Spooner Lake Trail

With a little effort we got ourselves ready and out the door this morning about 8:30.  It is a glorious day in northern Nevada—a great day for a hike.

The trail was through pines and aspen

US 50 is a mere half mile from our campground and US 50 leads to Lake Tahoe about 25 miles from here.  We were looking for a trail to hike.  After about 10 miles, we noticed a rather large parking lot which, on the side of a major road in a National Forest, usually means a trailhead is nearby.  It turned out to be a junction with the Tahoe Rim Trail, a 165-mile trail which encircles Lake Tahoe.  Also at this junction was an access trail which led down to Spooner Lake and the 2.1 mile trail which encircles that lake.  We could see snow on the higher peaks, but none at this elevation (7146 ft).  This would do nicely for our hike today.

View from our break spot

We started out along the Tahoe Rim Trail and intended to walk for about an hour or until we ran into snow.  The trail was a wide, sandy footpath through pine and aspen.  We had a couple glimpses of Spooner Lake, but none of Lake Tahoe.  (We were still several miles east of Lake Tahoe when we came to our parking lot along US 50.)  About 45 minutes into our walk, we came to a signpost marked “vista”.  We took the short side trail to see what the vista had to offer.  It was such a great place we took our break there and made it our turning around spot.

View from Tahoe Rim Trail

After our return trip along the Tahoe Rim Trail, we took the access trail down to Spooner Lake.  In the mid 1850s, this area had been a meadow.  Mr. Spooner, a Lake Tahoe pioneer, had settled in the area and established a lumber company to supply lumber to shore up the shafts of the numerous gold and silver mines in the area.  His business turned out to be quite successful.  To help supply demand for lumber, Mr. Spooner put in a flume to send the timber downhill.  He built a dam to create this small lake at the base of the flume.  As the mines played out so did Mr. Spooner’s business and the land, along with the lake, changed hands several times over the years until the state of Nevada purchased it in the 1970s.
Spooner is a pristine lake, cold and clear, fed primarily by snow melt.  The trail around the perimeter is close enough for great views, but far enough away to keep visitors from disturbing the water fowl.  Today we saw a fairly large flock of Canada geese and a couple mallards.

Another look at Spooner Lake

We really like it here.  We like it so well, we have decided to stay.  Gene has already reserved our spot for a month and cancelled all the other reservations we had west of here, including the Montana Owners Rally in Oregon.  There are several things to do around here—Reno is only 30 miles away, the junction of US 50 and NV 28 is only 10 miles from here and from there you can go left to South Tahoe or right to North Tahoe Lake.  Bishop, California is about 100 miles south on US 395.  There is a Borders Books across the street and one of our favorite things to do is sip coffee at a bookstore.  Of course, there are the hundreds of miles of trail to be hiked.  We’ll be back to the Tahoe Rim Trail, although much of that will still be under snow even when we leave here.

Gene liked the looks of this pine cone

I think the reason we like it so much is because of the trees.  When we got up to 6000 feet today, there were trees everywhere.  There are even trees in our campground.  We have seen nothing but brown for so long, the first tree we came to we had to stop and give it a big hug.  How pitiful is that?  Anyway, we want to do some hiking in the high mountains of Oregon and we have to wait for some of the snow to melt.  We might as well do some of our waiting here.

Our trail ended on the boardwalk through the Aspen

One other thing may have had an influence on our decision to stay—rest for weary travelers.  We have been trotting along at a pretty fast pace since we left Nashville at the end of December.  This is really not our style.  We much prefer to stay at least 3 weeks in an area.  I think we were just ready to give the road a rest when we saw those gorgeous tree covered mountains.

Tomorrow, we are planning to drive over to Virginia City.  That should be fun.