The Trail Experience - What to Expect

• Trout Creek Canyon Trail (1.75 miles)

A project of the Town of Truckee, this paved trail connects Northwoods Boulevard to Bridge Street in downtown Truckee. (Plans

for a parallel dirt trail are under consideration).

• Donner Lake Rim Trail (12.2 miles)

This trail is a Truckee Donner Land Trust project that includes stunning views of Donner Lake, Mount Rose, and the Pacific

Crest. Pines to Mines will follow the northern half of the Donner Lake Rim Trail from Castle Valley Road to Glacier Way.

• Hole in the Ground (7.5 miles)

Crossing the Sierra Crest, Hole in the Ground is popular with locals and visitors, 7.5 miles of which will become the Pines to

Mines Trail.

• Missing Link (20 miles)

The “missing link” connecting Hole in the Ground and the Grouse Ridge Trail, will take adventurers into stunning rugged

backcountry terrain of Red Mountain and beyond. 

• Grouse Ridge Trail (1 mile)

This short segment continues from the Missing Link across the Fordyce Creek pedestrian bridge and intersects with the

Spaulding Lake Trail.

• Spaulding Lake Trail (5 Miles)

The Spaulding Lake Trail provides spectacular waterfalls and wide-open granite landscapes interwoven with black oak forests

and towering firs and cedars as you travel along Fordyce Creek.

• Pioneer Trail from Spaulding Lake to Five Mile House (25 miles)

Graded switchbacks descend from Spaulding Lake which sits in a glacier-carved bowl of granite. Loosely paralleling Highway

20, Pioneer Trail traverses three ridges - Washington, Burlington, and Lowell Hill cutting through the Deer and Steephollow

drainages. In Bear Valley, it crosses the Bear River and the dazzling South Yuba River near Emerald Pools.

• Five Mile House to Rood Center (5 miles)

A final gentle descent on via Willow Valley Road links to Nevada City. The Pines to Mines team is hoping for a trail connection

via Sugarloaf Mountain in the future