New Hogan Lake - Calaveras County, California

Visited on 2/19/2018 - Jeff and I took advantage of the unusually warm weather we had during the three day holiday weekend to take in the beauty of some lakes in the Mother Lode Gold Country of the Sierra Mountain foothills area.  We loaded up the truck camper for a long weekend of camping and on our second day while traveling from Lake Camanche to Lake McClure we traveled south to New Hogan Lake.  This Lake is located just 3 miles southeast of Valley Springs, California.  Located at an elevation of 713 feet above sea level in the foothills 37 miles east of Stockton, California.  The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers holds jurisdiction over the Lake and maintains the modern marine and camping facilities.  The surface area of the Lake is 4,400 acres with 50 miles of shoreline covered with oak, digger pine and brushlands of chamise and manzanita.  New Hogan Lake is an artificial lake and is formed by New Hogan Dam on the Calaveras River, whose North and South forks combine just upstream of the lake. The earth-fill dam, completed in 1963, is 210 feet high from the crest of the dam to the original streambed. The reservoir was first filled in 1965. New Hogan Lake and New Hogan Dam are the successors of the original Hogan Lake and Hogan Dam. The dam was constructed as a response to flooding of the Calaveras River which caused problems for the City of Stockton, California. It was and is still the only dam on the Calaveras River. The original Hogan dam was deemed ineffective when floods reoccurred in the 1950s.

There is a really nice dog walking trail on the southwest side of the lake which was being used by many hikers with their dogs.