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Hiked the Northville-Placid Trail last week and saw something weird
I was about 12 miles in near the Long Lake section and noticed a bunch of tree blazes that were totally different colors than the official ones. Some were orange and some were bright blue, but the official DEC trail uses yellow markers. Turns out some local trail runners were marking their own shortcuts and loops without permission. Messed me up for a solid 20 minutes trying to figure out which way to go. Has anyone else run into rogue blazes on a marked route?
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bell.taylor1mo ago
Whoa, that's frustrating! Honestly this reminds me of how people do that in all sorts of places, not just trails. In my experience it's like when someone repaints the lines in a parking lot to make more spaces, or when neighbors put up their own street signs at the end of their driveway. People just assume they know better than the folks who planned things out. I've seen it with unofficial shortcuts cut through public parks too. Take this with a grain of salt, but it feels like a universal human thing where we all want to put our own stamp on stuff, even if it confuses everyone else.
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