Stebbins Cold Canyon - April '25 

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On a Tuesday in early April, ten of us met in Davis & carpooled to a carpark near the Monticello Dam on Lake Berryessa, six miles from Winters, Ca. Suddenly the terrain has steep hills !

There are two main trails here and one of them is immediately & impossibly steep. We took the Homestead trail, which follows Putah Creek gradually uphill into a modest watershed, with a goal of reaching the junction with Annie's Trail, at 2 miles out with 1,000 ft. of gain.    

The hikers today were Maryam, Max, Donna, Cynthia, Marcia, Ellen, Frank, Rick, Jean, and me.   

	starting out		looking uphill to the right		purple nightshade
				< pacific poison oak & California buckeye >
	Putah creek		Cottonwoods w/ bright spring foliage		morning glory
		looking back		pipe stem clematis
	sticky bush monkey flower

After spending some time on a progressively steep ascent, most of us turned back, while Marcia & Ellen kept going.

We headed downhill, diverting on a side trail leading to a shady spot, with an old building foundation, right on the creek, a great place for lunch. The audio was light breezes in the Cottonwoods overhead plus many bird calls.

On the way back -

	Cynthia & Jean		some of the group		Arroyo lupine
		woodbalm - this plant was  everywhere		2024 Toyon berries
	a giant maple tree...		...near the car park		Frank's group photo (at the start of the walk)

Most of us walked almost 4 miles round trip, with about 800 ft. of gain, and, we were up & down numerous well-constructed stairways at times, some with big steps.

There were technical aspects, like having to cross Putah Creek a few times, using boulders & stepping stones.

Epilogue  - That this good a walk is so close to home is amazing, a 90-minute drive from home. 

Landscape note - there was a wildfire in the canyon, 4 years ago, yet we saw hillsides with impressive growth of native shrubs & small trees, and most of the largest Cottonwoods along the creek survived.  

Another plant item - you could tell that we missed the ideal flowering period for native Redbud trees, by maybe 3 weeks. Maybe next year we'll try hiking here about mid-March. (The first time I hiked here with Rich's group, long ago, the hillsides were 'ablaze' with deep pink Redbud flowers.)  

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Postscript - Eight of us drove into Winters on the return drive, to have a snack at the Putah Creek Cafe, in the center of town. We shared the same meal as last time, one serving of corn pie plus a roasted veggie/feta pizza, along with sweet potato fries, and beers, well, or coffee & nice-looking bakery pie for M&M.

Arriving here at 2:30 pm on a Tuesday was an ideal for finding great service & quick delivery; pizzas here take only ten minutes ! 

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