Looking Downstream to Mineral Bar
My intent with this blog is to write about the Yuba and Bear Rivers in the Sierra Nevada in California, but there are other beautiful, interesting and exhilarating rivers nearby. The North Fork of the American is a designated Wild and Scenic River and the Stevens Trail is on the National Register of Historic Places. The trail is in a steep and rugged canyon located only a few miles south of the Bear River and I visit it often because it’s in the neighborhood.
Be forewarned that the Stevens Trail has become extremely popular and can be very busy in good weather. Part of its popularity is because the trailhead is on a major highway and therefore easy to get to, also in the spring the hillsides are ablaze with colorful wildflowers. The trail is a 3.7 mile descent of 1,200’ from the trailhead to its terminus at Secret Canyon followed by a return walk back upslope to the trailhead making it a 7.4-mile hike. It’s a well-designed 19th century pack trail that’s doable by a wide spectrum of hikers, even those who seldom hike.
I generally avoid crowds, so I seldom use this trail in pleasant weather unless I leave early in the morning or hike in the winter when it’s just as gorgeous. Because of the heavy use it’s important that you leave no trace and pack out trash left. This trail is a gift and deserves respect.
How to get there:
Colfax, California is on Interstate Highway 80 between Auburn and Emigrant Gap. Take the Colfax Exit and get on North Canyon Way on the east side of the highway. Drive north for less than a mile, past the cemetery, to the clearly marked trailhead. Some people have homes adjacent to the trailhead so don’t block driveways or trespass – be neighborly.
The Stevens Trail
The Stevens Trail connected the supply and transportation hub of Illinoistown with the hydraulic mining town of Iowa Hill and other mines on various tributaries. In between these two settlements is the North Fork of the American River located at the bottom of a steep canyon. The ridge dividing the Bear River and the North Fork of the American climbs northeasterly from Auburn to Illinoistown. Illinoistown was located about a mile south of present-day Colfax and was also known as Upper Corral and Alder Grove. The Placer Herald of September 18, 1852 said that it was named Illinoistown in October of 1849 when the miners had a grand dinner in this “town of four houses”, and since most of them were Illinoisans, “… they by acclimation and a bottle of whiskey, named the place Illinoistown.” The same article describes two productive steam operated sawmills and a fruit orchard – by 1853 they also had a Post Office.
The earliest references to Illinoistown describe it as lying within a small valley which, of course, was valuable to the indigenous Nisenan people as well. This valley, and others like it were within forests of Sugar Pine, Douglas Fir, Incense Cedar, Yellow Pine and Black Oak providing a mosaic of diverse ecosystems and environmental nooks that were essential ingredients for the Nisenan version of the good life.
The industrious inhabitants of Illinoistown immediately went to work dropping trees, digging holes for gold, creating big corrals and allowing livestock and horses in streams and meadows and other native ecosystems. Despite this rude behavior the Nisenan people were never consulted. The interlopers never asked for permission, never offered a trade, never even had a meeting to disclose their intent. They simply ignored the indigenous people. When the Nisenan responded by nicking cattle and horses the whites retaliated with extreme measures, eventually burning the native's winter stores in several locations and forming a militia called the California Blades, who burned entire indigenous settlements and posted Indian scalps along the trail between Auburn and Illinoistown. This particular episode of barbaric behavior is well documented in the historic record.
Secret Canyon and the North Fork of the American
The ridge itself is still a major route from the Sacramento Valley and Auburn to Donner Summit and the east side of the Sierra Nevada. There was trade and communication between the west-side Nisenan and the east-side Washoe for centuries and there is archaeological evidence of trade and occupation for thousands of years by the unnamed people who preceded them. In the historic era, Illinoistown was the eastern terminus of navigation for wagon traffic, a place where goods and people were transferred to pack animals who descended into the canyons to supply miners on the Bear River and the North Fork of the American and its tributaries. The trail between Illinoistown and Iowa Hill was built in anticipation of the transcontinental railroad (Central Pacific Railroad) which was completed in 1869.
John Rutherford allegedly began work on the trail in 1867 and immediately took on a partner named Truman Stevens who, by 1870, was the sole owner of the trail. Prior to the railroad there were already rudimentary trails into the canyons used by both the indigenous people and gold miners, but the Stevens Trail was an investment. In 1866 a Post Office was opened in Colfax, while the one in Illinoistown was closed.
Iowa Hill is 9 air-miles southeast of Colfax on a ridge between the North Fork of the American and Indian Creek at an elevation of 2,860’. Gold was discovered near Iowa Hill in 1848 but the area was propelled into prominence by the discovery of deep gravels in 1854. These tertiary gravels were mined by hydraulicking and later by drift mining. In its heyday there were 15 stores and 18 hotels with a population of approximately 1,000. By 1880 the Iowa Hill mining district had produced $20 million in gold but was considered “worked out.”
Slaughter Ravine
As you begin your descent from the trailhead there is mostly Canyon Live Oak above and below the trail. In the wet months the tread can get a bit soggy. Where the trail crosses Slaughter Ravine there are wildflowers in the spring and summer along with introduced plants like Tree of Heaven, Periwinkle and fruit trees. Before long you’ll find yourself on a dirt road that was created in 1978 and remains the only disturbance to an otherwise pristine trail. Easy to find signs will direct you back to the trail.
At Robbers Ravine the trail splits into an upper trail and lower trail. The upper trail is the more scenic of the two, but it can be difficult to navigate in the wet season. From the upper trail is a good view of Cape Horn where Chinese laborers, while secured by ropes, picked and blasted a ledge for the Central Pacific Railroad tracks. Cape Horn is a steep bluff with a 75° slope, 1,400’ above the North Fork of the American River. There is a popular story about Chinese workers in baskets hanging over a cliff to do this work, but this can’t be substantiated by research and this geologic feature is not really a cliff, but a dome with a dramatic slope. Baskets would shred if they were lowered and raised along this rocky slide. Author Maxine Hong Kingston tells a story about a man, who supposedly worked on this project, describing the lowering of baskets to get Chinese workers in position to set dynamite. I doubt its accuracy as history simply because there are no records. Also, reminiscences, in their continuous retelling, change and tend to amplify the “good parts.” Maxine Hong Kingston is a contemporary artist informed by tradition, who freely admits that some of her work is outside of the sphere of academia and wouldn’t necessarily stand up to Western critical analysis but this does not diminish her art in any way. There is an interesting discussion of this topic on the Central Pacific Railroad site (cprr.org).
Facing Cape Horn From Robbers Ravine
After the two trails merge, you’ll come to a place where the trail becomes a rock ledge with a mining excavation adjacent to the trail. Don’t bother exploring, it wouldn’t be an abandoned mine if it were productive. Continue walking out to a point with a great view of the North Fork of the American downstream where you can see the bridge at Mineral Bar. In 1851 a ferry crossed the river here on the wagon road between Illinoistown and Iowa Hill. Charles Rice built the Mineral Bar and Iowa City Turnpike Road in 1854 and worked as the superintendent and toll collector for the next 30 years. Tolls across the 110’ bridge ranged from 25 cents for a pedestrian to $6.50 for six yoke of oxen and a wagon. It was a 10-mile trip that took four hours. Placer County purchased the road in 1906 and today Mineral Bar is a Bureau of Land Management managed recreation area.
From this expansive vista the Stevens Trail descends to the east, with curvy river views and some steep drops downslope. On September 4, 1884 the Placer Argus published an article titled “Fatal Fall” in which they report the arrival of a riderless horse in Iowa Hill prompting the formation of a search party. “Honorable J. H. Neff found a hat known to belong to E. Webster on the Stevens Trail about a mile from the river on the Colfax side. Mr. Webster was about 60 years old and a native of Maine. His body was found well below the trail. It is supposed that his hat fell off, and he dismounted and stumbled over the bank, a distance of over 200 feet.” In November of 1890 the same newspaper reported the shooting of a 7’ long, 125-pound mountain lion on the Stevens Trail. The message is the usual one for outdoor activities, enjoy yourself but remain alert, for things can change in an instant.
Hikers on the Stevens Trail
There are long shade-free areas as you descend to Secret Canyon so wear a hat, use sunscreen and bring enough water. It can get hot here in mid-summer. When you get close to the river at Secret Canyon, there is a rocky ledge below the trail with a few bedrock mortars and some rusted wire rope. This was the location of a wire rope suspension bridge across the river that was used extensively from 1871 to 1895; in 1914 it collapsed and was never rebuilt. Andrew Hallidie, renowned for his invention of the San Francisco cable cars, made the first wire rope produced in the West for the Bay State Mine on the Middle Fork of the American River in 1856. In the following year Hallide established a plant to produce wire rope in San Francisco’s North Beach. By 1869 A.S. Hallidie & Company had built a 320’ bridge across Deer Creek in Nevada City and a 225’ bridge across the Bear River, among others. Years ago I walked the trail from Iowa Hill to this place and it was dense with vegetation and less scenic than the north side but I can’t vouch for its condition now.
Wire Rope from the Suspension Bridge that Crossed the River (1870-1914)
In addition to the bedrock mortars found at the bridge site here there are many more on the river’s edge just above the stream in Secret Canyon. In the early 1980s we counted over 50 bedrock mortars at this location. In the intervening 40 years many of the mortars have filled with sand and gravel due to the accumulation of silt and the periodic placer mining that takes place here. This is such a beautiful spot. Imagine the Nisenan gathered here where the river is shallow and there is a gravely bottom, perfect for salmon spawning. The men may have been fishing here, while the women were possibly drying salmon and pounding fish bones into a powder suitable for soup stock, while caring for the children swimming nearby. I don't think I'm reaching to say that they enjoyed and appreciated this place and I can easily imagine them singing, swapping stories and sharing jokes as they worked. This is obviously a seasonal campsite and I wonder what trail they used to get here.
Bedrock Mortars Alongside the North Fork of the American
When you get out of the canyon you may be hungry and ready for some regional hippie-mex food available at Homie Joe’s Tacos on North Canyon Road a stone’s throw from the Colfax Cemetery, near Highway 80’s Exit 135. There are some trade offs, but there is a unique and savory menu, plenty to eat, and great ambiance. I appreciated being addressed as “Brother-Man” and I intend to return.
Hank Meals will be hiking the Stevens Trail on January 12, 2020, For more information contact laura@hiking4good.com.
Hank Meals will be hiking the Stevens Trail on January 12, 2020, For more information contact laura@hiking4good.com.
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