The Tahoe Trip

                                  This is a glimpse of the Lake from Emerald Bay.  Its smaller than Flathead   in surface area, but the average depth is 1000 ft--so it holds WAY more water.
                                    I don't know the name of these beautiful falls just above Emerald Bay on   the south west side of the Lake, but they're in full spring glory.
               A lot of the lake is surrounded by cliffs and peaks like this.  Those clouds were               everywhere.
LOL. I just realized Doug looks kind of angry in this picture.  He's freezing.  This is about 4:30pm on Saturday up on Donner Pass.  It started snowing minutes later.  You can see a giant rock wall behind him, along with one of the snowsheds (necessary for protecting passing trains from snowfall and avalanches during the winter).  Both were constructed by Chinese rail workers in the late 19th century.

We dropped our kids with Amanda on Thursday morning and after Doug finished a quick meeting at McDermont, we headed north.  It always amazes me how short a five or six hour drive can be with no kids in the car--no frequent potty breaks or needs for snacks, with uninterrupted conversation nearly the whole way.  [Ok, so maybe occasionally we interrupted ourselves to sing pieces of Flight of the Concords songs or sing along to the iPod, but that's not the same thing.] And all weekend I was amazed at how light my purse is when I do not have to have on me at all times an extra diaper, a small case of wipes, and various assorted snacks of the goldfish-graham cracker-granola bar variety!

We had a late lunch at In-N-Out (been a while--so delicious) in Placerville, then continued on up Hwy 50 to South Lake Tahoe.  We arrived at the Marriott Timber Lodge at about 4:30 (check in time being 4pm--not too shabby) and I immediately remembered how much I like Marriott's.  I've really liked all the ones we've stayed at, and been impressed with the staff every single time.  I have also come to believe that valet parking, though perhaps overpriced, is a really great part of staying at a nice hotel.  We got everything into our rooms and then went downstairs to wander outside.  The Heavenly Gondola was literally just outside the door, and on the other side of it is a large shopping center called, of course, Heavenly Village.  After realizing how butt-freezing cold it was outside, we walked over to the theater and caught a late matinee of the new Indiana Jones (side note: great flick.  Just all the classic fun of Indiana Jones.  Lots of nudge-wink completely-lacking-in-subtlety references to older Indiana and other Lucas Spielburg movies that was all quite funny).  

Unfortunately, though we had planned to spend most of our trip doing day hiking and just lounging at the lake, the weather turned drastically from the week before, as it is wont to do in high country spring.  Last weekend, it had been in the high 70s and even hit the 80s up there. I'm afraid for all of our stay it was in the 40s and usually raining.  So what did we do?  What any reasonable couple would do:  went to a lot of movies and did a lot of driving.  Ha ha.  We did go to two more movies (Prince Caspian and Iron Man, both fantastic), which makes 3 movies in one weekend.  That's as many movies as I go to in a year, usually.  And I don't regret it one bit.  It was really nice to snuggle down in a dark theater with a big tub of popcorn and watch good movies.  Especially without having to say "Keilana, if you want to talk you need to whisper," every 10 minutes.  

We also went up to the Nevada State Railroad museum in Carson City.  Its a very small museum, but has some beautiful old classic trains and a lot of amazing pictures and maps of the process of getting  the railroad into and through Nevada and the Sierra Nevada mountains.  All the trains they have are older ones, from the 1880s thru the early 1900s, mostly.  Several of them were used in the movie Union Pacific.  

We did drive around the lake a couple times and really enjoyed some of the views from the dry warmth of our car, stopping occasionally to take some picture or climb to a better view.  I was bummed we didn't have appropriate clothing for hiking in the cold and wet, but judging by the cloud cover, we probably wouldn't have gotten very good views from the peaks at all.

We drove up to Truckee on Saturday afternoon and started to head up Donner Pass to try and get some shots of the snow sheds.  We got a few, but decided to turn around when it started to snow pretty steadily.  Heading up Donner Pass in a potential snowstorm just sounded like a bad idea.  So we tried again the next day, earlier in the day.  We checked out in the morning and headed north again.  This time it was clear and sunny, and actually fairly warm down in Truckee where the Emigrant Gap Park and Museum are.  We went through the museum and watched the Donner Party film "The Longest Winter".  It was just depressing (not to mention slightly creepy).  I'm pretty sure I would starve to death and even let my children starve to death before resorting to eating another human being's flesh.  :(

We drove over Donner Pass this time, and it impressed me that anyone made it over that rocky, unfriendly terrain with wagons intact.  It was a beautiful drive.  We made one last side trip, down Emigrant Gap road in search of a camp that Doug went to with his family several times when they were living in Sacramento (their ward did campouts at it).  After a lot of driving on a very narrow Forest Service Rd, a couple wrong stops, and a rather leisurely walk through very, very wet woods beyond locked gates, we did indeed find it.  Even in the rain and cold (lots of large patches of snow still on the ground), it made me want to go camping.

Most of the rest of our trip was just driving, but it was a delight to pick up our kids last night.  Keilana talked all the way home (and then for 30 minutes after we got home), telling us all about everything she did while we were gone.  Dylan didn't say much, but did do a lot of smiling and laughing.  Of course, the answer to every question I asked was either "No" or "go".  Always with a smile.  They are both napping now, recovering from their own rather eventful weekends, and I think we're all glad to be home again.  Even if its raining here, too.