July Hikes Continue at Coldstream Canyon
The July hikes continue, this time up Coldstream Canyon, just west of Truckee off Donner Memorial State Park. It's about six miles round trip from the gate, following Cold Creek up the valley, with the Sierra Crest showing itself here and there through the trees.
The dogs did the whole thing. There's a stretch where the creek spreads out into a marshy pond, grass growing right up through the water, and that was the end of any forward progress for a while. She waded straight in, lay down in it, and drank her fill with her front legs sunk in the mud. Her buddy stayed drier and stood on a downed log looking pleased with himself.
Partway up there's a jumble of granite boulders leaning against each other with a dark gap underneath, big slabs the size of cars. We poked around the opening but didn't go in far.
You can tell the canyon has been worked over — logging, old roads, gravel mining — but the creek section has grown back green enough that you have to look for the scars. The pond near the turnaround was still as glass, boulders sitting half out of the water.
