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February 2025
News From the Trail

 

From the Chair
For Good, For Ever

According to the AllTrails mobile app, the Best Trails in the USA include the John Muir Trail, the Tahoe Rim Trail, the Ozark Highlands Trail, American Discovery Trail and more.  What do these trails have in common?  They are epic, challenging, well known and well maintained, traversing some of the most spectacular terrain in the country.  There were visionaries who built them, and there are stewards who look after them.  The Tahoe-Pyramid Trail (TPT) is taking its rightful place alongside these trails, and the TPT Board, volunteers, supporters and users continue to work together to ensure that the TPT is here for future generations to enjoy.


The tag line “For Good, For Ever” has been used by many groups and charities, but those words don’t always mean what they say.  In our case, they mean exactly that.  With only 19% of the trail remaining to be built, we are planning for the trail to be available, well used and well maintained, forever.  In that effort, and to ensure the vision persists, our Founder Janet Phillips established an endowment in 2017.  With the Board’s support and agreement, the endowment is held at the Community Foundation of Northern Nevada, and the first donors were Mike and Karen Traynor.  Many people have contributed through the years including Sam Limerick and Gayle Haraguchi, Elaine Alexander, Jack and Linda Hartman, Jay Stuart and Nancy Wong, Muriel Sonne, Marcia Growden, Mark Hughs, and yours truly.  More than a dozen families have committed to make a gift to the endowment through their estate plans.


While the endowment didn’t grow much until 2021, in that year a regular donor, John Strangman, passed away and bequeathed about $1.5 million dollars to the TPT, which was added to the endowment.  A few additional large gifts were made, including from Greg Nelson, and then Janet left the bulk of her estate to the endowment when she passed away two years ago.  Today the endowment is close to $5 million and a donor you may recognize, Ernest Tschannon, has committed to make a significant gift that will grow the endowment to more than $6 million.  Ernest’s name is on signage on the trail as recognition of his commitment.  The TPT uses up to 5% of the endowment annually to help cover operating expenses. This money comes from the interest earned on the endowment, so we don’t touch the principal. Our goal is to grow the endowment to about $10 million, which we estimate will cover between 30% and 40% of our annual costs from the income stream.  There is little doubt that we will need to fundraise every year to “fund” the bulk of the costs of constructing, maintaining, improving and operating the TPT, but the incredibly generous gifts to the endowment ensure the organization will always be supported.


Few organizations have such a resource, and many organizations go under when times are tough, or when fundraising and/or grant income falls short.  For TPT lovers, arranging a bequest to the trail’s endowment is a way of joining with others of like mind and heart to make the gift that keeps on giving, for good, forever.  Once completed, and well deserved, I have no doubt the Tahoe-Pyramid Trail will join the AllTrails list of best trails in the USA.


~ Chris Askin, Chair of the TPT Board

Tailwinds Stories

Choosing Your Community

 

I came upon an article from the previous Surgeon General, Vivek Hallegere Murthy,  to the country.  It referred to his document titled  “My Parting Prescription for America”.  He stresses the importance of community.  It hit home to me, and I hope it finds something that you can take away that is meaningful to you.  The link is below, and I highly suggest reading it for your takeaway points that hit home with you.    


He states that the core pillars of the community are Relationships, Service, and Purpose, with love as the core virtue. What better time than February, the month of love, to look beyond a box of chocolates, reflect on what you think about your communities, how we may want to enhance or go beyond our thinking of what community looks like, and the role we want to play in it.  


I often think of the community as trail users, either cycling or hiking. Over the past few years, I’ve introduced myself to many people on the Tahoe-Pyramid Trail to learn how they use the trail. This past year, we conducted a survey of our users as part of our fact-finding mission. In one way, this is a community of users, but maybe our individual need to expand that community is when the building of relationships falls into place. 


Relationships are all about providing a network for social interaction.  We need more face-to-face conversations with people from diverse backgrounds.  That opens up our minds and builds community.  Through our survey, we realized how many people use the trail beyond biking and hiking such as birding, picnicking, or sitting by the water to meditate or sketch.  It is a diverse group of users.  Isn’t it wonderful how people view the value of the TPT in many ways yet we are part of the same community.  We need to embrace this diversity. 


Service is defined as assisting others.  This could be in some volunteering opportunity or reaching out to a neighbor who needs help.  It can be as simple as picking up trash on the trail or joining one of our volunteer activities clearing brush from a section.  I can guarantee that once you finish a days’ work and see what was completed, you will feel invested in the community and have a feeling of accomplishment. 


Purpose gives you something to strive for.  As the article states, it’s not “what” we do but why we do it.  When that purpose involves creating a better community, your impact can give you a better sense of worth and a healthier, more diverse community.  


This article is not about politics; it’s about making our communities stronger with the power of love.  How can we argue with that?  Happy Valentine’s Day.

Read Article

~Mary Beth Roselli, Past Chair of the TPT Board

 
 

Birding Along the Truckee River

Cedar Waxwing

Kingfisher

~ Photos by Lori Bellis

This month's Tailwinds article is about the diversity of users on the Tahoe-Pyramid Trail. Birding is one of the activities people enjoy along the Truckee, in addition to biking or hiking. Look for binoculars and long-lensed cameras.  


During college, I worked for a summer in an environmental center with wetlands. I fell in love with Blue Herons, Egrets, and Sandhill Cranes there. Their beauty and graceful flight amazed me, and they are easy to identify! To this day, I am still in awe of these beautiful birds. I often see Blue Herons along the trail between USA Parkway and Mustang Ranch.   


I live next to a field with various hawks that fly over. Cosmo, my dog, and I love sitting there and enjoying the show and sunshine. I hear owls hooting at night, but I’ve never been able to observe them. My neighbor Russell captured them on film, though. I am not a late owl!!!   


The Lahontan Audubon Society chapter offers educational events throughout the year.  Spring offers the most sightings for birds because of the migration of birds returning and migrating through, and the ones here year-round, the trifecta! The schedule is on their website for more details. They make trips to Pyramid Lake and to various parks along the Truckee. 

Here is their schedule:

The basics are a good pair of binoculars and a guidebook. Many will note their first sightings in their guidebooks. There are apps available for phones that help to identify.  You can also identify birds by their sounds. Birding is just another way to enjoy the TPT.    


Lori Bellis is the photographer who we need to credit for these fantastic photographs.   Here are her notes from when she took the shot of the eagle:  


“1/16/25 First time hiking the Tahoe-Pyramid Trail from USA Parkway to Patrick. It's only 4.5 miles and winds through ponds along the river. “ 


The other photos are of a Kingfisher and a Cedar Waxwing, taken by Lori along the Truckee. Thank you very much Lori, for sharing these photos with us.


Please remember that we have a photo contest every year, and one of the categories is flora/fauna. Birds are an excellent way to participate, as well as the abundant wildflowers along the trail. Throughout the year, when on the TPT, use those cameras or phones, and don’t forget to look at the details, which are not always the landscapes.


I know it’s sometimes hard to look anywhere but at your feet when hiking, but please take the time to look up and listen as you find a lovely spot along the Truckee to appreciate nature in its many forms.


~Mary Beth Roselli, Past Chair of the TPT Board

Bald Eagle

 
 
 

~ Photo by Addy Garibay

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Tahoe-Pyramid Trail is a 501(c)3 Non-profit Organization. Trail building, maintenance, and access is the result of many collaborations and partnerships with private landowners, private donors, utilities, state and local government agencies, other non-profit organizations, local businesses, community leaders, as well as a small army of dedicated volunteers, all of whom are valued trail partners and whose supporting efforts are critical to continued trail health.

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Tahoe-Pyramid Trail, 4790 Caughlin Parkway, Box 138, Reno, NV 89509, United States

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