Thank You to TAMBA’s Staff
TAMBA would like to acknowledge our three paid staffers for helping us keep the organization running smoothly as we worked through these challenging months:
Patrick Parsel: This month marks Patrick’s one-year anniversary as TAMBA’s Trails Coordinator. In that time, he’s contributed so much to our organization. From acting as TAMBA’s liaison with land managers and paid trail builders to navigating COVID-19 protocols to keep our trail crews safe, Patrick has been an invaluable addition to our staff.
Joan Wharton: Joan was TAMBA’s first employee, hired in April of 2017 as our Administrative Assistant, and continues to be an invaluable asset to the organization behind the scenes. She runs membership, donor recognitions, secures insurances, manages RTP grants, and most importantly keeps us organized in all aspects.
Vince Perry: Vince did an awesome job as our Trail Operations Technician this summer. He played a key role in the success of a number of our big projects, especially at Lily Lake and keeping the Bijou Bike Park in good shape! We hope to be able to hire Vince back again next spring once the snow melts.
Thank you Joan, Patrick, and Vince!
How can we improve our trails in the Tahoe Basin?
Share your voice and complete TAMBA’s Trail Planning Survey
TAMBA is working on an internal 5-10 year trail maintenance and development plan and we want your feedback to help inform our planning process! This effort will guide our collaborative work with partner organizations and agencies on a Trails Master Plan for the Tahoe Basin. Please click below to access a survey that will take 10-15 minutes.
Click here to complete the trails survey
October Trail Work
Our outstanding volunteers completed over 650 hours of trail work in October! Luckily the smoke and heat abated towards the end of the month and we were able to knock out a lot more work before the end of the field season.
Hartoonian Trail Network
The Hartoonian Trail network is a maze of trails connecting neighborhoods in South Lake Tahoe. They are excellent trails for beginner riders or those looking to get across town to access some of the popular trails like Cold Creek and Corral. We completed the first phase of our Hartoonian Trail Improvement project by installing kiosks and trail signage for three colored routes.
Phase 2 of the project will involve extending the Yellow Route signage to Elks Club Drive. We are working with the California Tahoe Conservancy to make this happen next season, as well as adding better signage for our neighborhood-connecting trails.
This project would not have been possible without the support of Over the Edge and the Latrobe Fund.
Stumpy Super G
Mission accomplished! The Stumpy Super G trail will be open top to bottom next spring/summer as the snow pack retreats. A huge shout out to the folks in our community who came out the past two years and volunteered to get this trail completed. A special thanks to John Clausen for taking the lead on this project.
As its name implies, the trail design keeps turns big and swoopy, as well as throwing in a few different surface textures and ride overs. The trail is designed to be traveled in both directions, down and up. The old Stumpy DH nickname of “Throw-up Hill” is history – but of course you can always shift up a couple of gears to make it a tougher challenge. Stumpy Super G will prove to be a great link in the network of Tahoe City trails.
Stanford Rock
A thank you to Jeff Coulter and Sandor Lengyel who have been the drivers behind the Stanford Rock project. They, along with their dedicated group of volunteers, have done an incredible job transforming the old logging road into a really special piece of singletrack that is a joy to ride up as well as down.
They completed over 1.5 miles of new trail this year featuring some amazing turns that are finally getting a chance to cure under the snow. Many of these new sections will be open for the first time next spring.
Some of the remaining work for next year will be some final re-routes at the very top and bottom of the trail.
Lily Lake Trail
What a great year of progress on the Lily Lake Trail! While we didn’t quite get the bottom part completed, the upper half of the trail is looking great. Hundreds of tons of rock were hand maneuvered into place to make this trail possible.
Scott Brown did an outstanding job leading the tough group of volunteers all summer long. Be sure to stay tuned next spring when we announce work days that will take us over the finish line.
In the map below, the red section is what we have remaining for next summer.
Outstanding October Volunteers
We want to extend a special thank you to the following individuals who volunteered two or more days out on the trails in October:
- Adam Anderson
- Cole Miller
- Dina Anderson
- Eric Clement
- Greg Johnson
- Jeff Coulter
- Jesse Desens
- Keith Fischer
- Mario Cruz
- Michael Butler
- Mike Pook
- Mike Wells
- Nils Miller
- Scott Brown
- Tim Clement
- Tim Holdener
Thank You to Our Recent Large Donors
While we appreciate every donation we receive, TAMBA would like to thank the following individuals in particular for their recent generous donations:
- Chris & Viktoria McNamara – $35,000 (matching all donations since the release of our Strategic Plan)
- Jack & Eva Wurster – $5,000
- Carl & Marlene Hekkert – $5,000
- Brian Lynden Beffort and Laura Henderson Brigham – $1,000
- Megan Warren – $500
- James Mitchell – $500
Thank you for your support!
