B & D's USA Hideout: Lake Tahoe, NV/CA

Lake Tahoe is located amidst the Sierra Nevada range in both California and Nevada, the state line running almost exactly down the middle of the body of water. It is the second deepest lake in the U.S., the first being Crater Lake in Oregon. The name Tahoe comes from a mispronunciation of the Washoe Native American name for Lake Tahoe, da ow a ga, which means, “edge of the lake.” The surface of the Lake is at an elevation of 6,225 feet and the surrounding mountain peaks vary from 9,000 to nearly 11,000 feet. The Lake never freezes, though certain inlets will ice over. To sum it up, the Lake is 22 miles in length, 12 miles wide, there are 72 miles of shoreline and 1,645 feet is its greatest depth. One inch of water is about 3.33 billion gallons and to fill the Lake, it would take 39 trillion gallons of water.

We stayed in Zephyr Cove which is on the Nevada side in South Lake Tahoe. Brian and I had a really great holiday season together. One, it is something we rarely get to do and two, we were in the perfect place for it. We skied Mt. Heavenly on Christmas day, which was great because it snowed all day on Christmas Eve so there was powder galore. Like the Lake, the mountain is split between the two states. So you can spend the morning skiing in Nevada and shoot over to California for the afternoon. I put a roast and veggies in the crockpot so we came home to a hot Christmas dinner. I love using the crockpot while we're skiing or doing anything that requires us to be out all day. There is nothing better than coming home to dinner being ready for you. On the other days of skiing I made a chicken enchilada soup and my mother's infamous Galumpkis. If you don't know what a Galumpki is, you must learn that it is a cabbage roll stuffed with ground beef and/or pork with rice and onion and simmered in tomato sauce. Not my number one dinner choice (no offense, mom!) but Briguy requested it.

Skiing in the west is great, but we still love our mountains back in New England. In my opinion, just because they're bigger, doesn't mean they're better. Skiing is also $$$ around here. We spaced out our days and bought lift tickets off of liftopia to save a little. In our ten day stay we hit 5 mountains. After Heavenly we skied Homewood, Alpine Meadows, Squaw Valley and Sierra. Alpine Meadows and Squaw Valley are under the same ownership and right next to each other so we split our day and skied both mountains. Though Alpine was less crowded and more intermediate friendly, we wanted to ski Squaw because of its Olympic notoriety. It was much busier, skied off and pretty challenging. I got so mad at Brian for taking up a lift that was all double black steep mogul trails. But now we can say we skied like Olympians!

On New Year's Eve we took a Lake cruise aboard the M.S. Dixie II. The sky was clear and sunny and the air was sharp and cold. We cruised west toward the other side of the Lake to Emerald Bay, the "crown jewel" of South Lake Tahoe. Really gorgeous.

We loved our stay here but it was a little too cold for the camper. We mostly used the RV park facilities because the water hose and sewer were freezing. We also invested in a space heater since we were going through propane so quickly. Regardless, Brian is claiming this to be his favorite stop yet! We are so ready to thaw out in Hawaii!