Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Tahoe in August

Keri and I spent this past weekend up in the Lake Tahoe region. We stayed at Northstar-at-Tahoe Resort, which is currently under construction, but we didn't mind. Actually, my company has been involved with this project (unbeknownst to Keri upon her booking the trip), but our phase is pretty much completed. Anyway, the room was nice, but the resort itself was a little quiet due to the work, so most of our chill time was spent in nearby Carnelian Bay, where we did a lot of eating. A good amount of our time was spent mountain biking. On Saturday, we went out by the reservoirs in Truckee. It was all rolling singletrack trails, which were not technically difficult, but really fun because you could get moving pretty fast and you didn't have to worry too much about any rocks in the trail. We spent about two hours out on that trail, but we wished we had spent more time. Nonetheless, it was a good warm up for what lay in store.

On Sunday, we went down to Tahoe City to hit the Alpine Meadows loop. It was supposed to be a pretty tame 16-mile loop with some paved road and some trail. Well, we started out the right way and we got on the right trail, but at some point we took a wrong turn and got onto a much more technical trail. There were a lot of loose rocks and it got quite steep at some points. I was really surprised with how well Keri handled the trail. She did a really good job on some really technical parts. Luckily I was in the front at one point int the trail where there was a foot or two drop off a rock, because I was able to warn her before she got there. She said afterward that if she had been leading she might have been going to fast and wouldn't have been able to stop. That would've been pretty crappy, but tragedy was averted. Overall, that ride was really fun despite being fairly difficult.

After our ride on Sunday, we went to the beach and took a dip. Keri claimed the water was too cold, but I thought it was really nice and refreshing. It got me excited for my week at the lakehouse in Maine. I'm really looking forward to that trip as well.

Overall, Tahoe really is a gorgeous place. The huge mountains, the crystal clear lake, and the beautiful California weather make it my sort of place. What else could a guy ask for? And it even snows in the winter...a lot. I love it!!! Now, if only there were a way to avoid the traffic...