Thank you Patricia! This is helpful. I've updated the photos so you can see the contours a little better after we had the area weeded (you can see how much good that did, though to be fair the weeds were engulfing our young trees, so something had to be done!)

The orchard is behind our ADU, which we rent out on Airbnb so this is effectively their backyard. Our lot is a long rectangle starting in the front with our dry/sunny front yard, then our house, then a covered deck and shady backyard with redwoods, then the ADU, behind that this sunny sloped orchard above our vegetable garden, and then the back fence with grape vines. The orchard has just a few mature trees and about 6 immature trees that aren't fruiting yet.

Definitely needs terracing first.

It does not NEED terracing. Terracing is very expensive and that hill is not terribly steep. It will be fine without terracing.

Looks pretty darn steep to me and we really have no ide of the slope from top to bottom and why a random tiny deck out in the middle of the this. I think the OP needsa good landscape designer for sure this is impossible for us to really answer . I have a steep slope at the front of my house and to work on it you need to be part mountain goat if I had the ability now I would terrace it but not possible now that the house is built and the town did a retaining wall at the bottom of the hill so IMO get some real pro help to do this right . That is IMO a long walk to veggie garden for sure .

What are the problems with your current stepping stones? Is the walkway for a daily stroll up to see the view or for orchard maintenance?

Thanks Patricia! The deck is a short term solution so there's a place to sit at the top of the slope, where the view is! It will be replaced with something more impressive once landscaping is underway. I don't really need ideas for the entire area as we do have a professional landscaper, but figuring out what sort of path to do has been a challenge.

Apple_pie_order, we will use it primarily to access our fruit trees (so not daily).
The primary user will be our Airbnb guests, many of whom are over 70, so we want the path to be easily navigable. Sometimes when the weeds get overgrown, the stepping stones disappear, so my hope is that the right path would help control some of our weeds too! One thought I had was just to upgrade the stepping stones with larger pieces of rock or flagstone cut into the ground.

I'd probably do something like these options.

This one has "steps" surrounded by gravel. (Forget the pergola; not necessary.)

Woodside Mountain Home · More Info

This one is similar to your stepping stones, but they are larger:

A Gardeners' Garden in Rural Vermont · More Info

Or you could put in stone steps like these:

San Marino Residence · More Info

Thanks Sabrina! I really love the look of the large slabs.