A familiar hike up the Arroyo Seco to the Brown Canyon Debris Dam.
By Nancy Beverly
We had a super-duper turnout for the Arroyo Seco outing, 17 hikers! We were supposed to have a certified arborist and a horticulturist as our special guest on the July 24 hike, but a family emergency prevented her from joining us…and yet, serendipity happened—one of our hikers, Bohdan, who is a volunteer at Eaton Canyon, gave us some fun tree facts on our canyon hike.
We gazed upon coastal live oaks, California walnut trees, beavertail cactus (ouch!), sugar bush and/or laurel sumac, blackberries (edible!), tons of poison oak (not edible!) and sycamores, where Bohdan pointed out how the sycamore leaves felt as if they were covered in, yes, felt!
Luck was also in our favor in terms of the weather — we had marine layer for a bit at the start which helped keep us cool on an otherwise warm day.
We saw several other hikers and mountain bikers on the trail, but we all navigated the space in a friendly manner. The water in the multiple stream crossings? Quite low this time of year, but we still got to dance on rocks and logs to cross the flow. We didn’t all pick the same route, but everyone navigated well.
At the Brown Canyon Debris Dam, our turnaround spot, we lucked out, there was only one other person hanging out at the waterfall – plus his happy golden Lab dog, who was having a fine time playing “fetch” over and over with sticks.
