Clark – The calluses on her hands were hard-earned for “D,” an erstwhile farm laborer who has stayed behind after last month’s Rainbow gathering to help restore the natural beauty of Big Red Park.
“You wake up sore each day, but then you get moving,” she said Thursday from her campsite in the national forest about 35 miles north of Steamboat Springs, where she and about a dozen other members of the cleanup crew are all who remain from a crowd of 15,000 modern-day hippies.
As the exodus began in the wake of the backwoods bacchanal, the impact on the broad, remote valley was apparent: Fire rings and denuded campsites dotted the forest, vegetation was trampled as if by cattle, and everything from tents to disabled vehicles had been abandoned.
D, who like many Rainbows doesn’t use her full name, has spent the past four weeks picking up trash, burying fire pits, scattering slash and covering the spiderweb of trails left behind with pine needles.
“I do feel an obligation to the land,” she said, espousing one of the principles of the leaderless group that retreats to the woods each year to commune with nature.
Officials with the U.S. Forest Service – an agency which battled the Rainbows over the location and permitting of the gathering – seemed generally pleased with restoration efforts, even though some heavy soil rehabilitation work remains.
“They’ve done a lot of work. It’s looking a lot better,” said Kent Foster, a Forest Service fire-management officer.
Most of the scars remain along the so-called “Hippie Highway,” the 12-foot-wide main trail into the six-mile long encampment, although even some hardy plants such as lupine and grasses have managed to poke through the inch-thick crust of dirt.
“Looks like we’ve got a non-native plant growing here,” Foster said, pointing out a small cannabis that had sprouted in the compacted soil.
Forest officials plan to bring tillers and harrows to the site and spread some 100 pounds of seed to reclaim the valley and close off unwanted paths. In areas that suffered less trammeling, they can let nature take over.
It could take years, foresters said, before the signs of the Rainbow gathering are gone, but they also acknowledged the damage could have been worse.
Staff writer Steve Lipsher can be reached at 970-513-9495 or slipsher@denverpost.com.
