Winding trails lead to success

GOOSE CREEK -- Don Watts makes his living doing what he does for fun. Sure, one time the job involved keeping a black bear from backing up traffic by repeatedly chasing it back into the woods. But that's the kind of fun that comes with the wilds at the Marrington Outdoor Recreation Area.

"Where else in a city can you find this amount of space within walking distance of your house?" Watts asks, waving his arm at a sunlit array of pine. "It's my backyard."

Watts, 53, of Goose Creek, was just named the South Carolina trail worker of the year by American Trails, the trail advocacy group. He is a civilian natural resources technician on the 1,600-acre spread of woods, marsh and river at the Joint Base Charleston-Weapons Station. An inveterate outdoorsman and mountain biker, he has spearheaded a decade-long effort fine-tuning the preserve into a 20-plus-mile-long network of trails with a focus on mountain biking.

"When he's not even paid, he does it. He comes in on weekends and does it. He comes in after hours. It's his passion," said Terrence Larimer, natural resource manager at the weapons station in Goose Creek. Larimer nominated Watts.

Watts lives his life outdoors. He grew up on a tobacco farm in Tennessee's Cumberland Mountains. He has hiked the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Pennsylvania, including a stretch of 180 miles at one go. He still volunteers yearly to do trail maintenance.

But after a stress fracture in his foot made it too painful to shoulder a loaded backpack for long, he hopped on a mountain bike. When he realized the potential in the few primitive trails through Marrington, he went after grants and started clearing fallen trees, building wetland crossings, bridges and

boardwalks.

He goes about it as methodically as he joined the Air Force (he convinced a girl he knew to forge his mom's signature on the papers so he could enlist at 17 years old).

One footbridge he built washed away in a flood and caught farther along in a drainage ditch. He rebuilt it, watched it get swept off again and lodge in the same place. So the third time he built it where it had stuck. This time it held.

The bear, by the way, eventually was trapped.

Marrington is one of those semi-obscure Lowcountry pearls. It includes a 14-mile perimeter trail that roams through high pine stands along white sand bluffs, as well as marsh, wildfowl ponds and the gator-studded banks of Foster Creek. It includes a motocross track and remote areas with names like "the Amazon." It now attracts 300 to 700 people per month.

Along with the Marrington work, American Trails cited Watts, a kayaker, for his role helping develop aquatic trails, for bringing biking associations, hikers and blueways clubs to Marrington, to help turn it "into one of the largest and most popular trail systems in the state of South Carolina."

Watts is still at it. He just opened a 4 1/2-mile trail spur along Foster Creek and is working on extending that another three miles.

"I was born and raised in the woods," he said. "That's how I like to spend my time."

Outdoor Recreation Area

What: A pine forest that was a Colonial-era rice plantation, with water impoundments, marsh and frontage on Foster Creek. Opened by the U.S. Navy in 1995.

Where: Redbank Road, Joint Base Charleston-Weapons Station.

Uses: Hiking, off-road biking, equestrian, wildlife observation towers, picnicking.

Hours: Sunrise to sunset.

Admission: Department of Defense pass or $10 annual pass. Pass requires four-week background check (driver's license necessary). Outdoors Adventure Center, 1956 Fletcher Ave., Goose Creek, Monday-Friday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m.; Sat., 11 a.m.-4 p.m. For more information, 764 2120.

Hunting: Three days per week, August-January, $20 firearms registration requires two to four weeks, limited hours at sunrise and sunset.