Happy Valley Rd, Somerset, CA
Happy Valley Rd near Somerset, CA, has one of the oldest wooden bridges in California still in daily use. Single-lane, with no center line and easily missed, Happy Valley Cutoff Rd is found tucked away in a sweeping curve along Mt. Aukum Rd, southeast of Placerville.
This quick detour is one of those Sierra Foothill backroads that rewards riders with something more than just endless curves (though we have plenty of those everywhere).
Tucked away among the oak-covered hills is the historic Happy Valley Bridge, a forgotten piece of California engineering that has quietly stood the test of time since 1906. Now exactly 120 years old, it remarkably remains in regular public use while the last few wooden bridges left in CA are being replaced.
As you roll across its weathered wooden deck, you're actually riding atop a rare steel Pratt deck truss—an uncommon design where the steel structural framework supports the roadway from entirely below. Normal you ride through the steel truss – this, one, you ride over the top of it. The rhythmic rumble of the timber planks beneath your rims and the narrow, focused crossing create a memorable moment that feels unchanged from the earliest days of motoring.
Happy Valley Rd actually connects to Mormon Emigrant Trail near Sly Park Reservoir via dirt sections of Capps Crossing Rd and Bonetti Rd along the edge of the Caldor Fire burn scar—assuming you have a thing for remote dirt fire roads. For the rest of us on street tires, just stick to the asphalt of Happy Valley Rd to pop right back out onto Mt. Aukum Road at Somerset a few miles later.
Happy Valley Rd runs parallel to Mt. Aukum Rd and traces one of the region's earliest corridors, following the natural contours of the river canyon between historic ranches and homesteads. By the early 1900s, the newer Mt. Aukum Rd had become the area's principal route, which left Happy Valley Rd to become a quieter backroad—effectively preserving this 1906 landmark that predates the automobile era.
While Mount Aukum Rd / Highway E16 is fast, smooth, and pulls you along, this short detour is well worth the quick brake check to ride across a piece of living California history.
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