to make a entry, a transition onto the wood and a transition off the wood and he kept going on and on and the other guys in the group were great, they go. You know she's the boss.

Jen:

Yeah, seriously, you know she's the boss. Yeah, seriously, she knows what she's doing.

Paula Burton:

And the guy, he never came back. I'm like you know, I don't know. He just stomped off, oh my god. And I mean it was not being at all confrontational, I wasn't saying, oh well, you know, I was the boss, I was just trying to explain what needed to happen. So, but whatever, and the rest of the crew was they. I had asked a lot of them individually to come out that day to do this project. So they were like you know, she's in charge, oh my God. But you know, yeah, that's, that's a little tough. I've also had guys take tools out of my hands, so you out of my hands.

Jen:

So you know, yeah, because I'm too slow, or whatever. You know I'm slow, that's okay, it's okay. My favorite is when they're like nice job.

Paula Burton:

Yeah, yeah, I would be like, you know, a lot of times they were my own personal tools, because I found out, um, yeah, having my own tools, I, I would just I would go out and buy the tools I like. Either I needed a shorter handle I mean, I'm five foot three, so you know or some of the tools were too heavy, or whatever. So I would go out and buy a really nice tool for myself.

Jen:

I'm like that's my own tools. Sorry, yeah, I don't know.

Paula Burton:

I think I'm seeing less and less of that, though, because I think there's been a whole kind of revolution there, and it's hard to break into anything new, whether it's mountain biking or trail work, and you're the only person of that gender or skin color or whatever, and but I think it's changing. You know, I would say this I'm just it may be a little, you know, I kind of think it's my. Some people just do what they want to do, and I'm one of them, and I just keep showing up and I just keep asking questions, and then, pretty soon, people are asking me questions, yeah no, that is very true, that is very true, and you know, and that is that's how things change, so that's good and yeah, I would agree.

Jen:

I would say generally it seems the macro aggressions have become micro aggressions. They're still there, but maybe not quite as blatant, and you know, but sometimes I think that's the harder part to blatant, and you know, but I, but sometimes I think that's the harder part to get through, because you know, you've got a bunch of people who are like I but I'm cool and I'm like so open-minded and I'm so welcoming and it's like, well, but you got a little systemic stuff that you gotta, you gotta work on and we all have to work on, you know, in different ways.

Jen:

So I mean.

Paula Burton:

I think, like the trail work, they kind of like the mountain biking thing. For a long time they thought a lot of women were beginners and I know from the very moment I started mountain biking and getting involved, there are some really kick-ass women riders and it's, it's whatever. You can't assume somebody is something just because that's who you think they are. You know, try to get to know people a little bit. They may have skills that are much needed, you know.

Jen:

Right. Right Applies to, yeah, skills, gender, equipment. I mean, that's my favorite, you know it's like, just because somebody's got an old bike doesn't mean they suck, it just means they're frugal and they've probably been riding longer than you, yeah, probably, yeah, all right, cool. Um, let's see what else have we not covered? Well, I guess, have you noticed any change in the way, um, people are building trails and the types of trails that are being built, like formally, since you've been oh, oh, yes, so much?

Paula Burton:

so, oh my gosh, because I've been, you know, I've been involved with this since the early 2000s. So, um, of course people are still doing a lot of hand-built trails, but, um, I would say one of the first, when they, when I first got involved with it, everybody was like, oh, we got to build the gnarliest, most hardest trail on earth. Well, you know what new england is the gnarliest trail, you know wherever you go. So we really those trails are much needed. But, uh, the whole concept of flow and then also having trails that are accessible to different levels of riders whether it's your family or significant other or a new person or some people just like to ride those kinds of trails. They don't have to ride all the Rocky, rudy, techie stuff all the time, or maybe they want a little bit of both. So, and I know when the Ember group came, so that's in the 2000s, they were really kind of emphasizing that. So you have a stacked loop, you have the harder trails on the outside that are longer, and then inside you make them progressively a little less steep and easier to ride, but still fun. And there's ways to do it to make it fun. And then there was this big controversy about oh, do you do a go around? Well, my, I mean it probably still is a controversy, but I've always told everybody in my trail schools if you can make a go around, make the go around, because otherwise someone else is going to make the go around and then they'll make another go around. So you've got to be in control of where that trail goes and how they're going to use it, as well as give a good experience.

Paula Burton:

And then machine made trails. You know a lot of that stuff up at Kingdom is made with machines and the bike parks made with machines, and that is a huge revolution. People started saying, oh my gosh, I love these kind of trails and you can make them really fun and you can make pump tracks and you can make berms and all kinds of stuff that would take forever to do by hand. I mean you can still make some of that stuff by hand and we're seeing more and more sort of berms. I mean you can still make some of that stuff by hand and we're seeing more and more sort of berms. And in my chapter at Rockhouse Hill, they made a little jump line and they made it by hand and it's very popular. But they've got to keep going in and maintaining it, that kind of thing. They dug a lot of dirt but it's very nice and people enjoy it. So but that kind of trail is really come to the forefront. And now I would say over the past three or four years, adaptive trails, now that can mean anything.

Paula Burton:

Because we were in Rhode Island last year we had an adaptive rider at our trail school and he could just ride. I was just floored what he could ride by. Again, you don't want to make assumptions. He's riding black diamond stuff. But then he would get stuck by some log across the trail that maybe, you know, intermediate rider wouldn't be too bothered by. So we went out and cut that log for him, you know, so the next day he could get through and then then it opened up like a whole nother trail for him.

Paula Burton:

You know he's going up all these rocks and everything. He was like, wow, that was great, thank you. You know so little things like that and really, um, that's the trend now and we're seeing like even in the hiking world they have hiking wheelchairs now and we have all those adaptive bikes and really getting everybody out at different levels. But again, I would say the assumption is not to make that. An adaptive rider needs, you know, this really easy kind of trail. They might need it a little wider, they might need a little bigger rate, turning radius, they might need a little different signage, but that's what I'm seeing now.

Jen:

So yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Even I just got a new bike and the handlebars are much wider than my last one and I'm like how do you ride half of the stuff Like it just feels so well, cut it down. There down there's so many. Yeah, I'm like oh my god, this is. I gotta go back back to my old school mini bike. Um, yeah, I guess, on that same note, e-bikes.

Paula Burton:

Give me your thoughts um, I think e-bikes are becoming more and more integrated, particularly the class one, and they're a lot, you know, people do have. I have some friends who have the ada. If you qualify for that, you can certainly take your e-bike anywhere. But you know, there's different rules and different places and I guess that can be kind of confusing. And then it's confusing to the land managers because there's different classes of e-bikes and the ones with throttles are the ones that can go 30 miles an hour. I don't know, you know.

Jen:

I think that'd be called a bike. I don't think so. If you can go 30 minutes, that's a motorcycle without pedaling, without pedaling.

Paula Burton:

Yeah, yeah, that's that.

Jen:

I think that's a little problematic, um but I can imagine it's going to have a big impact on design right um no, I wouldn't think so.

Paula Burton:

No, yeah, no, I mean, if I've seen those e-bikes do some pretty tough trails. No, I mean, I mean unless some place was specifically for e-bikes do some pretty tough trails. No, I mean, I mean unless some place was specifically for e-bikes. But I don't know that the design would be so much different. You know, unless you're you know, I think you know, like they've in the national park service they're allowing e-bikes on like gravel roads and and things like that and double tracks. They haven't really gotten into the whole single track thing, but but you know e-bikes are there.

Paula Burton:

They're getting integrated. One thing that would be nice to see that we haven't really seen an awful lot We've seen some is more advocacy from e-mountain bikers themselves. You know, I mean, probably at some point I might want to ride an e-bike somewhere. I mean, I have ridden them in places where they've allowed. It wasn't, you know, real enjoyable. I like my lightweight carbon fiber bike because they're heavy, but they're getting lighter and lighter and they're getting more and more maneuverable. So we're going to be seeing them everywhere and some of them you can hardly tell whether they don't make noise and you know these $13,000 ones and they look like a regular mountain bike.

Jen:

So, and you know these, $13,000 ones and they look like a regular mountain bike. So I don't know. Yeah, I heard today that's for sure.

Paula Burton:

All right. Um, I think over the years, I think the mountain bike community for a while, like do we allow? This was like a long time ago. Do we allow free riders in our? You know, in our, do we have a cape for that? You know, I don't know so, but it keeps evolving and I think we should be inclusive. So that's my opinion on that.

Jen:

What did they mean by that? Just people that were into downhill and like wearing the body armor and stuff, like yeah, I'm wearing pads and jumping off of big rocks, and yeah, that was a long time ago.

Paula Burton:

You never hear that anymore. It's all you know they all do that.

Jen:

now. You can't keep the bros off the trails and you just can't or the girls or the girls. Exactly All right. So let's see the other things. I just wanted to ask you what's, what would? What is your favorite Numba trail to ride and maybe what was the favorite trail you've been part of building? Oh, oh, that's interesting, wow.

Paula Burton:

Well, I kind of like to ride where I'm riding, but I did. I really like Waldo. That's that little park with seven miles of trail. It's not. That's close to my house and I built most of those trails and it's great. Just get over there for an hour and I know it really well. So that's probably over there a lot. And then the other one, one of the.

Paula Burton:

I'm very proud of what we've done at Rockhouse Hill in Oxford, connecticut. They had, well, there's kind of two sections and one section. I did a lot of the design work. All it had was like a double track and over the past I don't know seven or eight years, there's probably I don't know seven or eight miles of trail and I did a lot of the design work and it's a lot of fun and people enjoy it and I've been involved in different parts of the Rockhouse thing but to really see it grow, there's over 15 miles of trail now when there was just, you know, like a mile and a half when it started. So and a lot of other people are involved there's a high school youth group that comes out and does a lot of the building and maintaining.

Paula Burton:

Now I've kind of stepped back from it a bit but I was fairly. I was really glad that I could get involved with that. So and I've been, you know, do a lot of these trail schools. So I've done stuff up in Maine, done stuff in Massachusetts the Rhode Island one we did last year, I think you know a couple in New Hampshire it's kind of funny because I'll be particularly in Connecticut. I did some work in Bluff Point like long, long time ago and there was an like an adventure ride there last fall and I went and I was like I remember this, so I did do some of the layout for that. I was like, okay, so it pops up, you know, every once in a while I'm just out riding something. I was like, oh, I remember this section of the trail.

Jen:

Yeah, I was going to ask you if, when you're hiking and riding now, like, is your mind constantly like, oh, why did they do that? Or oh, I got to fix this, or they should have done that better. Well, I have to turn that off sometimes.

Paula Burton:

So I just say, oh, got to turn that off right now. I'm not on like an assessment ride or assessment walk.

Jen:

But it does occur to me.

Paula Burton:

You know like the stuff does get in my head sometimes.

Jen:

Right, yeah, I would think it's like no, no, no, I'm out here to have a good time not to worry about somebody else's trail building. I'm just riding today. That's funny. All right, cool. Well, this has been fun. I'm excited now. Well, I guess let's end with one more guess. I guess let's let's end with one more. Just why do you think it's important for people to come out for trail days and get involved in trail building in their community?

Paula Burton:

well, trails don't build themselves. And also I think it gives people a chance to give back. I'm sure you've heard that too. But it also gives people a new respect for trails, goes into them and, uh, how to make it work if it's a shared use trail, you know there's other users and how to make it work for everybody as much as possible, and that's that's something. And also it makes people. It's becomes their trail, so they're going to become more protective of it. They're going to be willing to go to town hall If there's some issue. They're going to be willing to come out another day. They can be willing to show their friends the trail and say, oh yeah, we built this. And that spreads the word throughout the community as well.

Jen:

So yeah, that's, that's awesome. I totally agree. I think that's such a key to like. Continued stewardship of the things that you enjoy is making sure people get close to them, so and have some skin in the game, so I love that. Anything else you want to share about being a badass female trail builder?

Paula Burton:

I'm totally not badass. I would just say, well, one thing we didn't really touch on, but one of the reasons I really got into this is because I love the outdoors and I want to preserve it. So building trails properly and getting the community involved actually helps preserve what we have, because it's concentrating the use in one area and people aren't going out there. They need the trails and if they're doing a lot of sort of unauthorized trail building or not building the stuff correctly, it does affect the environment in not a good way and it also affects us socially. So that's one reason I really feel doing legitimate trails, teaching people how to do them and and the appreciation for them.

Jen:

So yeah, no legit, um kind of related to that. I just this just poked in my mind Do you have, is there anywhere you know on the planet I guess that is on your bucket list that you want to ride before you can't ride anymore Like a destination?

Paula Burton:

No, well, there's. There's a few um I want to. Um, I've traveled quite a bit, so, um, I've been to a lot of places, but I'd like to go to Baja California. Um, I hear that there's some really cool um writing there, and then I'm thinking next spring, uh, maybe go out West and do like Bear Ears or Escalante Staircase. I mean, I've done Moab, I've done Sedona, I've been to Grant, you know, grant Junction, fruita, I've done all that, but I haven't done some of that other stuff that's more remote. So, yeah, there's always more trails.

Jen:

And I've been to a lot of them. Yeah, and that should be a note to all the guys that are doing trail schools like, talk to the women and see where they've been, because they might have been more interesting places than you, case in point, right here. I love it all, right, paula. Well, this is awesome. Thank you so much for um. Thank you your time. I'm looking forward to this. I kind of I'm like I'm I kind of want to publish this on my podcast because it's you were, were Well whatever you know, that's fine.

Paula Burton:

Whatever you wish to do with it, Down with that.

Jen:

I was doing this because I wanted to run it, run a transcript and then pull out some stuff for the article.

Jen:

But, I might play around with a longer version of this because you were. You were a great guest and said a lot of cool things. You had a lot of good sound bites. I love it. Good. Big thanks to my special unexpected guest, paula burton.

Jen:

If you enjoyed this conversation, I've got some more great bike and trail content for you. For more information on the new england mountain bike association, or nemba, check out my conversation with executive director and former olympian, nicole friedman. That was just back on July 24th. Or, if you're fired up for more trail design and build inspo, head back to November 2023 for my conversation with Lindsay Currier, another awesome trailblazer I talked to way back in December 2021 with Sandy Noble. If you want to hear what it was like in the Wild West days for a pioneering family in the skate park world, definitely go back and check out that episode.

Jen:

And, of course, if hanging and talking bikes with another Gen Xer is your jam, you had better listen to anything and everything I've ever done with my community inspiration, heidi Myers of Rasputitsa. We cover her origin story back in April of 2021. All right, now that I've set you up with an epic playlist for your weekend travels, I hope you'll be on your way to nature to hike or bike or paddle, enjoy the foliage, pick some apples, drink some pumpkin spice lattes while you wander in the woods, whatever. Just remember to make it a little bit wild.