We all managed to get up early, breakfasted, filled the car, said goodbye to Diane and the dogs, and set off for Lake Tahoe on the freeways. The drive was 3-4 hours long, but went pretty quickly. Long drives are always a good opportunity to chat.
The scenery along the way changed from flat plains to mountains and trees as we approached Tahoe. There have obviously been a lot of fires in the last couple of years, though not this year. The weather has been very wet in 2023, so the desperately dry forests and empty lakes are now in much better shape.
We arrived well before our check in - enough time to sit down on the lakefront and for Alastair to go for a rather chilly swim.
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| Lake Tahoe shorefront |
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| Nutters |
After an ice cream we still had time to fill so we went for a short walk up beside the Truckee River, before finding the Rigi Chalet we were booked into.
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| Our accommodation for the next three nights |
Cheese and crackers, dips, beers and wines were the next appropriate step, followed by a challenging game of Cornhole, where the aim is to throw small sacks of corn through a small hole in a board. I guess it's like a variation of quoits or horseshoes. Great fun. A simple dinner beside the outdoor burner filled any remaining gaps in our tummies, until Sophie spotted a bear mooching around a house nearby. Of course our immediate reaction was to have a closer look! As you do. It had wandered a little further away and we wandered a little too. Apparently the appropriate response is to sound a hooter repeatedly to try and scare it off. It seemed to work.
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| Bear doing a reconnoitre |
It is so quiet here, with few people around. Not many of the very large number of houses/baches which are nestled into the tall trees here appear to have people in them. We were all pretty knackered after a very busy week and so were in bed soon after 9pm.
