Autumn Gold in The Gold Country: Hiking Around the Sugar Pine Reservoir

Sugar Pine Reservoir

 

Date: October 18, 2025,
Place: Sugar Pine Reservoir 
Coordinates: 39.130585, -120.790957

Length: 4.7 miles
Level: mildly moderate

 

One day last October things were getting a bit too much for me and I felt that it was time to reset myself and clear my mind. When I am in need of a getaway, I go out to Nature. Leaving the house in the good care of my family I took my camping gear, drove northeast and found a camp site in Mineral Bar State Park on the American River. Now, Mineral Bar State Park is in the heart of the Gold Country. I arrived there at nightfall, made myself some dinner, spent a couple of hours doing some writing, and went to sleep. In the morning I saw people going down to the river carrying, not fishing rods but gold pans. I've been hiking California for a long time and I knew that some people are still panning for gold but this was my first time actually seeing it with my own eyes. 

Mineral Bar is a recreation park that isn't focused on hiking and I wanted to hike. Before leaving on this trip I found on the map what looked like a lovely little reservoir with a four-miles loop trail around it. So After breakfast and breaking camp I drove through the forest and past some old Gold Country little towns to Sugar Pine Reservoir. A cute western fence lizard welcomed me at the mostly empty parking lot. 

Western Fence Lizard

 

One of the reasons I chose Sugar Pine Reservoir loop trail for my hike is because it is located in Placer County. It might be a silly reason but I'd like to have all of California counties represented in my blog and Placer County wasn't yet. It was an area of the Sierra Nevada I was less familiar with and now was the perfect chance to finally see a bit of it. 

My hike as captured by my GPS

The day use parking area was near the boat ramp above the reservoir, and my hike begun with going down the short trail that connected the parking lot with the loop trail. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir Trail

When I reached the bottom of the access trail I paused and took in the view of the lake. It was like a blue jewel, nestled between the forested slopes. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir

It had fairly round shape, almost like it was a natural lake. It was easy to forget this body of water was a dammed, human-made reservoir. 

I was surprised to find out that below the parking lot the lake-round trail trail was asphalt-paved. It promised to be an easy walk, and probably not a lonely one either. Indeed, soon after I started walking east I came upon tow women, a mother and daughter, who asked me to take their photo together with the lake at the background. I gladly obliged their request, and then I asked them about their cargo - each woman was carrying two large plastic bags filled with mushrooms they have collected on the trail. I was curious to know which mushrooms they were and I was seriously concerned when their answer was that they weren't completely sure ... well, I didn't hear of any sickness or fatality due to wild mushroom consumption after this hike so I hope their instincts were correct and that those mushrooms were edible. I personally would not have taken that risk. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir Trail

I didn't meet any other hikers for a while. Continuing east (counter-clockwise) I passed the lake shore and reached the bridge that crossed Forbes Creek, one of the creeks feeding the reservoir. The creek was running low - the rains didn't come yet to this part of the country. 

The pavement continued on the opposite shore but it was also going up and down a bit. I was hearing birds around me and among them I identified the call of the mountain chickadee. It was very hard to see them though and I couldn't get any good photo of these little forest birds. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir Trail

The trail rose above the shore, giving me a view of the eastern lobe of the reservoir. I saw a couple of anglers on the opposite shore, not far from where the boat ramp was. On the other side of the trail I was being watched by a pair of plastic googly eyes that someone glued to a rock by the trail side. Seeing it made me smile even though I do not appreciate people leaving senseless marks in nature. 

The trail leveled and delved into the forest, distancing from the water a bit. The forest was all of conifers - pines, firs and cedars. I heard a bicycle rider coming up fast from behind and moved sideways in time for him to pass me. 

When the trail came closer to the reservoir once more I saw an information sign posted there. The sign had a faded photo of cattle grazing in a flat, mild valley. It was how the place before the damming of the creeks and the valley's flooding. Below the water, so the sign said, were artifacts of the Native California community that lived there, and also of a small mining operation that was there during the Gold Rush years.

Sugar Pine Reservoir

I have clearly reached the interpretive part of the reservoir-surrounding trail. I started seeing strategically placed benches and more interpretive signs along the trail. One of these signs said that osprey birds were frequenting this lake. I watched out for them but didn't see any of these magnificent raptorson my hike that day. 

Curving around the eastern shore of the reservoir the forest receded from the shore and the vegetation near the trail looked more like thin chaparral comprised of small pines and large manzanita. 

The manzanita were covered with ripe, red berries. Naturally, I picked some to munch on. They were a bit on the dry side but otherwise quite good, so I kept picking manzanita berries to chew on whenever I saw them along the hike. 

Manzanita, Arctostaphilos sp. 

A splashing sound came from the water and when I turned to look I saw the arrowhead formed by a few ducks that were swimming away from the shore. 

Those ducks were mallards - perhaps the most common and ubiquitous duck species there is. These mallards were the only species of waterfowl that I saw at the Sugar Pine Reservoir that day, save for a solitary greb which I wasn't able to photograph before it took a dive under water. 

Mallards

The forest was back at the edge of the water now, and another interpretive sign informed me about the importance of fallen logs to the forest's ecosystem, providing shelter to many animal species and a reservoir of nutrients that was slowly returning to the soil through the ceaseless work of decomposing fungi. 

Although people were looking for gold in this part of the country, other minerals were mined here as well, including chromite. Another interpretive sign informed me that chromite mined in this location was put into use during the first world war. 

Aster, Symphyotrichum sp. 

Once again the trail led me into the forest. Another interpretive sign informed me about the importance of managing the forest's density, to prevent mega wildfires. 

Then the trail curved west to cross the Shirttail Creek, a name that was given to it by a lone miner that tried its luck in the area. I paused there for a bit to look at the thin, lazy flow but saw no wildlife in the water. 

Shirttail Creek

A bit further past the Shirttail Creek crossing I saw an interpretive sign with more information about wildfire. The sign directed me to a nearby cedar tree that survived a big fire in 1936 which burned most of that killed most of the trees in the forest there. I went behind the tree to see the remaining fire scar, which the tree was slowly mending by growing bark over it. 

Helping to hold the fire scar together were some heavy duty, serious-looking spider webs. I gazed inside hoping to see the spider but I didn't see it. 

After the signs about the fallen logs and the fire risks the next sign I saw was not interpretive, but a large orange warning sign telling me to expect tree work ahead. I was there on a Saturday and I thought that I won't see much work but soon after I started hearing the noise of chainsaws.  

Sugar Pine Loop Trail

After crossing Shirttail Creek the trail curved south. In the clear, emerald-colored water I could still see the original channel of the creek before that part of it was flooded. 

Right of the trail was an area with a few stunted pines and very little vegetation otherwise. Another interpretive sign confirmed my guess that this area was of serpentinite soil - a mineral-poor soil that isn't very supportive of plant life. It might be worth the while to visit this place again in the spring to see the plants that are suited to serpentinite soil. These plants are usually endemic and rare. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir was created in 1982, so it is a fairly new one. It provides water for the town of Greenwood. The reservoir was named after the most common tree in the local forest - the sugar pine. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir

The pavement ended and the trail continued as a packed dirt path. Large bushes of berry-laden manzanita lined the trail, and I kept on picking and munching on them. In one spot I found the droppings of another being that enjoyed the manzanita berries - probably a coyote. 

A small, serpentinite-barren peninsula protruded into the lake. I went to the edge to take in the view but also to avoid the large group of hikers that dropped into the loop trail from a nearby campground access. 

Around the curve I was once again inside the forest. Now I was paying more attention to the tall trees, many of which were indeed sugar pines. 

Sugar Pine, Pinus lambertiana

Other trees that captured my attention were the red-barked madrone trees. The madrones were so tall that they towered to the height pf the sugar pines, competing with them well on the sunshine. 

Pacific Madrone, Arbutus menziesii

Below the trees the forest understory was fairly thin and comprised mainly of young madrones and some patches of mountain misery shrubs. The mountain misery can form large, impassable thorny carpets but here it was quite patchy.  

Mountain Misery,  Chamaebatia foliolosa

My attempt to separate myself from the large family group of hikers didn't quite work out. Some of them walked fast while others walked slower. Soon they stretched out along the trail and I found myself passing them then being passed again whenever I stopped to look at something.  

Sugar Pine Reservoir Loop Trail

One of the sights I stopped for was a beautiful stand of aspens in fall colors on the opposite shore of the lake. The aspens were perfectly reflected in the calm lake water. 

I stepped off the trail and went to the lake shore to appreciate the view better, while the stragglers of the hikers group caught up with the leaders. 

There was a small blackberry plant growing below a young madrone by the lake shore. It had a small clusters of berries, one of them was ripe. When I returned to the main trail it no longer carried the ripe black berry. 

Blackberry, Rubus sp. 

I started seeing oak trees along the trail. They were few, and most of them were on the smaller side. I don't know what species of oak they were, but they were deciduous, and were showing their fall colors.  

Oak, Quercus sp. 

The hikers group stopped to tend to one of their younger members and I passed them again. As I was making my way southwest the forest got denser and the trees taller. 

The trail delved into the forest. There also I first encountered the first noticeable change of elevation as the trail ascended sharply the hillside. The uphill part wasn't long though. Soon the speedier members of the hiker group passed me and once again I found myself in the middle of the long-stringed family group. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir Loop Trail

After enough leap-frogging each other it only needed a small trigger to start a real conversation. The randomly placed improvised swing over the lake presented the perfect start. Behind the swing, on the other side of the water was the dam that created the lake. The trail, I knew, want over that dam. 

We came upon a split in the trail - one branch was going uphill and the other was leading downhill toward the water. The upper trail looked a bit thin and flimsy so without pausing I wend down the lower trail. The hiking group followed me without pausing either, or even asking if I knew where I was going. Soon however, I started running into obstacles. Fallen logs weren't much of a problem but they were foreshadowing. A bit further down the trail transformed into a thicket of fallen logs and overgrown branches. 

I turned about and motioned the others to do the same. Now they did question my decision but it didn't take them long to also figure out that there was no going forward on the lower trail. The had missed the upper trail junction so I pointed it out to them, then commenced going up the upper trail. Along the trail side the forest undergrowth was presenting its very beautiful fall colors. 

Fall Colors

I didn't wait for the others to leap-frog me again. Energized by the desire to be on my own again I strode up the trail and through the forest at a quick pace. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir Loop Trail

Eventually the trail leveled off and the trees receded up the hill. Small patches of cute star moss decorated the human-carved hill side from which the dam extended to the other side of Shirttail Creek. 

The other people were coming up from behind so I made my way across the dam, pausing only briefly to take some photos and to look around. 

Sugar Pine Dam

From the dam the lake looked calm and beautiful, and very inviting. I didn't see any waterfowl in the water, nor any human boats. Nothing disturbed the mirror-smooth surface.

Sugar Pine Reservoir

When I drove to the trailhead I was looking to see where the trail was continuing on the other side of the dam but couldn't see it. Now that I was right there at the other side of the dam I saw that the trail continued past a narrow gate in a tall chickenwire fence that blocked the access to the south side of the dam.  

The trail continues

Past the dam the trail along the south shore was on the north-facing slope. The forest that grew on that slope was much denser and darker and the understory was made of taller bushes and shrubs. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir Loop Trail

Some of the understory plants were wearing their beautiful fall colors, like this young dogwood in the photo below. 

Fall Colors

There were wood roses growing along this part of the trail as well. There were no rose flowers of course, but here and there the rose hip fruit were still hanging on the plants. 

Rosehip

I noticed that the large family group was no longer behind me. For a little while I cherished the silence but then another large group of hikers were coming toward me. I squeezed myself to the side of the narrow path and they all filed by me one by one. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir Loop Trail

I came upon a large madrone tree. I usually admire the thin, red bark of the upper trunk and branches of the madrone trees, but this time I was captivated by the lovely pattern of the thick, unpeeled bark of the lower trunk. 

Pacific Madrone, Arbutus menziesii

The madrone was very tall. Tall enough to compete with the pines and cedars that surrounded it. High at the canopy the leaves glowed in the sunlight the way conifer needles don't. 

When I came out of the trees I was right by the boat ramp. A few people were picnicking nearby and others were fishing from the deck attached to the ramp. I stepped onto the ramp to look at the water, but seeing nothing in particular other than great view I continued on the trail to where the spur leading to the parking lot was. 

At the junction I took one last look at the Sugar Pine Reservoir. The loop trail was an easy one, save for the trail mixup before the dam, and I completed it in well under three hours. 

Sugar Pine Reservoir

A cute little fox sparrow was waiting for me on the trail up to the parking lot. When I reached the parking lot I saw the large family group that had followed me a long part of the trail. They were coming up on the road, which they had found way easier for the stroller they had with them. 

Fox Sparrow

We wished each other a great rest of the day, then I got into my car and started driving down the mountain, back home.