In this episode we chat with Sirena Rana, owner of Trails Inspire. The episode covers many cool outdoor topics including Amerind Museum's grand opening (Oct 7th, 2023) of a new hiking trail system in Texas Canyon, AZ (in the Dragoons) and The Sun Corridor Trail project which aims to establish a bike touring route from Douglas, AZ to Las Vegas, NV.
Trails Inspire was established to help promote the outdoors through freelance writing, photography, public speaking and trail design. It's owner, Sirena, loves to share the fascinating places she explores while hiking, backpacking, rafting and canyoneering through her photography, speaking engagements and writing.
Sirena is the author of “Best Day Hikes on the Arizona National Scenic Trail” and a contributing author to “Your Complete Guide to the Arizona National Scenic Trail” and her articles have appeared in the Copper Town News, American Long Distance Hiking Association – West Gazette, Visit Arizona’s website and many more.
Her photos have been featured in Backpacker Magazine: Long Trails and “Your Official Guide to the Arizona National Scenic Trail" as well as numerous publications, online articles and the Arizona Highways blog.
She has appeared on Arizona Public Media, The Arizona Republic, Arizona Daily Sun, Arizona Daily Star, Arizona Highways blog, Good Morning Arizona, Tucson News Now and She Explores ,The Trail Show, and of course the Mountain Cog podcasts.
Episode web links.
Texas Canyon Hiking Trails Grand Opening: https://www.amerind.org/events/texas-canyon-nature-preserve-trail-system-grand-opening/
Sun Corridor Trail Project: suncorridortrail.org
Trails Inspire: trailsinspire.com
Texas Canyon trail system: https://tinyurl.com/mvdkfua9
Texas Canyon Mountain Bike Race: https://www.amerind.org/events/texas-canyon-mountain-bike-race-3/
Amerind Museum: https://www.amerind.org/
Sirena’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/desertsirena/?hl=en
Sirena’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sirena-rana-45b59848/
Listen to Mountain Cog
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
Other Podcast Sites
Socials
Instagram
Facebook
Email
mountaincog@gmail.com
In this episode we chat with Sirena Rana, owner of Trails Inspire. The episode covers many cool outdoor topics including Amerind Museum's grand opening (Oct 7th, 2023) of a new hiking trail system in Texas Canyon, AZ (in the Dragoons) and The Sun Corridor Trail project which aims to establish a bike touring route from Douglas, AZ to Las Vegas, NV.
Trails Inspire was established to help promote the outdoors through freelance writing, photography, public speaking and trail design. It's owner, Sirena, loves to share the fascinating places she explores while hiking, backpacking, rafting and canyoneering through her photography, speaking engagements and writing.
Sirena is the author of “Best Day Hikes on the Arizona National Scenic Trail” and a contributing author to “Your Complete Guide to the Arizona National Scenic Trail” and her articles have appeared in the Copper Town News, American Long Distance Hiking Association – West Gazette, Visit Arizona’s website and many more.
Her photos have been featured in Backpacker Magazine: Long Trails and “Your Official Guide to the Arizona National Scenic Trail" as well as numerous publications, online articles and the Arizona Highways blog.
She has appeared on Arizona Public Media, The Arizona Republic, Arizona Daily Sun, Arizona Daily Star, Arizona Highways blog, Good Morning Arizona, Tucson News Now and She Explores ,The Trail Show, and of course the Mountain Cog podcasts.
Episode web links.
Texas Canyon Hiking Trails Grand Opening: https://www.amerind.org/events/texas-canyon-nature-preserve-trail-system-grand-opening/
Sun Corridor Trail Project: suncorridortrail.org
Trails Inspire: trailsinspire.com
Texas Canyon trail system: https://tinyurl.com/mvdkfua9
Texas Canyon Mountain Bike Race: https://www.amerind.org/events/texas-canyon-mountain-bike-race-3/
Amerind Museum: https://www.amerind.org/
Sirena’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/desertsirena/?hl=en
Sirena’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sirena-rana-45b59848/
Listen to Mountain Cog
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
Other Podcast Sites
Socials
Instagram
Facebook
Email
mountaincog@gmail.com
So we've started, but we're not sure if Serena can hear.
Josh:She can't hear the music. She can hear the great music that Josh has written for it. You can all hear the music, but uh but Serena, unfortunately.
Mike:okay, Welcome Serena.
Sirena Rana:Thanks for having me on the podcast.
Mike:Yeah, yes, um all right. On the mountain cog podcast today, serena Rana um coming to us live link from out in the Southwest desert. Serena, welcome. Can you tell us um introduce yourself, if you wouldn't mind, please?
Sirena Rana:Sure, my name is Serena Rana and I am a hang on. Let me start again.
Josh:That's fine, no worries.
Mike:Yeah.
Sirena Rana:Okay, it's just, it's just, it's just, it's just no.
Josh:I'm just going to say it's just a conversation, so like, no stress, what's it.
Sirena Rana:I know. It's just that sometimes it's just like getting started, and then, once I get started, you can't shut me up. So we'll cut all this bad stuff out, right.
Josh:Good.
Mike:That's awesome. All right, whenever you're ready, it's fine. Okay, okay, so go go go go. Serena.
Sirena Rana:For real, for real, we're going to shut up, we promise. Okay, hi, I'm Serena Rana and I'm the owner of trails inspire, a consulting company that's promoting the outdoors through writing, photography, public speaking and trail design.
Josh:Oh, that's awesome. It's so nice to have you on. Well, it's Sunday, sunday afternoon here on the MCP and we actually we were introduced to you through Mark Flint and actually Mark was with Mark on kind of early in, I don't know, maybe 20 or 30 episodes ago. We actually have Mark on coming again Tuesday.
Mike:He'll be on a podcast on Tuesday People loved here and Mark Flint's episode and we're going to love hearing all that you have to tell us about Serena. So thanks for making time.
Sirena Rana:Absolutely, and Mark is one of my favorite human beings of all times.
Josh:Well, he speaks very highly of you as well, so that's, that's pretty awesome.
Mike:It's. It's so funny like both you are in the same kind of like vein of, I guess, industry if you will out outdoor trail building, I mean there's just not many of you out there, so the perspectives that you and Mark bring are pretty fascinating, to be honest, especially for our listeners, tying into the outdoors and mountain biking, and other fun stuff. So yeah, all right, go ahead, serena.
Sirena Rana:Oh, I was just really fortunate to have Mark as a mentor for my trail building and trail design. He is an incredible person with infinite knowledge about these kinds of things and so willing to share, and I am very excited that now I can hire him through my company.
Josh:Oh, that's awesome. I didn't realize that he was working for you. That's very cool.
Mike:Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, so what is the name of your company? Maybe you said it and I missed it, but you're the founder of a trail company.
Sirena Rana:Well, trail, yeah it's called trails inspire, and it's because I believe that trails can inspire people to do great things. And not only can they inspire people to do great things, they can inspire people to really get to know themselves and find peace and nature.
Mike:All right, so great name. It makes a lot of sense to her. I think they can resonate with her listeners. But I think there's a backstory that you have that's especially important to you, if you don't mind sharing. How did you get involved with hiking and what does it mean to you?
Sirena Rana:Well, my path to hiking was a little different than a lot of peoples, because I didn't grow up hiking at all. I mean, I grew up going to national parks with my parents and things like that, but we never, ever put on a backpack and went hiking. It was never called hiking, we would go sightseeing and things like that. I come from a family where both of my parents are immigrants my dad is from India and my mom is from Italy, and so there really wasn't that cultural background that a lot of Americans have where they're camping and hiking and things like that. And I'm always a little surprised to hear that people have done so much when they were kids, you know backpacking and hiking and bicycling and stuff. So I grew up in the Chicago suburbs, also not the greatest place for rugged outdoor stuff.
Josh:Another mid-western, yes, yeah.
Mike:Welcome.
Sirena Rana:Nice, and so I would spend a lot of time outside as much as I could. Luckily, the house that I lived in, that I grew up in the neighborhood right across the street wasn't developed. There was like a downturn in the economy and there was this big chunk of land and so my friend Kristen and I still my best friend to this day and we used to just spend tons of time out there, but we never called it hiking, we never took a backpack, we never took any water. I mean, maybe come home and drink from the hose a little bit.
Sirena Rana:Yes, you know it was never like an organized activity, but I loved being outside, Also visiting my dad's family in India. We would be outside, we would sleep on cots with mosquito nets on us outside, and you know that was a lot of my exposure to the outdoors when I was younger.
Sirena Rana:And so it wasn't really until I moved to Arizona. I just decided to come to the University of Arizona to study archaeology in 1994. And I had never been here before I had, you know, just came sight unseen and it was like being dropped on an alien planet. But I grew to love the place and that was really where I got exposed to the idea of hiking. And it wasn't, you know, hiking itself, that was like just basic. I didn't even know about backpacking until much later. So it's really coming out to Arizona that made that big difference.
Josh:It's so interesting. It's like from the Midwest, like we'd go on walks, but we didn't think of it like a hike. We might walk down the road for some exercise or something. The other thing you mentioned about carrying water, like like so I'm from Detroit, mike's from outside of Milwaukee, you're from Chicago.
Josh:So we got the big three like Midwest, but like we never carried water ever in my entire life, and now I can't even leave the house in Tucson, no matter what time of year, without like at least some type of water. You know something to carry water and it's pretty interesting.
Sirena Rana:When I started at the University of Arizona, it was August and I was walking around campus and I thought I was going to one building but it ended up. I was kind of lost and I will never forget, because that was like the first time I could ever remember being thirsty like actually thirsty like oh my God, I need to get a bottle of water right now.
Josh:The desert will do that, won't it? Definitely, definitely.
Sirena Rana:For sure.
Mike:So I don't know, you know if you want to get into this part, but I know there's a can I ask her a question first?
Josh:Yeah, yeah, so we always ask someone if they have a nickname. Oh yes, do you have a nickname by any chance?
Sirena Rana:So I don't have a nickname and I don't have a trail name only because there's not a whole lot of serenas out there and so it's kind of easy to pick me out. But I do have a fun story about my name. My name was chosen out of a baby name book and my name is Indian. My last name is Rana and then my first name, serena, was chosen out of a baby name book. However, if you speak Spanish and I'm introducing myself to you, hello, my name is Serena. Rana sounds like hello, my name is mermaid frog, put it in Google translator, I hope that doesn't stick, because like sometimes the nicknames talk about this podcast.
Josh:they do stick on people, so hopefully out on the trail. Hopefully you don't start to hear frog People are going to walk up to you and say hey, mermaid. Oh, wow, that's interesting.
Sirena Rana:That's a great story.
Mike:I mean that's the worst, no, that's true, there's worse things to be called than mermaid. That's a good thing.
Josh:And here you know, here in the desert Southwest we have a, we have a large kind of Hispanic community, so I'm sure that that happens to you pretty often. Does anyone ever giggle?
Sirena Rana:Yes, and they use the Spanish pronunciation, which is Serena.
Mike:Serena, okay, yes, yeah, that would sound more like it. That sounds more like it. So Josh is going to Costa Rica in a what a week Saturday.
Josh:So he's been trying to learn Spanish a little bit.
Mike:It's really walk in and he's like, and he's like what's too much Desa, you know, like no, it's breakfast, he's like no, he starts mumbling to me something in Spanish and actually sounded great, yeah. So I don't know if you're starting to think in Spanish now, josh, not yet. Okay, still thinking in Arabic? All right, okay, yeah, josh.
Sirena Rana:So are you? You're going to Costa Rica.
Mike:I am, I'm going to go ahead.
Sirena Rana:There's actually a place in Costa Rica and Corcovado National Park called the Serena station. It's the Serena sector of Corcovado National Park.
Josh:Corcovado National Park, where?
Sirena Rana:is the mermaid.
Josh:Wait, where is Corcovado National Park? Do you know? Is that the?
Sirena Rana:one. It's on the Osa Peninsula.
Mike:Okay, osa, that's Burt, that's female bear, isn't it?
Sirena Rana:Osa.
Mike:So bears and mermaids.
Sirena Rana:Yes, yes, all right, how do?
Mike:you know all this, you're aware. Have you been there?
Sirena Rana:No, but I'm actually planning on going for my 50th birthday next year.
Mike:Oh, wow, wow, that's exciting.
Sirena Rana:Okay, so go ahead, I can only imagine, though making the reservation is going to be kind of interesting, because I'll be calling and saying hello. My name is Serena and I'd like to go to Serena.
Mike:Very cool. All right, so you are. It's funny because here you talk about your background like in Chicago, suburban Chicago, and then now you're like on the complete opposite of that, living in a van just in the desert in the desert.
Josh:By you know 30, 40 miles from any town.
Mike:So do you take your van down to Costa Rica? Do you fly down there? Like how extensive is van life for you nowadays?
Sirena Rana:As far as you know, traveling in the van I can pretty much go wherever I want. I've got satellite internet and I've been pretty much in Arizona for the most part just because that's where I know and I love. But I can tell you, next summer I am out of here.
Mike:That's awesome, like when you say out of here, like Costa Rica, and then for your birthday, and then where else are you going?
Sirena Rana:Yeah, so in my van, especially for the summer, I'm planning on doing a big road trip up through Colorado to Canada, to Banff and Jasper National Parks to visit a friend. And then I have another friend that lives in Vancouver Island and visit that and then come down Washington, oregon, california and back.
Josh:You pretty much have to stop by Whistler and do some laps at the bike park up there, right, if you're going to be that close.
Sirena Rana:If I was a biker.
Josh:Can we get you on a bike sometime in the next 12 months? What?
Sirena Rana:do you think, maybe, maybe, all right.
Josh:What if Mark comes with us? Does that help If Mark came with you know, I think the thing is if it was a place without a bunch of cactus, maybe oh yeah, well, there's no cactus in Whistler, so not so much.
Mike:You'll be fine up there, okay, so I, as we talked about I kind of like pre-call here, you have just an incredible amount of experience and a lot going on always, so we have a few things we only have. Generally, we try to keep this an hour. We could go on for many hours, but so can we maybe start with? You're an author and you've got a really cool book out there about the Arizona Trail.
Sirena Rana:Yes.
Mike:Okay, it's called best day hikes on the Arizona National Scenic Trail. All right, can you tell us kind of a little bit about that, like what inspired you to write that and you know where listeners can find it and how it might help them in their hiking and biking?
Sirena Rana:Sure. So I got involved with the Arizona Trail. I want to go back a little bit and talk about mentioned how I got into hiking when I moved here. However, I didn't really get super into hiking until after an accident that I had in 1997. I was in my last semester at the U of A and I was walking across the street and I was hit by a small pickup truck. Oh no, and so that basically changed my whole life. I had some acute injuries and those healed, but then, like a year or so later, you know, I was still feeling bad and I was actually feeling worse and I had terrible chronic pain. I had a problem sleeping.
Sirena Rana:Eventually I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, which is a chronic pain condition, and so that put me. That set me back so far. I was basically bedridden at one point and just miserable. I was 23. I had no idea what the future held for me, and at that point there wasn't very many stories that were positive about fibromyalgia, and so I really didn't know what the future was going to hold. I did, after a while, start taking walks with my dog, zeus, and it was these walks with my dog that made me realize that when I was outside in nature, I didn't notice what was going on with my body so much, and so that really made a difference, and once I kind of got a taste of that, that totally changed my whole trajectory really is. You know, I wanted to spend as much time outside as possible, and it's pretty much what healed me and brought me back.
Mike:What a cool story.
Josh:So are you still suffering from that?
Sirena Rana:I am and I had a really bad flair that lasted a whole year, from May 2021 till May 2022. And it's excruciating. It's a lot of pain, fatigue. You know. I go from somebody that can back pack 20 miles in a day to sometimes I can't make it upstairs, and it's especially for somebody that is so active. I'm outdoorsy and I'm. You know, even just being in the van is tough If you know you don't have any energy and things like that.
Josh:And so you have to do so much. You have to do so much physical stuff just to like, just for everyday things in the van yeah.
Sirena Rana:So it's definitely something that is always in the back of my mind. I'm really happy to be feeling good right now, and I don't take that for granted at all, and so I cherish any time that I can spend outside doing what I love.
Mike:Wow, that backstory is so meaningful and I think it adds to the name of Trails Inspire, because it sounds like it was hiking and trails and being outdoors is a change. Your life Got you back on track for things, hey.
Sirena Rana:Absolutely. And so in 2007, I went on a hike in Oracle and I went on a hike on the Cody Trail and when I got back from the hike, I hiked all day, came back and I saw this sign for the Arizona Trail and at the time there was just like very little information about it.
Sirena Rana:But, I was like how on earth you know there's a map? And I was like how on earth does somebody walk across Arizona with no water? I just couldn't understand it. And so that was actually what led me to investigate the Arizona Trail, and at the time it was 2007,. It was still like four years from being complete, so, and there was very little information about it. I was planning on through hiking it, and then the economy crashed, so I ended up section hiking it, but for real, when I contacted the Trail Association about information, they mailed me a packet Like there wasn't even a website at the time, so really old school packet.
Sirena Rana:So I decided that I was going to section hike the Trail instead, and so once I got interested in the Arizona Trail, I so what does that mean?
Josh:Just for our listeners. What is a section?
Sirena Rana:hike. What does that mean? So the Arizona Trail is 800 miles total, and so you can either do it as a through hike, where you start at the, you know one of the ends and go all the way through, or you can do it as a section hike and you know you go out and do pieces. I did anything from a day hike to like five or six days out on the trail and I've actually done the Arizona Trail both ways. I section hiked it in 2008, 2009. And then I through hiked it in 2014.
Josh:Wow, which way did you through hike it North to South or South to North?
Sirena Rana:South to North. I started in mid-March and ended at the end of May, so it was about two and a half months.
Josh:Oh wow, Did you run into any snowpack at that time?
Sirena Rana:No, it was actually a super dry year in 2014. I didn't have to set up a tent once.
Josh:Oh, wow.
Sirena Rana:Yeah.
Josh:You got super lucky. That's awesome.
Sirena Rana:So it was a little challenging. As far as the water was concerned, yeah, I guess that makes sense.
Mike:I forgot how we started this whole thing. No snow, but you had nothing to drink. Good point.
Sirena Rana:But I was really fortunate to. I had a great experience and you know it was something that I would recommend to a lot of people. Actually, both ways. Both ways have their pluses and minuses, and so you know, if you're section hiking and the weather is bad, you can just stay home.
Mike:Yeah, for sure.
Sirena Rana:You know to go out there in the bad weather, or you know if you're not feeling up to it or something happens.
Sirena Rana:You don't have to push through.
Sirena Rana:You can choose the best season and the best direction to go, because sometimes it's a lot easier or better views going one way or the other, and so you know their section.
Sirena Rana:Hiking definitely has its pluses, and you know a lot of people can't take that kind of time to do a through hike, and so I always tell people you know you don't have to do the entire thing, and so that's kind of where the idea for the book came from is to cherry pick the best pieces of the trail to give people an opportunity to experience it without having to backpack, making it very accessible, using trailheads that were nice and accessible, nothing that you had to go for wheeling down some you know crazy road or anything like that.
Sirena Rana:And so my goal with my company and pretty much everything I do, is to try and cast as wide a net as possible for people to be able to do things in the outdoors. And so you know everything from for the hikes, every hike has a short version and some of the you know there's lists in the beginning that sell you which are the easy hikes and the hikes at high elevation and things like that, and it also has a desert hiking guide for people that haven't been to the desert or haven't, you know, studied how to be safe in the desert, and also some things about the geology and history. I mean, I'm a former tour guide so I just love teaching people about the outdoors, so could you like highlight a couple of things.
Josh:Like you said, ways to be safe in the desert. Can you highlight a couple of things that would be in your book? Examples of like things to be safe, how to be safe in the desert?
Sirena Rana:Sure, one of my favorite things is tricks and tips to keep yourself cool. So my number one tip is to wet a bandana and tie it around your neck, because that will bring your body temperature. It will make your mind think that your body temperature is cooler than it actually is, and so because it's getting the information from your neck, and so that's one way to do things. Another one is I use an umbrella. Love my umbrella, maybe not so much appropriate for mountain biking.
Josh:That's a different sport, it's like windsurfing or something.
Sirena Rana:So I love my umbrella, and an umbrella plus a cold bandana around your neck or cold bandana around your head, a wet bandana around your head that means you're getting evaporative cooling, and so those are some of my favorite tips and tricks. Also, if you come near any kind of water, soak your bandana, maybe put some on your head.
Sirena Rana:If you're really hot, get in, take advantage of whatever kind of cooling opportunities that you can and, on the other end of that, always be ready for the weather to change on you and to all of a sudden be cold.
Mike:Oh yeah, because there's the whole desert thing, the swings in the temperatures, right, yeah, it's amazing.
Josh:Yeah, I just want to ask are those birds in the background that we're hearing?
Sirena Rana:They are. Are those the ones like that, the PGA?
Mike:pays for Birds in the background. Oh, those real birds, those are real birds, that's great. And then when you're describing van life, like when a bamf and everything, I think our listeners because I know we are, I don't know kind of envious. They're just vicarious. We're living vicariously right now. Hey, good for you.
Josh:So I just want to highlight one thing for our listeners. We've talked about the Arizona Trail I don't know a hundred times in this podcast. I want to make sure everyone remembers that. You know Serena's talking about hiking, but the Arizona Trail you can actually bike and you can do that whole 800 miles on a bike. Well, the whole 800? Well, I think there's sections you have to go around, a couple sections you have to go around.
Mike:But you can do it In theory, you can bike from north to south. And, like Serena said, it is stunningly beautiful, oh my God. So I bet they could use. Maybe, serena, you can chime in on this, but I bet they could get that book and then pick out, you know, strategically, like hey, I got a weekend Shoot up there, do a section of it on the bike and or hike whatever they wanted to do, but that could be a great resource.
Josh:Yeah. So, serena, where can we find your book?
Sirena Rana:You can find it on trailsinspirecom. You can order it directly from me. I sell signed copies. You can also sign.
Josh:Oh sweet.
Sirena Rana:You can find it at REI and at Summit Hut and other local businesses across the state.
Josh:Okay, so, so. But if they want to get it online because we've got a, we've got a list, on. Amazon Is it on Amazon?
Sirena Rana:Absolutely, it is on Amazon as well.
Josh:Yep, but better to go to trailsinspirecom and get the, get the signed.
Mike:Yeah, that'd be really special, for sure. Okay, so, serena, I graduate college from the Midwest and I get into hiking a little bit and I get into hiking in Arizona 96, 98., if you remember the book by any chance by Bill Bryson into the, what is it called? Into the? Into the wild? Is it into the wild? I don't know.
Sirena Rana:That's a walk in the woods.
Mike:Yeah, Thank you very yes, and I I listened to it, whatever on tape, I'm old and and I cracked up, it was so funny. But that's the Appalachian Trail, as you know. And then and I think the backstory on the trail is Arizona Trail is a guy from Flagstaff I think you've mentioned this. You know the story. He couldn't get to the Appalachian Trail right, so then he kind of did one in Arizona, is that, is that the backstory?
Josh:I don't know. Do you know Serena?
Sirena Rana:Yeah, yes, that is, that's Dale Shea-Walter, who is a Flagstaff math teacher, and so the Arizona Trail owes basically everything to him and his idea. And he looked at the map of Arizona and there's just this gigantic swath of public land running up and down the state and we're so lucky to have something like that. And so he believe it's 1985, he did the first hike from Mexico to Utah and then was so inspired by it that he made that his life's work. Basically he's still, and he was still, a teacher, but on his free time he would try and promote this idea of a of the Arizona Trail to the Forest Service, the Park Service, you know all these different agencies that he'd have to work with to get them to allow a trail across their land.
Mike:So, um, okay. So you mentioned the public lands and I want to shift gears, if we can now, but before we do that. Lastly, here Best Day Hikes on the Arizona National Scenic Trail, Serena, Rana, Amazoncom or, even better trails, Inspirecom.
Josh:Sign Copy. We'll put some links in the show notes here too, so you can just click right on it.
Mike:So if we can shift gears, Serena, unless we've, unless there's anything else to add to that, Are we going to talk about her other book.
Josh:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I think so. Okay, so you talk about that now, or you?
Mike:want to come back to it. Well, I kind of want to go, go.
Josh:You got a plan.
Mike:Okay, yeah, well, because she mentioned the public land. Yeah go, and so what hurt where she is today.
Josh:Yeah, let's hear about it.
Mike:It's amazing. I love it, like her next project that we're very excited to hear about.
Josh:Serena, it's about to open up, right? Yes, yes.
Mike:So, um, one of the things you're driving along I-10, you've got this amazingly weird set of rocks yeah, texas Canyon, jagoons, right, jagoons. Yes, and, and, but I think and Serena can add, add to this, of course but I don't think there's a lot of public land there, it's all private. So they have her project that she's worked on, um has opened up some trails for for people, uh, and the Amerind, uh, texas Canyon, what's?
Josh:the yeah, the trails. Tell us about this, tell us about it, tell us about what you're doing, serena.
Sirena Rana:Sure, it's called the Texas Canyon Nature Preserve at the Amerind Museum and I got an inquiry kind of out of nowhere from Eric, who is the CEO and this was in 2019, wrote me a very nice email saying you know, from the Amerind Museum, we're located in Texas Canyon, we're interested in trail system, and he went to describe a little bit about the location and so I wrote him back and I said I know exactly where you are and exactly what you're talking about.
Sirena Rana:And I've been looking at that piece of land forever. I mean, anybody who stopped at the rest stops on I-10 has looked and said, wow, I wonder what it's like over there. And the wildest thing is, it's even better than you could possibly imagine. Really you can't see the beauty from I-10. The real beauty.
Josh:Is that what you're saying?
Sirena Rana:Yeah, I mean, this place is just endlessly fascinating. There is so much to see, and so I was just so excited to have been contacted by them, and in January 2020, I did a site visit and did a little bushwhacking around, get some ideas for where we eventually put the trails. And then, of course, 2020 happened, and so everything was put on hold until about December 2021 is when Mark Flint and I were able to come out here and do the initial trail layout, and so what that consists of I'm sure you've had Mark talk about it, but what that consists of is basically, you know, people ask me like do you use drones, do you use this, do you use that? I use my feet and my eyes, so I am basically just walking around, you know, doing some free preliminary work on Google Earth and maybe maps or something like that, but really the way that I design trails is just to walk the land and see what's available. Also, another thing that's really important is I always ask the people that know the land best. So that was the folks that were taking care of this area, making sure that you know I'm not missing something. They know where all of the good stuff is. They also know where I should avoid Things like that. This is a private piece of land and it's an archaeological research institution, so they had already done the archaeological clearing of the areas that I was going to be looking at for the trails and as well as they have botanists that comes out, so a lot of the stuff that would have been done under a NEPA or under a government contract were already done. So that was really nice. So I was basically just given this area and he said make some trails.
Sirena Rana:And so Mark and I wandered around this location for a week and a half just looking at different options, doing some flagging of preliminary ideas, and then we went through and basically made a rough draft, which was our first trail.
Sirena Rana:The first trail plan was pretty much our rough draft, and so that was in December 2021. So, and in March of 2022, we had Flagline Trails, an amazing company out of Flagstaff. We had them come out and do a trail assessment to get an idea of what it would cost to build. At the time it was about 5.2 miles a trail and it ended up actually growing a little bit during trail construction because we found some really fun alternatives and it grew to about 5.7 miles, you can do about 7 miles. It's a series of stacked loops. If you know Pima County trails, you know stacked loops really well. They give you a lot of options and that's what I wanted is to give people a lot of options as far as distance and scenery and just ability to go different directions on the trails and put together a bunch of different options.
Mike:That sounds awesome.
Josh:I just want to highlight something. So Mark is a professional trail builder. So even though you're designing the trail, as you're out there and feeling the terrain and all that kind of stuff, I would imagine, and you guys had what was the company you had?
Sirena Rana:Flagline.
Josh:Trails, but these were professionally built trails designed for sustainability and runoff and all that kind of stuff.
Sirena Rana:Absolutely. That's the most important thing is the sustainability and making sure that things are a proper grade and that there's enough ways to get the water off. That is the number one thing. It doesn't matter if you've got a pretty trail, if it's in the wrong place and it's going to rut out. We've all been on those trails where you're walking in a V-shaped rut or biking in a V-shaped rut. So no one wants that. And if you put a trail in the wrong place, you're basically just giving people problems for the rest of the trail system's life, because if it's not in the right place, there's nothing you can do. It'll just get blown out, it'll get washed out, for example, the trail system that we built here. After the first rains I came out here. Trails were looking amazing, just absolutely incredible.
Mike:So Flagline knows what they're doing.
Sirena Rana:Oh, absolutely, they are top notch. I'm so impressed with their work.
Josh:So are they machine built or are they just hand tools?
Sirena Rana:It's a combination of machine and hand building. Our terrain was such that there was a lot of opportunity for the machines to come in A lot of the trails there's these wild rock formations and stuff, but between the rock formations there's pretty nice grassy areas and so they were able to come in with machines on a lot of it, and then you have somebody clearing ahead of the machine and then doing the finishing after the machine. So it's not like you just machine build your trails and they're done, and then certain areas had to be completely hand built just because of the challenges of the terrain or you couldn't get the machines on there, and so it was a combination.
Josh:And just for our listeners, these rock formations are huge. They're like the size of a house or a car or a person. Right, they're giant rock formations. Do I have that right?
Sirena Rana:Yeah, absolutely, and some of them are, you know, even bigger than that. They're like stories, tall and you know it's a variety of different things. There's everything from like cool lone boulders to giant rock formations.
Mike:So I don't want to steal your thunder, but there's one that particularly was showcased, I think you mentioned. It's going to be like the Instagram kind of famous or how you word it Instagram famous? Yeah, what's the name of that rock formation?
Sirena Rana:It's the whale rock. It looks exactly like a whale.
Mike:Interesting. Yeah, I think you just get a glimpse of it right from I-10. But what we heard you say is that it's just stunning, even more so when you get back there. Huh, okay, so connecting it to mountain bikes, that there's some access to what twice a year to? Is it the trail or kind of the area for for bikers?
Sirena Rana:Right. So there's a mountain bike race and then that takes place on the dirt roads here. So the trails will not, the trails themselves will not be open to anything but hiking, but they do allow, two times a year, to mountain bike this area for an event, and that event is coming up next Saturday, on the 23rd.
Josh:What's the event called?
Sirena Rana:The Amaran Bike Race.
Josh:Amaran Bike Race Okay cool.
Mike:So, amaran, shame on me for not even knowing this living. You know an hour away from it, but I didn't realize the amazing work since the early 1900s I think 1937 is when I can't remember his name Fulton. Yeah, in Amaran, the society of the Native Americans and I know that's near and dear to your heart and a lot of time the Grand Canyon and the Native. You know peoples, but can you tell us a little bit about what like Amaran is and like the basis of it and how it connects to maybe you know the area of where you've been working?
Sirena Rana:Sure, like I mentioned, it's an archaeological research institution. It also has a gallery, so it has a museum. It has a gallery with indigenous artists. It also has artists and residents that are indigenous, as well as incorporating a lot of indigenous practices into any kind of event that they have here.
Sirena Rana:One of the things that I was really pleased with is that Eric wanted to make the trails. One of the goals of his was to provide basket weaving access, so the bear grass is what the Tahauna Autumn make their baskets out of, and so they had been coming to the property to gather bear grass, but it was kind of tough because you had to bushwhack around and there wasn't really a trail, and so one of the major features is this trail that will be called the Beargrass Trail, and it's one of the first trails that you come to and it goes along a ridge with a bunch of bear grass on it, and I'll never forget one time I was hiking this trail and I came down and there was a family of Tauna Autumn processing the bear grass, doing exactly what we had hoped, and I was just so pleased to see that our goal had come true.
Josh:It worked and it worked all totally organically right, Because the trails weren't even open yet.
Sirena Rana:No, they were having an event and so they had some of the families at the event and then after the event, they were able to go collect the bear grass.
Josh:Can you explain to us what bear grass is? So we have the buffalo grass that kind of grows all over here where we live in Vale. But what is bear grass like? Can you explain it to us?
Sirena Rana:It's in the Agave family, so it's long. It's kind of like a sotol or a yucca, but it's got really long leaves that have spines on the end All right, cool, I guess.
Josh:another thing for the show notes for this. Yeah bear grass Because it's like grass, but not really grass kind of.
Sirena Rana:It's more like an Agave stuff and a bunch of grass, and this is the Chihuahuan Desert. So we're no longer in the Sonoran over here.
Josh:So it's a little different. Ecology oh, I did not know that at all.
Mike:So the ecology is different because it's different desert.
Josh:And for our non-desert listeners Agave is where tequila comes from.
Mike:Thank you for that, josh. All right, so the exciting part about this is it's brand new and I think it's opening soon. Yes, when's it opening, serene?
Sirena Rana:The grand opening is October 7th, from 9 AM to 4 PM. We're going to be doing a ribbon cutting at 9. And then it's a free event. There's going to be expert talks and guided tours of the museum and the Founders House and the first opportunity for the public to see these trails.
Mike:Oh that's awesome, and are you going to be out there? Of course as well. Out there come on.
Sirena Rana:Of course, I wouldn't miss it for anything.
Mike:OK, so people can find you, get signatures on the book if they have it, if they have it Got on Amazon and just talk to you about it, because our podcast, as you know, we're planning to publish it prior to this. So that's awesome, we'll publish this on Tuesday, october 3rd.
Josh:Ok, so I-10 runs east to west, kind of across the United States, right, yeah, it goes all the way across. Yeah, pretty sure, but it definitely goes across Arizona, and so you've got Tucson, arizona, and about 45 minutes east is Texas Canyon, and that's the area that we're talking about. Yeah, yep.
Mike:OK, so what are we at? We're at almost 40 minutes in and all right. So anything else to add to the Amerind Texas Canyon project, serena? Otherwise, we'd love to hear about that, I think.
Josh:I got one question for the weary. Go ahead, josh. Can I ask a question? Yes, it was the Tejana Ultim, the only tribe that was local there in the Amerind area. Good question.
Sirena Rana:No, it was also the Apache, and so when the signs go in for the trail system, the trail names will be translated into both autumn and Apache.
Mike:Oh wow, that is cool, that is super cool. Yes, very nice. Yeah, Serena, anything else to add to the Amerind trail?
Sirena Rana:Just that. You can find out more information at amaranorg.
Mike:OK, amaranorg.
Josh:This is going to be a long show notes. The show notes is going to feel exact today. That's awesome.
Mike:OK, all right, Serena next. So no rest for the weary. So you're on to the next project. Or maybe you're already concurrently working at doing two things chewing gum and walking at the same time. All right, I think it's called the Sun Corridor Trail, is that OK if we jump over to that one?
Sirena Rana:Sure.
Mike:OK, all right. So what is the Sun Corridor Trail?
Sirena Rana:So the Sun Corridor Trail is a pretty new concept. It was come up within 2013. And the idea is to create a trail that goes from Douglas, arizona, all the way to Las Vegas, nevada, kind of diagonally across the state, approximately 1,500 miles when it's done. So this concept is designed around the idea of credit card touring, which, if your listeners are familiar with this, it's a form of bike travel, and so, basically, you have full bike packing with the panniers and all of the stuff.
Josh:Wow that's cool. It's basically the opposite.
Sirena Rana:It's the opposite of that. So this is trying to travel from town to town with just some water and some snacks, and so you get your food and your lodging and all of the resupply and things like that in the towns that you go through, and so it's also using several of the loops that are complete, such as our Tucson Amazing Tucson Loop and the Maricopa Trail around Phoenix, the Prescott Circle Trail and the Flagstaff Loop Trail so far, and so the idea is to take all of these and connect them through routes that are bikeable. And this is a work in progress, it's a concept, and so I'm just starting to do presentations for communities around the state to promote the idea of the trail and get people interested. It's been really exciting because, as I'm doing these presentations, for example, I did a presentation for the Verdi Front Trails Working Group, which is the entire Verdi watershed, and so I did a presentation for them.
Sirena Rana:We're still trying to figure out routes in that area, and so people in that meeting got to contact our route developers called Dig Studio, and they're collaborating now and figuring out how to connect these different areas, and so it's a very exciting project because it's a concept that's pretty new but also has a lot of backing. I've been hired to do marketing as well as develop a Trail Towns program for them. I developed the Gateway Community Program for the Arizona Trail Association, and so I am doing that same thing now for the Sun Corridor Trail, and that involves getting folks interested, getting people to understand how trails can benefit communities, and it's not just about the people that are on the trail getting what they need. It's also about the economic development that can occur in these communities that the trail goes through.
Josh:Serena, if we look back to our episode 47, we had Josh Liptonon from Campfire Cycling, which really focuses on bicycle touring. Do you know Josh, and are you working with him at all on this?
Sirena Rana:I don't. I'm mostly on the marketing side of things, but I'd love to get in touch with him.
Josh:Yeah, so that's one of the things we'd like to do is try to use this as a way to connect people, and so Josh has got his marketing list of 50,000 people and stuff like that, and they're all like bike touring. That's his passion, so I think definitely be good to, and he's like an online wizard. So, it'd be great to hook you up with Josh. We'll definitely do that and if you haven't been to Campfire Cycling great shop kind of in the real close to the downtown area of Tucson Arizona.
Mike:And it would definitely fit the 1,500 miles Douglas to Las Vegas. That's crazy and I think you've mentioned I don't want to paraphrase, but something about the folks coming in off the trail, whether hiking or biking, being out in the wilderness for days on end, and they're coming in and they're adding to the community, For sure For the economic tourism.
Josh:Yeah, I mean you call it credit card touring. Is that what? I get that phrase right?
Sirena Rana:Right, yeah, and there's actually a website credit card touring, credit card bicycle touring I think it is dot com, and so it's a style that's more popular in overseas or the East Coast, so this is one of the first credit card touring opportunities that will be in the Southwest. It's also going to be open, obviously, to hikers and some limited equestrian use, but really the backbone of the design is to provide this credit card trail experience, and that's also why the Arizona Office of Tourism is so interested in the project. We've gotten a $250,000 grant that we're working with right now from the Arizona Office of Tourism, because this idea that people can just come into the communities and get everything that they need, hopefully every day, on the bike, and so that provides a lot of economic opportunities All right, I've been trying to get my wife to go bike touring forever, but she can't handle not having a shower.
Josh:Maybe I can get her to do some credit card touring, because it sounds like. You'll get to sleep more often in a hotel versus out on the trail.
Sirena Rana:Exactly a much easier self. Yeah, a much easier self.
Mike:Yeah, exactly OK. So you're on the marketing side, so are the trails kind of there and you just need to connect them. Where is it in the product?
Sirena Rana:Yeah, it's a combination. We're trying not to build new trail, we're trying to use existing routes, sometimes dirt roads, sometimes existing trail. There are a number of places that are a little more challenging because it's Arizona and there's wide swaths of land with not very many communities. But Dig Studio has a really neat process that they use to decide which routes might be viable and then they go out and ground, truth it and actually go out on the ground and try and see if their idea that they came up with with the maps and things like that, if that, works on the ground.
Mike:So right now it's kind of a concept, but also being worked on to make the concept of A funded concept right you get a 250,000 dollar grant.
Sirena Rana:Right.
Josh:So any idea on the timeline?
Sirena Rana:You know, with this it's fluid and it's going to be an iterative process where it's not like everything gets done all at once, but I think we've got a really strong start and the website for that, if you want to add that to the show notes is suncordortrailorg.
Josh:Hey, is there anything our listeners can do? Is there any legislation going through, anything we can vote on or anything that can happen politically to help kind of make this reality?
Sirena Rana:I think that at this point, what would be most helpful is just for people to go on the website and sign up to get updates on what's happening with the trail, because you know we'll be providing updates on our website.
Josh:Yeah, and then, as needs, open up or opportunities to help open up, you guys will be communicating that with your, with your, with the list of people who are interested.
Sirena Rana:Right, Exactly so. We have a contact form on the website and if people want to just go to that and then they can be up to date with what's happening on the trail.
Mike:Oh, that's awesome. All right, so last thing on my agenda if I can switch gears and I've got some general, we've got some general questions. Serena anything else you want to add, but if that's OK, if we can shift again here, ok, so you, I think, are writing another new book. Can you tell us about your next book project, please?
Sirena Rana:Sure, it's called Urban Trails Tucson and it's part of a Mountaineers book series that they have quite a few all over the country, and the idea is again this idea of access. I said that before that I try to make my work. I make my work so that other people can feel comfortable being outside, even if that's not something that they normally do. And so same idea with the Arizona Trail Book information on how to keep yourself safe in the desert, all of my desert hiking tips and tricks that I've learned through the years, and also a wide variety of different kinds of hikes, Because two suns hiking can be pretty challenging if you just stick to the mountains.
Sirena Rana:And so what I wanted to do was to really highlight a lot of these wonderful new parks that Pima County has developed. There's so many neat trail parks and they're new and really haven't been written about very much. Also, the loop hasn't really been written about very much, so I include pieces of the loop as well and some of the newer parks, like Enchanted Hills and Painted Hills and things like that that people might not know about but that are really the right in town. And so I wanted to make it geographically too, so that people in all of the different parts of Tucson could have something nearby.
Josh:And the word urban in your title? There is just to signify that these trails are close to a city. Like you, don't have to drive far to get to them. Was that your intent with that?
Sirena Rana:Yes.
Josh:Yeah, so it's not that these are like you're not walking through city or neighborhoods and things like that. These trails actually are out in the desert just close to Tucson, or a lot of them anyways.
Sirena Rana:And then you have things like the loop that actually goes through town in certain places. Yep, so, but yeah, the urban part is, it's their series, it's called Urban Trails, oh okay. Name of the town Gotcha Gotcha.
Mike:So how's the project coming along? Are you out there like experiencing these trails and then you write about it? And what kind of a timeline until publishing of this book?
Sirena Rana:So I do all of my research, I hike every single trail, I take notes, I do GPS tracks. It's really important to have solid information because you're sending people out into the desert.
Mike:Yeah, it's true.
Sirena Rana:And so I, you know, take voice notes, I do pictures. I have a bunch of different things that I do when I'm out researching a trail. Thankfully I had like the most beautiful spring ever.
Josh:Yeah.
Sirena Rana:This year was just incredible All of the flowers and the water everywhere and you know, it was just like Tucson at its best. So I had so much fun this spring doing I did some of the hikes in the winter and then most of them I did this spring. And you know, like I said it was, it was really fun. I got to do a bunch of waterfall hikes and then also find out new places that I'd never been before.
Josh:Dude the more you talk, the more I'm thinking about quitting my job.
Mike:So, serena, with you know, in our AI or artificial intelligence type world, we'll start to live the hearing you like boots on the ground kind of experience these trails Acoustic.
Sirena Rana:Thank you, Josh.
Mike:And then that context that you're adding to the literature right that you're writing about, I think makes it so meaningful for the person. You know avid hikers, or does anyone pick up a book, wants to go on a quick, get off their iPad, get off the computer and go for an urban hike. I think it's neat yeah.
Josh:Especially in a world where you can't even tell what's real anymore. I'm like we don't even know if the things we're seeing, you know digitally, are actually the person that's talking. But to hear about you going out there, touching and feeling, smelling, tasting, experiencing and then sharing those insights with us, man, that's pretty cool.
Sirena Rana:Well, one of the best compliments I've ever gotten on my previous book was that it feels like you're on the trail with me.
Mike:Oh, nice, yeah, that's super cool. All right, so that is going to be coming out in a. Do you have a title? Is it Urban Trails, tucson?
Sirena Rana:Yeah, it's Urban Trails Tucson. I'll be completing the book by the end of the year and then it'll come out early 2025.
Mike:Okay, early 2025. That's okay. Yeah, all right, very cool, all right. So I got some general questions for you. So you've racked up countless miles on trails. Are there any specific trails or regions that hold a special place in your heart, and why?
Sirena Rana:Oh gosh, the whole area around Tucson is just incredible, and the more I travel around the more I realize we are so lucky to have what we have in Tucson. The Catalinas are gorgeous. All of the mountains around here have their own character. I like the fact that you can go canyoneering in the Catalinas. People would never think that you can go repelling down waterfalls in the desert, but there's that right there. And then there's all the trails, but then there's all the bushwhacking and route finding, kind of choose your own adventure, sort of thing, and you know the fact.
Josh:So, irina, can you define the word when you say bushwhacking? Can you define that term for our listeners?
Sirena Rana:Sure. So it's not like hanging out with a machete in the desert, like clearing a trail which is what it sounds like.
Sirena Rana:But it just means traveling with no trail and being off trail and making your own way, and so there's a lot of opportunities to do that and a lot of them are really, really rugged but super amazing. As far as the payoff, I'm thinking these things can be right in town too. I'm thinking like Pima Canyon has some of my favorite. There's all those peaks in Pima Canyon. You can bushwhack too and go off trail and it's brutal and it'll test your will, but the feeling of being up there and finally getting to your goal and also what you see on the way is incredible.
Josh:We live at the base of the ring cons out on the east side and we do some bushwhacking out there too. There's some beautiful opportunities out in the ring cons as well. If you haven't done that.
Sirena Rana:Absolutely.
Mike:All right. Next thing is I know a lot of your work involves outreach in the communities and some education, and so how do you go about and this is kind of a plan, not play, but taking the name of your company here but how do you go about raising awareness and inspiring others to become responsible stewards of the outdoors?
Sirena Rana:Well, it's just something that I work into pretty much everything that I do. It's one of those things that I teach people about in both of my books. It's something that I've always mentioned in my social media and on my website, and when I'm doing work with the Sun Corridor Trail, we work with the Arizona Office of Tourism's Appreciate AZ, leave no Trace, and so just also leading by example, not posting things that you shouldn't be doing, and also you can do a lot of stuff in person as well. I love to teach people about that kind of thing because, again, I work with a lot of people that might not have been outdoors a lot and don't know that you might think, oh well, just an Apple Core, what's it going to be? What hurt is it going to do? But then you explain to people well, this is why, and then they had a better understanding of it, instead of just like there's these rules and this is the way it is.
Josh:Yeah, so one of the things I want to highlight from your website, Trails Inspire you guys offer an opportunity if there's organizations that are looking to book you for some education, virtual courses, right? Can you tell us a little bit about what you're doing there?
Sirena Rana:Yeah, absolutely I do. It's neat because virtual presentations have really opened up a lot of opportunities for me to reach a wider audience and not have to do a bunch of traveling to do it, and so in that way I'm able to teach about a number of things backpacking, hiking. I also teach about benefits of trails to communities. I teach about the Grand Canyon. I basically teach about anything. I'll teach about anything I know about, and I love to share my experiences and my knowledge with folks.
Josh:And you've got a great list of suggested topics and things that you've kind of worked out already. But you mentioned that you can do custom with people as well and they can get a hold of you from your website there, right?
Mike:Of course that's awesome. So kind of going back to what after the accident, if I can, and then kind of get back on your feet literally and then outside on the trail and then sometimes you have some flare-ups that you mentioned and then trails inspire. It also involves, like, just getting everyone involved in the outdoors. Like what are some? What steps can individuals take to make the outdoors more accessible, like to everyone? Whether it's, you know maybe I took my mom on as an example hiking. I used to always take her out hiking and the last time I took her out she just couldn't make some of the steps you know because of her knees. And when I heard you talk about like the urban book that you're writing, maybe something like that would be helpful for some folks who maybe, you know, physically can't hike like they used to.
Sirena Rana:Absolutely. I also think about my dad a lot. My dad's 83. He loves to hike but he doesn't. He can't do the kind of steps and things like that and you know he prefers something that's he loves the loop, basically the trails at Amaran.
Sirena Rana:Surprisingly, even though this terrain is so extreme and you know boulders and stuff like that flagline trails is so great that sometimes you don't even need to look at your feet. I mean, like most of the time on the Amaran trails you don't have to look at your feet because the tread is so good, and so that alone makes it way more accessible to a lot of people. Also, whenever I design trails, I try to do an interpretive loop that's smaller and wider for folks. That you know just has a lot of interpretive information on it, places to sit. One of the things that this Amaran is doing is ordering a lot of benches so that people can sponsor a bench and, you know, just giving people that experience.
Sirena Rana:I also say that you know I designed trails too for the Serena that came to Arizona and knew absolutely nothing. Like you know, I didn't know a single thing about hiking or how to find my way or anything like that, and so I always think of and that was really helpful when I was writing my books too is to take it down to that beginner's level and think back to like, oh, this is how I was when I first came here. Other than, you know, it's easy to get caught up and think like, oh yeah, people know how to do this, but you know, coming from a background where I and I came here and learned, I think really gave me a great perspective to get other people out there.
Josh:So you mentioned a word. I just want to make sure our listeners understand it Because, as we're learning these the kind of trail specific terms, you said that the tread of the Amaran trails in many cases was like so good that you don't even have to look at your feet. What that? I think what that word means is actually the surface of the trail itself, so it must be pretty smooth and worked out. Do I have that right?
Sirena Rana:Correct. Yeah, so it goes through the grasslands, like I said, and so they were able to really create beautiful pathways, get you know bunch of the rocks out of there. You know, work around the rock formations so that you don't have to be watching your feet all the time and you can enjoy looking at all of the scenery.
Josh:Okay. So for all of our mountain bikers that are having a FOMO right now, you wouldn't want to ride this on a mountain bike. Anyways, get off your bike and go hike it, it's awesome.
Mike:Yeah, so we feel very fortunate to have like people like you, Mark Flint, in our community. It's a great like collaboration of your perspectives and interests and experience to bring to what our topography and geography and everything right in this area. So thanks, thanks for all you do, Because if it wasn't for people like you, who would have these?
Josh:you know these resources, outdoor resources, yeah, so do you have any final thoughts? You want to leave our listeners with.
Sirena Rana:I just really hope that you know I'm talking to outdoorsy people, but also maybe take somebody that hasn't been outdoors, that's a great thought.
Mike:Take Milan, love it.
Sirena Rana:See how they like it. But also don't beat them up the first time. Take it easy. Make sure it's a good time for them. Make sure it's a good time for them.
Josh:All right. So it's trails, inspirecom and Amarin trail system opening up on grand opening on October 7th. This podcast will be out October 3rd. Thank you so much, serena, for coming and spending some time with us. We really appreciate you Absolutely.
Sirena Rana:It was a pleasure talking to you both.
Josh:I'm going to play our go out music, serena, but you can stay on, okay.
Sirena Rana:Can you dig it?
Mike:Can you dig it? Can you dig it Okay?