Drive Around The West Side Of Lake Tahoe

Friday 5/18/2011

We are now near Winters, CA., which is about 30 miles from Napa Valley,CA. We are at a campground that has no phone or internet service. Joe and I drove to Winters, which is 9 miles away to do some internet business. I am getting way behind in my blogging, but that is one of the negatives about RV full-timing, " sporadic services"! We leave here on Monday, so we hope our next spot will be better. 

On this day in Lake Tahoe, we drove further up on the west side of the lake.  We stopped at D.L. Bliss State Park, because we saw that there was a lighthouse on the map, and we needed exercise. There were a lot of cars in the parking lot. The park was not open yet, so we had to walk in to the beginning of the trail head. The walk into the park ended up being a mile going down. By the time we found the trail head, Mallery was panting. The trail head sign said the trail was a mile to the lighthouse. We decide by the time we walked back up the the mile to the parking lot, we would have our exercise for the day. If we went on, I would be carrying Mallery, and 7 lbs gets heavy after awhile. This would be a good hike when the park is open. But pets are not allowed on the trail.

Our next stop on the west side was Meeks Bay Resort and Marina.

You have to pay for a day use here, so we just drove in for a look see!

This campground has a beautiful beach, but from reviews, the cabins are not so great. Someone also said, that the campground is not pet friendly. But it has a beautiful beach!

Sugar Pine Point State Park is also located on the west side, but it is located across the street. And because it is a state park, it has few hookups.

To camp at the state park, it is $25 a night, and $10 for day use.

There were bike and walking paths along the road after the state park.

We went through many small towns like Tohoma-749 pop., Rubicon Bay-235 pop., and Tahoe Pines- 255pop.,

The north west side of Lake Tahoe has many homes on it.

We had been looking for a place to eat our lunch, and finally pulled off to the side of a road next to a bicycle campground, that had a very small beach.

After lunch, I got out to look at the water and found another one of these fungi's. Wish I could figure out what it is called.

After lunch we continued our drive and just a few miles north was this very nice public beach. We should have waited a few miles, and we would have had a better lakeside view for lunch!

The beach was made up of small round stones.

Even though the beach is rocky, it is a beautiful beach. Malley didn't like the rocks though.

We entered into Tahoe City that has a population of 7012. As you enter into Tahoe City, you cross the Truckee River Outlet. Truckee River is the only outlet for Lake Tahoe. The lake has 63 creeks and streams that flow into it.

Truckee River Dam

This is a map of Lake Tahoe. It shows that Lake Tahoe is located on about 2/3 of CA. and 1/3 of Nevada. We were staying in South Lake Tahoe while we were there.

As we headed back home, we looked for the Fleur Du Lac Mansion. This the entrance to the mansion.

Fleur Du Lac Estates is a private condominium development located on the West Shore of Lake Tahoe at Tahoe Pines. Originally the beautiful summer home of famous industrialist Henry J. Kaiser, the grounds still contain some of the family’s complex of old stone buildings. The old stone boathouses were used as a backdrop for the movie, Godfather II, that was made at Fleur Du Lac in 1973. Today the 15-acre waterfront community consists of 22 individual homeowner units and a shared recreational infrastructure: a marina, 2 tennis courts, exercise facilities, and a swimming pool.Add caption

Views as we drove back to South Lake Tahoe, the biggest town on Lake Tahoe with a population of 21,403.

View of southern end of Lake Tahoe.

Tahoe Park on Dwellable