Backpacking Stephens State Forest - Woodburn Unit West Loop
This is my second installment of my experience backpacking the Woodburn Unit at Stephens State Forest near Chariton, IA. This post will be focused on the West Loop. My thoughts on the East Loop are here.
The West Loop is three miles and has two campsites, Bottom Oak and Buck Stop Camps. If you have not read my post on the East Loop here is a little review of the Woodburn Unit. It consists of two loops between 2.5 and 3 miles in length each. There is parking and water where the two loops meet in the middle. So, after refilling my water and visiting with a college student from Iowa State who was heading out after one night I was back on the trail.
When you start the West loop there is a straight path until you get to the fork in the road. You can go north on the North Slope Trail, you can go south on the Shagbark Trail, but don't go straight on the DNR access path. I chose to go north and was greeted by some slow rolling hills and beautiful landscape. Since it was early April and it was still very cold the trees were all bare and I could see ridge after ridge of forest. My guess is, in the middle of summer the view would still be nice but you wouldn't be able to see as far. Even without the green it is still a wonderful sight.
After about half a mile you will start to head back southwest and encounter Big Bend Crossing. I like how they have all of the creek channel crossings named and on the map. It really helps with knowing where you are on the trail, though, it's not a hard trail to follow. You will now be on Rock Crossing Trail. After a bit you will see the sign for the entrance to Bottom Oak Camp. The camp entrance is down a very steep hill with the ground thawing it was a bit slippery, so be careful if you come soon after or during a rain.
The camp itself was very nice. It is the only camp in the Woodburn Unit in a valley and by the water and not on top of a ridge. Other than the wet tents due to proximity to the water, it would be an excellent place for a Scout Troop to camp. It is very enclosed and you wouldn't bother anybody down here. There is a nice flat grassy area for tents, not just leaves and dirt. I do love camping by the water but I don't like having to dry my tent out for hours in the morning before I pack up, so keep that in mind. Of course, when I was visiting there was very little water in the creek
I exited Bottom Oak Camp up that really steep hill and headed down Rock Crossing Trail. Rock Crossing Trail heads back down to the valley and follows the creek for a while and then you pop into a small clearing that has a random makeshift fire ring in the middle of the trail. Since I have never been here before I don't know if this is always there or if somebody wanted to make their own campsite in this little clearing but wanted to make a fire "responsibly." I have a hunch it is the latter, but perhaps I will find out the next time I visit. I take a sharp left turn and towards Rock Crossing. After crossing Rock Crossing look to your right and you will see your trail. Don't look at the trail that heads straight for about 30 yards.
This is the only time I got off trail and I truly believe I was on an old trail as my pictures still show me today. After I crossed Rock Crossing I looked at a seemingly nice trail right in front of me (picture above left) so I went without looking at my map. Mistake. I headed down the trail and started up a steep incline. It was very rough trail and started looking a lot less used than the rest of the trails I had been on. There were big fallen trees in my way so that made it even more challenging. You could see that there was a path in the trees if you looked up at the tree line, so even though I was starting to wonder if I was on the right path, I was pretty sure I was. Then I got to the top of the hill and came up to an old looking sign that said Ridge Trail (not Pine Ridge Trail like it is called on my map). This trail headed down to Buck Stop Camp and on the way to Buck Stop Camp I saw a newer sign with Pine Ridge Trail. This clued me in that I had taken the wrong trail. So, just for the benefit of my readers I headed back down the true Rock Crossing Trail, back to Rock Crossing so I could figure out what I did wrong. The picture of the correct trail is above right. This added an extra mile to my trek, but it wasn't even lunch time yet so I was not too worried and I wanted to test my conditioning with my pack on.
The current trail is much nicer and is consistent with the rest of the trail. Just make sure you look to the right immediately after Rock Crossing. This trail was a little easier since it wasn't as steep and didn't have large fallen trees in the trail. So I headed back up and into Rock Bottom Camp. This camp is pretty far back off the trail as well. It has the same picnic table and fire ring as the others. Personally, I didn't think this camp had as good of places to stake out a tent as the other sites and it looked more heavily used. But it is hard to tell when everything is covered with leaves. It did seem more exposed to the weather than the other camps. The trees weren't as thick up here. I was planning on spending the night here after one more trip around the West Loop, but because I had not gotten a picture of Black Oak Camp, I chose to head over there along the south side of the West Loop.
Heading out of Buck Stop Camp on Pine Ridge Trail it is a nice walk on top of the ridge. Then there is a good downhill stretch. The trail isn't too bad going this direction but it might not be too fun if you were going the other way. Then you hit Cottonwood Crossing. When you get over Cottonwood Crossing you get up out of the creek channel and pop up to a large clearing. It looked like there was some sort of trail that went straight across the clearing but it wasn't too well defined. There was another trail to your right (south) that went right along the treeline around the clearing. Not wanting to make the same mistake again, I got out my map and compass and figured out the correct way to go. To the south along the treeline. So make sure you turn right down that tree line. The trail is pretty well defined once you get on it.
You are now on Shagbark Trail and this is where things get tough. Shagbark trail has two very steep inclines that really slowed my pace down. It is an easy trail to follow but it is definitely the hardest section of trail in the Woodburn Unit that I experienced. There are some steeper and longer stretches up at Yellow River State Forest, but these were pretty good. They definitely played into my decision to just stay at Black Oak Camp after I took my pictures. I didn't want to do those inclines very early morning on the way out. I'm an old guy who wanted an easy morning. Obviously I was a bit too tired to take any more pictures, which will make the rest of this go more quickly.
There is another creek crossing but there is a nice bridge on this one so there is not a named crossing there. It is much better than jumping across a creek, even though the creek didn't have much water.
After those couple of inclines I headed to the trailhead to go over to Black Oak Camp which I covered in part 1 on the East Loop.
Just some other notes on the trip. I did hear back from the Park Ranger and she asked me if I had a good trip and if the trails were in good shape. I told her everything was great, with only a couple areas where there was a fallen tree in the trail. I then told her of my experience at Rock Crossing and she said she would send some people out to see if they needed to add another sign at that area. She said to come back later in the spring when the wild flowers were blooming. I do hope I can make it down there for a day hike. That would be nice.
This is a great trail for somebody to start backpacking or if somebody just wants to get a pack on and get in some miles. It is close to a large metropolitan area, but you would never know it. The camp sites are all very nice and having a picnic table at all of them was excellent cooking and sitting. All in all it was a cold but very enjoyable trip.
The West Loop is three miles and has two campsites, Bottom Oak and Buck Stop Camps. If you have not read my post on the East Loop here is a little review of the Woodburn Unit. It consists of two loops between 2.5 and 3 miles in length each. There is parking and water where the two loops meet in the middle. So, after refilling my water and visiting with a college student from Iowa State who was heading out after one night I was back on the trail.
When you start the West loop there is a straight path until you get to the fork in the road. You can go north on the North Slope Trail, you can go south on the Shagbark Trail, but don't go straight on the DNR access path. I chose to go north and was greeted by some slow rolling hills and beautiful landscape. Since it was early April and it was still very cold the trees were all bare and I could see ridge after ridge of forest. My guess is, in the middle of summer the view would still be nice but you wouldn't be able to see as far. Even without the green it is still a wonderful sight.
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| Shagbark Trail Left |
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| DNR Access Trail Middle |
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| North Slope Trail Right |
After about half a mile you will start to head back southwest and encounter Big Bend Crossing. I like how they have all of the creek channel crossings named and on the map. It really helps with knowing where you are on the trail, though, it's not a hard trail to follow. You will now be on Rock Crossing Trail. After a bit you will see the sign for the entrance to Bottom Oak Camp. The camp entrance is down a very steep hill with the ground thawing it was a bit slippery, so be careful if you come soon after or during a rain.
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| Big Bend Crossing |
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| Rock Crossing Trail |
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| Bottom Oak Camp Entrance |
The camp itself was very nice. It is the only camp in the Woodburn Unit in a valley and by the water and not on top of a ridge. Other than the wet tents due to proximity to the water, it would be an excellent place for a Scout Troop to camp. It is very enclosed and you wouldn't bother anybody down here. There is a nice flat grassy area for tents, not just leaves and dirt. I do love camping by the water but I don't like having to dry my tent out for hours in the morning before I pack up, so keep that in mind. Of course, when I was visiting there was very little water in the creek
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| Trail Down to Bottom Oak |
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| Bottom Oak Camp Fire Pit |
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| Bottom Oak Camp |
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| Bottom Oak Camp |
I exited Bottom Oak Camp up that really steep hill and headed down Rock Crossing Trail. Rock Crossing Trail heads back down to the valley and follows the creek for a while and then you pop into a small clearing that has a random makeshift fire ring in the middle of the trail. Since I have never been here before I don't know if this is always there or if somebody wanted to make their own campsite in this little clearing but wanted to make a fire "responsibly." I have a hunch it is the latter, but perhaps I will find out the next time I visit. I take a sharp left turn and towards Rock Crossing. After crossing Rock Crossing look to your right and you will see your trail. Don't look at the trail that heads straight for about 30 yards.
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| Random Fire Pit |
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| Rock Crossing |
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| The Creek on Rock Crossing |
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| This is the "trail" that is straight DON'T go this way |
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| This is trail to your right after you cross Rock Crossing GO this way! |
This is the only time I got off trail and I truly believe I was on an old trail as my pictures still show me today. After I crossed Rock Crossing I looked at a seemingly nice trail right in front of me (picture above left) so I went without looking at my map. Mistake. I headed down the trail and started up a steep incline. It was very rough trail and started looking a lot less used than the rest of the trails I had been on. There were big fallen trees in my way so that made it even more challenging. You could see that there was a path in the trees if you looked up at the tree line, so even though I was starting to wonder if I was on the right path, I was pretty sure I was. Then I got to the top of the hill and came up to an old looking sign that said Ridge Trail (not Pine Ridge Trail like it is called on my map). This trail headed down to Buck Stop Camp and on the way to Buck Stop Camp I saw a newer sign with Pine Ridge Trail. This clued me in that I had taken the wrong trail. So, just for the benefit of my readers I headed back down the true Rock Crossing Trail, back to Rock Crossing so I could figure out what I did wrong. The picture of the correct trail is above right. This added an extra mile to my trek, but it wasn't even lunch time yet so I was not too worried and I wanted to test my conditioning with my pack on.
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| Old Ridge Trail at the end of the old trail |
The current trail is much nicer and is consistent with the rest of the trail. Just make sure you look to the right immediately after Rock Crossing. This trail was a little easier since it wasn't as steep and didn't have large fallen trees in the trail. So I headed back up and into Rock Bottom Camp. This camp is pretty far back off the trail as well. It has the same picnic table and fire ring as the others. Personally, I didn't think this camp had as good of places to stake out a tent as the other sites and it looked more heavily used. But it is hard to tell when everything is covered with leaves. It did seem more exposed to the weather than the other camps. The trees weren't as thick up here. I was planning on spending the night here after one more trip around the West Loop, but because I had not gotten a picture of Black Oak Camp, I chose to head over there along the south side of the West Loop.
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| Sign for Buck Stop Camp |
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| Buck Stop Camp |
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| Buck Stop Camp |
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| Buck Stop Camp |
Heading out of Buck Stop Camp on Pine Ridge Trail it is a nice walk on top of the ridge. Then there is a good downhill stretch. The trail isn't too bad going this direction but it might not be too fun if you were going the other way. Then you hit Cottonwood Crossing. When you get over Cottonwood Crossing you get up out of the creek channel and pop up to a large clearing. It looked like there was some sort of trail that went straight across the clearing but it wasn't too well defined. There was another trail to your right (south) that went right along the treeline around the clearing. Not wanting to make the same mistake again, I got out my map and compass and figured out the correct way to go. To the south along the treeline. So make sure you turn right down that tree line. The trail is pretty well defined once you get on it.
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| Top of the ridge on Pine Ridge Trail |
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| Look down Pine Ridge Trail |
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| Cottonwood Crossing Sign |
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| Cottonwood Crossing |
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| Onto Shagbark Trail |
You are now on Shagbark Trail and this is where things get tough. Shagbark trail has two very steep inclines that really slowed my pace down. It is an easy trail to follow but it is definitely the hardest section of trail in the Woodburn Unit that I experienced. There are some steeper and longer stretches up at Yellow River State Forest, but these were pretty good. They definitely played into my decision to just stay at Black Oak Camp after I took my pictures. I didn't want to do those inclines very early morning on the way out. I'm an old guy who wanted an easy morning. Obviously I was a bit too tired to take any more pictures, which will make the rest of this go more quickly.
There is another creek crossing but there is a nice bridge on this one so there is not a named crossing there. It is much better than jumping across a creek, even though the creek didn't have much water.
After those couple of inclines I headed to the trailhead to go over to Black Oak Camp which I covered in part 1 on the East Loop.
Just some other notes on the trip. I did hear back from the Park Ranger and she asked me if I had a good trip and if the trails were in good shape. I told her everything was great, with only a couple areas where there was a fallen tree in the trail. I then told her of my experience at Rock Crossing and she said she would send some people out to see if they needed to add another sign at that area. She said to come back later in the spring when the wild flowers were blooming. I do hope I can make it down there for a day hike. That would be nice.
This is a great trail for somebody to start backpacking or if somebody just wants to get a pack on and get in some miles. It is close to a large metropolitan area, but you would never know it. The camp sites are all very nice and having a picnic table at all of them was excellent cooking and sitting. All in all it was a cold but very enjoyable trip.
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