Spring Ride 2026
Montesol Ranch
Calistoga, CA
When
Friday April 24 — Sunday April 26
About
The historic ranch is located in beautiful Napa County. It is a spectacular ranch, with natural springs, lakes, wildlife and extensive orchards. The climate is excellent and the elevation is 2000 feet. There are over 75 miles of trails.
We are afforded this opportunity by the generosity of Judge Dick Livermore and his family. The ranch has been in their family since the 1880's. The historic town of Silverado was located on this ranch. Robert Louis Stevenson, the author of Treasure Island, spent two years there.
This will be a great ride with meals starting with Friday night dinner through Sunday morning breakfast. We will also have live entertainment.
Bring your own hay, tie/ground lines and water buckets.
Robert Louis Stevenson & Montesol Ranch
Freshly married in San Francisco on May 19, 1880, Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne headed north looking for clean air and a cheap place to recover his health—friends had suggested Calistoga and the upper Napa Valley's hot springs and mountain climate. They traveled the very 19th-century way: ferries across the Bay and then rail up-valley toward Calistoga (Stevenson later described the double bay-crossing and the rail journey in The Silverado Squatters). The couple spent the rest of May in Calistoga in one of the Hot Springs Hotel cottages, then—joined by Fanny's son Lloyd—went up the grade of Mount St. Helena to the toll road area and ultimately "squatted" in an abandoned bunkhouse at the old Silverado mining settlement until late July, turning a broken-down building into a makeshift honeymoon home (cloth for windows, hauling water, foggy nights, rattlesnakes—classic Stevenson humor about hard travel and improvised comfort).