Specks of gray peek out of Donna Burch’s blonde hair while she sits in downtown Elon during a crisp autumn day. A white, linen long-sleeve top disguises her cobalt blue undershirt. Resting on a thin chain, a silver, circular pendant resembling a wedding ring dangles from her neck. When the sun hits her, the lenses of her glasses darken. Through the tint, tears form in her eyes as she remembers her husband, Haley Burch.
The wrinkles on her face crease as she smiles talking about the life she had shared with him. Her hand, no longer the home of a wedding ring, pushes over stapled papers that read “Haley Barrett Burch.” Haley smiles in the picture attached to his obituary. He’s in a Mountains-to-Sea Trails hat and sports a tan from the warm North Carolina sun. He is now forever frozen looking at Donna.
Natives of North Carolina, the couple volunteered together at the Mountains-to-Sea Trail — a wilderness path that spans the width of the state from Clingmans Dome in the Great Smoky Mountains to Jockey’s Ridge State Park on the Outer Banks. Volunteers, also known as Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, work field days throughout the year to maintain the trails. Haley left a legacy through his leadership, his experience in carpentry and the energy he brought to the group.
Donna Burch looks for weeds to clip along the Mountains-to-Sea Trail by Guildford County Farm on Oct. 29.
The couple met in Elon in the late 1970s, when 20-year-old Donna had moved into town. Haley was a 25-year-old contractor trying to figure out what to do with his life. At 22 years old, he had moved to Burlington to work with Ralph Harris Builders. They dated for a few months before deciding the relationship wasn’t going to work. Afterward, Donna had started working at a Navy base in the Bahamas, where she met her first husband. She and her first husband then moved to Florida where she raised two children. But Donna knew that her heart was missing the piece of itself that was left with Haley and decided to end the marriage out of respect for her husband.
After a mutual friend helped reconnect them, Haley moved down to Florida from Greensboro to date Donna once again. He put his property in the Triad area up for rent, left his job and moved down the block from Donna. In 2003, they got married.
When both Haley and Donna’s parents became sick, they moved back to the Triad area to care for them. In Greensboro, they bought a house with 13 acres of land that they both maintained Haley was diagnosed with stage 3 esophageal cancer in July 2021. After unexpected complications from his esophagectomy, where the infected esophagus is removed and replaced with a piece of the stomach or large intestine, he died suddenly Dec. 30, 2021.
“Even though I lost him the way I did, I still feel like I was the luckiest person on the planet,” Donna said. “I had him for 20 years. I can't think of anyone I know that could love their spouse more than I love that man.”
Birdies, Bogeys and Trail Builders
As people gathered for the workday, Alamance County Mountains-to-Sea task force leader Andrew Sam smiled with a shine in his eyes. His gray hair sprouts out from his green Mountains-to-Sea hat and his eyes hide behind soft, almond-shaped glasses. He hugs his wife, Laura, who brought a box of biscuits for the group.
“We’ve developed a group where the social aspect is as important as the building of a bridge or a trail,” Sam said. “I might be the task force leader, but I look at what somebody is bringing to the group.”
All 725 miles of the Mountain-to-Sea Trail are maintained by the volunteers — either by hand or with equipment. Trail leaders work with communities to establish connections that can further expand these 3- to 6-foot trails, as Sam does with the town of Elon and other surrounding areas. At the end of the year, many come together for the “Gathering of Friends” that celebrates the achievements of those who have come out to work field days or who have hiked the entire trail.
“The majority of people who are members of the Mountain-to-Sea Trail tend to be maintainers,” Sam said. “Every person there is a hiker or has some hiking in them, but most of them are maintainers. They volunteer to maintain or do something for the organization. If a volunteer comes out here and helps build — they have pride in it.”
Coming down the side of a resident’s home on Indian Valley Road in Burlington, the Mountains-to-Sea Trail volunteers head around the border of the backyards that surround The Valley Golf Course. Gravel crunches under the weight of the 11 volunteers who are heading to work on the wilderness paths near the Haw River. White plastic circles drilled into tree bark lead the group to where they will be working for the day. A sign that marks the marriage of the Haw River Trail and the Mountains-to-Sea Trail heads the start of the path.
In the distance, volunteers weed out the overgrown path that has been flooded from the heavy rainfall that hit the area before Hurricane Helene. But the river that lies under the bridge has been drained to only leave mud under the builders’ feet.
Sam walks with a chainsaw in hand. His slim figure is dressed in neon orange protective gear, a face shield, cool-colored work clothes and brown work boots. He leads the Mountains-to-Sea Trail in Alamance County. While volunteers talk to each other, Sam occasionally looks at his phone with one orange work glove removed so he can touch the screen.
Donna works on her hands and knees building a wooden bridge with only hammers and saws. A dirt path leads to and from the bridge, curving around the Haw River that streams through under it. Oak trees enclose the space to shelter it from the neon and white golf balls that soar through the air from the driving range next to it. She leans over two-by-four planks that were once a part of the bridge that connected the wilderness trails from Great Bend Park to The Valley Golf Course’s fifth hole.
“We were on our way back in with some materials,” Donna said “I had to make a couple of trips back to get other tools. Somebody's like, ‘What are you doing out there?’ ‘We're working on a trail. There's a hiking trail.’ He's like, ‘Really?’ That's part of the struggle is trying to get people to understand that.”
Three other men assist Donna with the deconstruction of the bridge, which has shown decay from environmental effects and usage from citizens in the area. Donna wears a Mountains-to-Sea Trail hat and T-shirt as she, one of the team's sawyers, saws into new wood parts for the bridge. Both pieces of clothing serve as a reminder of her husband who worked on the trails. In pictures, Haley wears a uniform similar to Donna’s to show his loyalty to the group that creates wilderness paths for the community.
“My trail family saved my life,” Donna said. “The trail people, they were all just crushed because he was just amazing. He got so many people to come out and continue to come out. They loved Haley. He was one of a kind. They show me their love for him by being there for me.”
Back at the top of the trail, a white work trailer connected to Sam’s black truck is decked out with Mountains-to-Sea Trail decals. Sweat droplets stream from Sam’s face. After having hauled up a large brush mower, his hands come out of his gloves to reveal calluses that illustrate the hard work he’s completed in four hours at the golf course. He leans against his Mountains-to-Sea trailer, hooked to the back of his black pickup truck, and drinks from the plastic water bottle he’s brought.
The trailer’s history is not just that it was bought from a shop. Haley had gotten the trailer to hold tools for his own company Burch Builders. He took it with him when he patented the “Easy Coper” tool, a device used to help cope crown molding. This would help create a piece of ceiling or floor trim that fits snugly against another piece to create a joint in an inside corner. After touring the United States selling the product, the trailer stayed at the couple’s house.
When Haley passed, the Alamance and Guilford County Mountains-to-Sea Trail, or Segment 8 and Segment 9, volunteers had broken off into two separate groups. Sam said it was too large of an area for volunteers of both counties to commute, so the change had to be made. Donna keeps the trailer on her property as a way to honor Haley.
“Before Haley passed away, I would go over there and he would complain about this trailer,” Sam said. “He’d say, ‘Hey, you want that thing? It leaks.’ Donna wanted to donate that trailer to the Mountain-to-Sea Trail. She pays the tax and tags. It doesn’t belong to the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, anyways. They’re not really in the business of owning trailers.”
There were two places volunteers would go after field days: The Fat Frogg in Elon or Donna and Haley’s house. Haley would invite others to come enjoy a meal and refreshments after working in the sweltering sun. As Sam worked more and more with Haley, they grew a strong friendship beyond the trailwork.
“After we did multiple trips together and a lot of sawyer work together, we became really good friends, but only for a short period of time,” Sam said. “We would have a beer or do some work at his house, cut trees, and help him with his property. He would want me to have one more and one more. I’m like ‘Haley, I’ve got to drive home at some point here.’ He just wanted to hang out.”
For 30 years, Sam changed into his dark blue scrubs to work at a University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill hospital in the medical intensive care unit after work days on the trails. From nurse to trail lead, Sam has created paths that continue to be rebuilt and require assistance in times of need. When Haley got sick, Sam would come to the house for medical and emotional support.
Since Haley’s passing, Donna and Sam have maintained a friendship that includes checking up on one another and helping with yard work, especially after storms. While Sam said volunteers become upset when there aren’t enough biscuits in the morning to feed the crew, sweet treats from Donna help them feel better. The dedication and enjoyment she brings are things that the group also appreciates, Sam said.
“Donna brings brownies to the maintenance trips, so everybody’s excited to see her when she brings the brownies,” Sam said. “She works really hard. She’ll cut something as quickly as anybody else and clear the trail with her chainsaw. I enjoy being around her. I consider her a really good friend.”
Putting Down Roots
Belews Lake, located by Stokesdale, houses long-term, leased tiny homes that Duke Energy rents to campers staying in the area. Next to it sits the Knight-Brown Nature Preserve, which consists of almost five miles of trails that run through Belews Creek into the Dan River. Piedmont Land Conservancy conservation planner Palmer McIntyre said she remembers that she and Haley started trail building around 2011 when the Burchs owned one of the homes in the area.
“He started coming out to our volunteer work days and he had never done trail building before,” McIntyre said. “We were all learning as we went. He just was willing to work really hard.”
The Piedmont Land Conservancy aims to protect land resources through conservation and preservation. The organization acquired Knight-Brown Nature Preserve in 2008 from a woman who inherited and donated the land from her partner. It was the first nature preserve PLC has constructed. Additional tracts and trails were added for hikers and campers to enjoy the area.
“We got together regularly for about a year and a half to build all these trails,” McIntyre said. “He was part of that small team, and we opened that preserve in 2013. Haley never saw the newest trails added since he passed away.”
McIntyre has a sense that Haley had a want to service the community and “create spaces that others could enjoy.” The trails created by the PLC are now regularly used for school field trips, hikers and those who live on the campsite by the lake.
“He left such a legacy with that project,” McIntyre said. “Even after we built the trails, he would continue to steward them. After a storm, he'd go around with his chainsaw and clear off any fallen trees. Donna would help him. He was kind of our little trail angel fixing things.”
Burch Bridge
Along the Mountains-to-Sea trail by the Guilford County Farm on Howerton Road in Elon, Donna carries a hand pruner to slice any loose thorny weeds or roots from the ground. In the other hand, Donna carries a light, brown walking stick carved with a deer bone and dark green chording, which she digs into the ground for stabilization as she walks the trail. Formerly the Guilford Prison Farm, 120 out of the 730 acres of land have been turned into a nature preserve with three trails. One of the trails that runs through the vast wooded area is a section of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail.
A man sits at the edge of the lake that encompasses the middle of the hiking area. He wears a snap-back hat and a beard that lengthens to his chest. In a white T-shirt and black skinny jeans, he holds a DSLR camera with a 200-millimeter lens to capture pictures of birds that fly by.
Donna points the man out. They spark up a conversation on the man’s work documenting birds in the Piedmont area. She explains that her hike is focused on a portion of the Mountain-to-Sea Trail with a bridge.
Among yellow leaves that have fallen from the trees as autumn approaches, a curved bridge sits across Travis Creek. In the shape of a rainbow, its inclines have been installed with extra smaller planks for tread support after a runner slipped going up the bridge following a rain.
In Donna’s backpack, a blue bench brush peeks out. Donna kneels down and uses it to sweep leaves and twigs off the bridge. As she works her way up and then down the bridge, Donna reaches a plaque that sits bolted to its arch. On it reads “Burch Bridge: In memory of Haley Barrett Burch with much love and gratitude from the Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail.”
Burch Bridge sits on Travis Creek on the Mountains-to-Sea Trail by Guildford County Prison. Haley Burch built the bridge before his death, dedicated to him March 25, 2023.
“Haley built that bridge at our house,” Donna said. “I think that nobody knows what goes on behind the scenes of these trails and any kind of volunteer thing.”
On March 25, 2023, the bridge was dedicated to Haley. Sam’s wife recorded the event to document the friends, family and county officials who had come to celebrate the work Haley did. Sam organized the event and emphasized the importance of having people of different skill sets come together to make a project happen.
As Donna watches the video back, she winces and pauses the video 10 seconds in, saying, “I can’t do it. I’ll cry.” She continues to brush away any leaves left on the bridge.
“I’m not a bridge builder,” Sam said about the Alamance County group and its volunteers. “I can lay out a trail. That’s the importance of this group. I wasn’t a part of that project. But the design of it with the arch was very special. I think it shows a lot of the talent that Haley had.”
As the trail ends, Donna pulls down on a dying branch, cutting it off with a small hand saw. Once removed, she throws it off the trail paths.
“He always told me, ‘Anything you do, any branch you move, anything you pick up, it all helps,’” Donna said. “When you're walking on a trail and you see limbs, just reach down and put it to the side.”
While the path changes with the weather and season, Haley’s name and memory stay frozen on the plaque left at Burch Bridge. Donna continues to pick up his legacy from where he left it after his passing. Once she gets to the end of the trail, she uproots some weeds, reaches down and throws them to the side.