Eagle Lake

Oh my goodness, did we find us a hike for today.  This 6.5 mile loop was listed on Backpacker.com and was spectacular as far as views go.  The hike was a little difficult with a 1500 foot elevation gain.  Backpacker gave it a rating of 5 out of 10.  I guess that is a fair rating.  Trail builders had installed rock steps for much of the first couple miles because it was so steep.  The steps certainly made it an easier climb.

Lake Tahoe and Emerald Bay

The first mile was along Eagle Creek which fell as a rushing torrent due to the recent rains and snow melt.  Our trail started above the lower falls so we didn’t get a view of that, but the upper falls was pretty special all by itself.  At the end of the first mile, we were rewarded with the tranquility of Eagle Lake.  It was the perfect spot for a short break.

Eagle Lake

Water rushing out of the lake destined for the Falls

Back on the trail and the relentless uphill climb for the next hour and a half.  Before reaching the top we got into snow.  However, the trail was mostly clear.  After about 4 miles we came to our trail junction.  We stopped for lunch here before turning onto Bayview Trail and heading down the mountain.

The area around the top was relatively flat, a welcome relief from the steady climb.  It didn’t last nearly long enough; we soon came to the very steep downhill run.  But first came the snow field--one that I was too afraid to cross.  Gene is braver than I and forged on across.  I picked my way first up hill from the snow, holding onto rocks and trees then down hill from the snow.  There was only one time when I almost cried.  In the meantime, it started to sleet.  After about 30 minutes to cover maybe 100 feet, we were  clear of the snow and on dry ground again.

Upper falls of Eagle Creek

The downhill was very steep, but it offered fabulous views of Lake Tahoe and Emerald Bay.

Our lunch spot

Though more difficult than the others, we are calling this one of our favorite hikes in the area.

Skunk Harbor

Today is our anniversary.  We met some years ago on a hiking trail in Tennessee.  We’ve been hiking together ever since.  Even our honeymoon was a hiking trip, some of it backpacking.  So today, as we continue to celebrate our life together, it is not surprising that a hike would be part of the agenda.

Gene found the description for this hike to Skunk Harbor in a little book he purchased when we first arrived in Carson City--Best Easy Day Hikes for Lake Tahoe by Tracy Salcedo.  Many of the hikes described in this book have some feature or another as the highlight of the hike.  For Skunk Harbor, it was the wedding gift.  How appropriate on this special day.

The hike was an easy 3 miles (round trip) down a forest service road to a beautiful, secluded cove on the east side of Lake Tahoe.  The Newhall House is located in this cove.  The house, which was built in 1923 during the Resort era at Lake Tahoe, was a wedding gift from George to his new bride.  George, one of the rich, if not rich and famous, already had a very nice home on the western shore of the lake.  Apparently, it wasn’t secluded enough for those special occasions, so he built this little “picnic house” for his beloved.  All the construction materials were brought in by boat “at great expense”.  I bet it was a great expense.  Upon completion, the Newhall’s could just scoot across the lake in their boat for a picnic and fun in the sun at their own private beach house.

Today, the land falls within the National Forest holdings and the beach is now public.  It is, however, still pretty secluded because there is very limited parking at the trailhead and, though the walk down the dirt road is easy, what goes down much come up.  The only other access is by boat.

We have no other plans for today. We are staying in for dinner.  We have a nice steak in the refrigerator which will be accompanied by a baked potato and steamed fresh asparagus and let’s not forget the bottle of Two Buck Chuck.  Who says we don’t live it up every once in a while?

If you are interested, there is a more detailed description of our wedding day in the New York journal, June 10, 2008 entry--The Wedding Dress.

We don’t have a clue what we will do tomorrow.

The Bench

The weather forecast was finally right on the money and we had a beautiful day for our hike to “the bench”.  This hike was 10 miles round trip with a 1500 foot elevation gain so we wanted to get an early start.  That was a little hard to do since this was the 4th day in a row to be out and about.  Somehow we managed to be at the trailhead about 8 AM.

The trail was damp, but considering all the rain we have had in the past week, it had drained nicely.  Once we got near the top, we were not surprised to run into a little snow, but the trail was mostly clear.

We had no idea what “the bench” was, but we had heard it offered some of the best views of Lake Tahoe.  We wanted to see, of course.  I think I had in my mind that the bench would be just that--a park bench to sit upon and enjoy the view.  There was no “bench”.  What we found was the flat top of the mountain, perhaps a half mile in length from where the trail crested the ridge to where it started down the other side.  There were several large rock outcroppings dotting the edge.  We stopped at the first one we came to.  The views truly were spectacular from our high perch 2500 feet above Lake Tahoe.

The temperature at that elevation (about 8500 feet) was chilly and the steady wind made it down right cold.  We put on hats, coats, and gloves then snuggled in close to the rock out of the wind.  With the sun shining that was a rather cozy place for lunch even though we didn’t have the great view from that angle.

The trip back to the truck was easy, mostly down hill.  But 10 miles is 10 miles and my feet hurt and my legs are tired.  Whatever I do this evening, it will be from the recliner.

Tomorrow we will stick pretty close to home I suspect.

North Canyon Trail

With daily thunderstorms in the forecast, it seems we are getting up and out earlier and earlier for our hikes so as not to get caught in the rain.  That was the case today, but as it turned out the weather forecast was off by a few hours and is now indicating no rain until this evening.

We were at the trailhead by 8 this morning with the intention of hiking along the Marlette Lake trail for a while then turning around.  Marlette Lake is farther than we wanted to hike today, but we thought it would be nice to hike up through North Canyon for a different perspective from the ridge-line views we have been getting.

Backcountry campsite

We parked just off Hwy 28 at the Spooner Lake section of Lake Tahoe State Park.  We were surprised to find a nice lodge here which is used mainly in the winter by snow skiers.  Our trailhead was 0.8 miles from the parking lot down a very well maintained dirt road.  This was a pleasant walk along the edge of a beautiful alpine meadow.  Along the way we passed Spencer’s cabin.  Mr Spencer had been the cowboy caretaker way back in the day when all this land for as far as the eye could see was owned by the lumber company supplying lumber for the gold and silver mines.  Mr. Spencer is gone, of course, but the cabin is maintained by the park service as a shelter for anyone needing a place out of the weather.  Inside is a wood burning stove, a stack of wood and a couple picnic tables.  It would have been a nice place to wait out a thunderstorm.

We started at this beautiful meadow

When we got to the trailhead for Marlette Lake, we found the dirt road to continue on.  By studying the map closely, we discovered the road to parallel the trail.  About 1.5 miles farther down the road was the North Canyon Backcountry Campground.  We wanted to see that so we stayed on the road instead of taking the trail.  The road walk turned out to be a real education.

Lark spur

We noticed numerous piles of cut trees waiting to be burned.  There is an issue with bark beetles here, so we assumed these trees had been cut in an effort to get rid of these little pests.  Soon we came across the work crew.  They were taking down the dead trees, but their primary goal was aspen grove regeneration.  They were also cutting live furs and pines in an effort to thin out the forest to promote aspen growth.

We also learned from this crew that the road is not just a service road for the park.  It is also a biking trail in summer (hikers are welcome) and a cross-country skiing and snowshoeing trail in winter.  That better explained the lodge and Spencer’s cabin with a stack of wood.

We were very surprised at the backcountry campground when we arrived.  We have spent quite a lot of time in the backcountry and this was the nicest campsite we have seen.  The sites were large with picnic tables, metal fire rings, food storage lockers, and all the cut firewood you would ever need (thanks to that work crew, I’m sure).  There was even a standard issue regulation vault toilet.  A trail from the campground led up the hill 1.2 miles to the Tahoe Rim Trail.

Spencer Cabin

We had a short break here then headed back to the parking lot.  On the way we took a side trail to check out the “Wild Cat Cabin”.  I fully expected something like Spencer’s cabin.  Boy, was I wrong.  This little jewel sleeps four, had a 2-burner propane stove, a wood burning stove, and a million dollar view.  I checked on the internet when I got home and learned they rent for $50 per night for 2 adults and they are available year round.

Wildcat Cabin

View from the porch of Wildcat Cabin

I say “they” because there are 2 of them.  Wild Cat was located about 2 miles from the lodge and the parking lot and about one third mile off the dirt road.  The other one is located about a half mile from the lodge and very close to the dirt road.  By reading the sign a little closer we learned that these cabins are being built by the park service from the timber being cut by that work crew we ran into earlier.  It makes me want to take up cross country skiing just to be here in the winter.

Our plan for tomorrow is a little sketchy right now.  It depends on the weather forecast (if you can believe that).

Floating Island and Cathedral Lakes

With a forecast of afternoon thunderstorms, we got out early this morning for our hike.  We took US 50 again over to South Lake Tahoe and up a Forest Service road to our trailhead.  If we are going east or west, US 50 is the way to get there from here.  For most of our hikes, we head west either stopping at Spooner Summit after 10 miles or driving another 10 miles down the other side of the mountain to South Lake Tahoe.  No matter how far we go on US 50, it is a beautiful drive with magnificent views of the mountains and Lake Tahoe.

Mt Tallac

Today’s hike started near the end of Fallen Leaf Lake.  There is a stretch of land maybe 5 miles wide between the south end of Lake Tahoe and the north end of Fallen Leaf.  After about a half mile into our hike we were high enough on the ridge to have great views of both lakes on our left.  Rising more than 2000 feet above us on the right was Mt. Tallac.  We always find the views spectacular, but today they were less dramatic.  The day started out with fog which kept some of the mountain from view.

Fallen Lake

Hedge mustard

This 4.2 mile round trip hike was a bit harder than the previous hikes in the area.  The trail was pretty steep in places and very rocky.  We got a good cardiovascular workout today.  Above Floating Island Lake we got into snow and a lot of snow melt runoff was taking the easy way down the mountain--right over the trail.  We also had two stream crossings without benefit of foot bridge.  It is wilderness, after all.

Floating Island Lake; no island I could see

Pop Tart man

Even though the rain was supposed to hold off until afternoon (according to our local forecast), we noticed storm clouds building while we were still at the trialhead before 9 AM.  We got sprinkles before reaching Cathedral Lake and heard the rumbling of thunder all the way down the mountain.  We got to the truck only about 15 minutes before the clouds opened up and we had some real rain for about 2 hours.

Cathedral Lake

We stopped in South Lake Tahoe for a hamburger at Snow Flake Drive In.  The Snow Flake and In and Out Burger will have their own story, so I won’t go into that experience just yet.

With a basket full of wet hiking clothes again, it looks like tomorrow will be a laundry day. I’ll probably be too stiff to get out of bed since I fell down today.

The Five Lakes Trail

It was such a beautiful day, we just couldn’t resist getting out on the trail.  Today we went to the western side of Lake Tahoe to the Alpine Meadows area which is near Tahoe City.  This trail has been on our list for several days, but highway 28 is undergoing major construction and is closed weekdays.  Going around the lake from the south side adds several miles to an already 30 mile trip.  We took advantage of the road being open this weekend.  We were not disappointed.

It was a beautiful trail even though we did not have views of Lake Tahoe.  The trail stayed within the Granite Cliffs Wilderness except for one small piece which was on private land.  There are 5 (maybe even 6) small alpine lakes 2.5 miles from the trailhead after a 1000 feet elevation gain.  At the area of the lakes we were within a half mile of the Pacific Crest Trail.

We stopped for lunch at the first lake.  Still mostly covered in snow, it was an inviting setting for lunch.  We found a log in a sunny spot just a few feet from the lake.  The warm sun had melted the snow around the log so we had a relatively dry place to sit.

View from our lunch spot

We had walked through some pretty deep snow to get to this first lake and were not much interested in wadding any farther.  However, so many people passed us while we had lunch that we decided to trudge on.  After all, the prettiest lake may be just over that 8 foot drift.  After following what looked like the most footprints for about 10 minutes to the top of the slope, we expected to find the next lake, but it wasn’t there.  We weren’t real thrilled with hiking in the snow, so we headed back down the mountain.

With the hike and the long drive to and from the trailhead, I didn’t have any time today to work with my photos on the Apple.  That is my number one priority for tomorrow.  Well, right after a couple loads of laundry and a quick trip to the grocery.

Vikingsholm and Emerald Point

I think we could save some time and energy and not plan hikes—just go with the flow.  Today, the hike we intended to do was near Tahoe City on the North Western shore of the lake.  As we were driving there, we came to a beautiful spot along the road and stopped to investigate.  Not only did we find gorgeous overlooks, but we also found the very popular trail to Vikingsholm, another summertime retreat for the rich and famous.  We couldn’t resist.

The half mile trail led down 400 feet from the parking lot to Vikingsholm which is situated at the back of Emerald Cove.  It was a beautiful 2-story stone and wood mansion overlooking a white sand beach and emerald-colored water of the cove.  Today, it is owned and maintained by the California State Parks and is open for tours (in season).  Since this is not the season, we just peeked in the windows.

Rubicon trail followed the shoreline

Boat camp about a mile from the house

If you continue on around the beach past the boat dock area, you come to the Rubicon Trail which leads along the shoreline past Emerald Point and on to the next state park—D.L. Bliss.  We followed the trail as far as Emerald Point (about 2 miles) and stopped there for a lunch break before heading back to the truck.

Emerald Point, our destination

Everything about today was fabulous—the weather, the hike, the views.  I have a feeling every hiking day here will be just as rewarding.

Emerald Bay, house is to the right in the trees

Tomorrow will be chore day for me and Gene is taking the truck for regular scheduled service.  It’s hard to say who will have more fun.

The only island in Lake Tahoe is in Emerald Bay