The Nature Conservancy Partners with Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado to Build New Trail at the Medano-Zapata Ranch, located near Great Sand Dunes National Park

(PRLEAP.COM) May 2007 / Denver, Colorado: More than 100 volunteers from across Colorado joined forces on May 5th and 6th, to build a new 1.2 mile public hiking trail on the historic Medano-Zapata Ranch. The ranch, owned and managed by The Nature Conservancy, spans some of the most biologically diverse and historically significant land in the San Luis Valley. Adjacent to the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, the ranch and this new trail are open to the public from dawn to dusk. No pets, bikes or horses are allowed. The Nature Conservancy welcomes visitors from the surrounding community, as well as those visiting the Great Sand Dunes and the San Luis Valley’s other destinations, to stroll through shady cottonwood groves and wetlands where mule deer and elk are commonly spotted along with great-horned owls, migratory songbirds and waterfowl.

The trail construction project was coordinated and managed by Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC) in partnership with The Nature Conservancy. Volunteers built a mile of new natural surface trail which leads from the parking lot near the entrance road, along a restored wetland area, under mature cottonwoods to an overlook mound to the west with 360 degree views, and loops back east along the cottonwood forest to rejoin the wetland trail. In addition to creating a new trail, VOC volunteers built three walking bridges that cross over drainage ditches, cleared away debris and reclaimed old golf cart paths from a former course.

While the new trail allows the visitor to experience the ranch’s natural beauty speckled with antique farm equipment, it also offers fantastic views of the San Luis Valley, with the majestic 14,000-foot Crestone Needle and Peaks to the north, with the Great Sand Dunes beneath them, and four more 14ers - Mounts Blanca, Lindsey, Ellingwood and Little Bear just to the east.

The trail is a great new stop along Highway 150, three miles south of the Great Sand Dunes National Park and just a mile north of the road to Zapata Falls. For access turn at The Nature Conservancy sign, follow signs to Inn and park in the marked grassy area.

“We’re excited to offer a new hiking experience in the San Luis Valley and encourage neighbors and visitors to enjoy this new trail at Medano-Zapata Ranch,” stated Audrey Wolk, Director of Outreach, for The Nature Conservancy in Colorado. “The ranch is a beautiful property that we have long been wanting to share with the public, but could not manage until we had a sustainable trail in place. We are grateful to Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado for making this happen, and have invited them back to expand the trail offerings in the near future.”

“The Nature Conservancy is a great agency partner for VOC,” shared Jerry Severns, Outreach and Marketing Director for VOC. “Audrey Wolk and her team were some of the most active and engaged partners with which VOC has ever worked. We welcome the opportunity to return to Medano-Zapata as it was a very special and rewarding experience for all of our volunteers.”

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The Nature Conservancy is a leading international, nonprofit organization that preserves plants, animals and natural communities representing the diversity of life on Earth by protecting the lands and waters they need to survive. To date, the Conservancy and its more than one million members have been responsible for the protection of more than 15 million acres in the United States and have helped preserve more than 102 million acres in Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia and the Pacific. Visit us on the Web at nature.org.

Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC) is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to motivate and enable citizens to be active stewards of Colorado’s public lands. Founded in 1984, VOC has engaged almost 50,000 volunteers in the completion of over 260 trail and habitat projects. Work to date is valued at more than $11.8 million. Projects range in size from 15 to 1,000 volunteers and include building and maintaining trails, planting and removing invasive plants.

VOC also promotes local stewardship throughout the state by providing expertise and resources to help other organizations partner with volunteers. VOC programs to support the conservation community include: V Outdoors (www.voutdoors.org), Colorado’s outdoor volunteer clearinghouse and project management database, leadership and skills training programs, and a model for staging small-scale, adopt style projects.

Contacts:
Audrey Wolk, The Nature Conservancy
(303) 444-2950, awolk@tnc.org
Jerry Severns, Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (303) 715-1010, x 15, jerry@voc.org

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