Lake Tahoe or ?

Old Jul 25th, 2016, 05:43 AM
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Lake Tahoe or ?

My husband and I (late 50s) are going to be attending a wedding next 4th of July weekend in the region of the Plumas National Forest.. We plan to fly in and out of Reno, which is a little over an hour's drive to the venue. On July 5th, we are thinking of moving to a new location for the last 3 nights of our one-week trip. Lake Tahoe looks to be about 2 hours away, depending which part of the Lake we choose. I figure it is going to be very crowded, and we prefer peace and quiet. Our main interests are hiking and eating at good restaurants. Not interested in gambling or night life. We usually prefer boutique hotels, small resorts or B & B's if there is privacy. We like to be able to walk to restaurants from our lodging. I was looking at the Hyatt at Incline Village, which is huge and very pricey ($400 night). I'm hoping to find something below $300/night.

The Black Bear Inn looks very nice and it sounds like there are good restaurants close by. But I'm not familiar with Lake Tahoe and not sure if South Lake Tahoe would be too touristy for us.

The other option would be to go someplace else, perhaps a little west of the the wedding venue. But I think that would place us too far from Reno airport for our flight home.

Any suggestions are appreciated!
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 06:34 AM
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Have a look at some of the towns along Calif. Hwy 49 in the gold rush country just south of where you'll be. (Or maybe not so far south; maybe that's where the wedding is.)

Downieville, Grass Valley, Nevada City... extremely historic, picturesque, low key, with lots of very cool old buildings, B&Bs...

Then it's a hop onto I-80 and badda bing, Reno.
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 06:52 AM
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Thanks Gardyloo, that area does look interesting. We will be staying near Graeagle so that is just south of where we'll be. Because we will want to do some hiking, maybe we should just stay put, as it looks like there are some nice hikes in the Lakes Basin area. But since Graeagle and Portola look very small I was thinking we might want to mix it up a bit and stay closer to a little bigger town...
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 03:12 PM
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First, the area around Graeagle is beautiful, and quieter than Lake Tahoe. That said, I'm a huge Lake Tahoe fan (we are spending 4 days a week there all summer this year). I would not do South Lake Tahoe which I do think is too developed (there are nice residential areas, but the main road, which is where all the hotels are, is just very spread out and built up). Incline is very nice, the only thing I don't like about it is there's no "town center", the way there is in Truckee or Tahoe City, or even King's Beach, but it's lovely. I would consider renting something on the West Shore of Lake Tahoe, or possibly within the Northstar resort (that's where we rent).

There's lots of good hiking in Lake Tahoe (we're hikers, too, and always on the lookout for good ones), but peace & quiet around July 4th - maybe not so much. There has been terrible traffic in and around both Sand Harbor (Incline), King's Beach and Tahoe City the last few weekends. Weekdays are quieter (obviously)
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 03:22 PM
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I was just going to suggest Grass Valley/Nevada City. I like it so much I moved here. And it's an easy drive to Reno, from Nevada City straight up Hwy 20 to I-80 and right on in.

Here's a series of blogs I did around the area: http://www.travelgumbo.com/blog/port...try-california
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 03:53 PM
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I will check out your blogs, thanks! I am leaning toward Lake Tahoe because I think my husband would rather hike than visit the gold rush towns in the heat of summer. I imagine it's hot at Tahoe as well but I'm hoping we can find some forested hikes.

sf7307, I realized this afternoon that the north part of Tahoe sounds like it's more our speed (Plus closer to Reno Airport, I think) And I was just looking at the Northstar resort before I saw your post. We would arrive there on Wednesday July 5 and stay until Saturday so not there over 4th of July weekend, although I suppose that whole week will be crowded. Any particular hikes you like in that area?
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 07:16 PM
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First, there is a great trail system that goes through Northstar itself. I love to walk on the trail. Here's a link to the trail. Some of this is a "walk" and some is a "hike" but it's all in the woods.

http://www.mobilemaplets.com/showplace/7850

This year we joined the Tahoe Rim Trail organization and are doing the 6 "challenges" for this year - 3 to 8 mile hikes around the lake. We went on two so far - we walked about 6.3 miles at Mt. Rose trailhead to the Galena waterfall and a little farther a couple of weeks ago, and this past weekend we walked 9.5 miles at the Spooner Lake trailhead (it was a great hike, but I wouldn't recommend it because the trailhead is closer to South Lake Tahoe). Neither of these was particularly hard - I'd call them both moderate, about 1,000 ft elevation gain. I also love the Shirley Lake Trail at Squaw VAlley (shorter but harder), Five Lakes at Alpine Meadows, Mt. Judah at Sugar Bowl and Castle Peak in Truckee. We also hiked at Brockway Summit just after July 4th this year. We're going to do Echo Lakes next weekend - I'll let you know what I think. Oh, also along the west shore, D.L.Bliss State Park is great.
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 08:46 PM
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We just got back a few weeks ago from 10 days at Incline. We have gone every year to either Incline, or Truckee for the past 30 years. Yes, the 4th was crowded but during the week afterwards and even the weekend after that, it was pretty calm. Look at perhaps Vrbo or Air Bnb for a place for several nights. Truckee is also great as it is handy to I-80, has a nice downtown with many restaurants. In Truckee, we have rented houses at the Tahoe-Donner development.

If I had the $$$, I would love to stay at the West Shore Cafe

http://www.westshorecafe.com
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Old Jul 25th, 2016, 08:49 PM
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It will not be hot. It will be beautiful. Hot for Tahoe is 85 and no humidity.
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Old Jul 26th, 2016, 04:35 AM
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Thanks all for the great info!! Sf7307, the hiking sounds great--especially being able to hike right from the property. I'm assuming some of the hikes have views of Lake Tahoe(I'm more interested in looking at it from above than hanging on the beach). We stayed in the town of Telluride a couple years ago and it was amazing to take beautiful hikes during the day and then walk to great restaurants at night, with no need for a car once you're there.

I was wondering about Truckee, I'll also look into that. Glad to hear it won't be as hot as I feared. I'm from Chicago, where it's been in the low 90s with high humidity lately.
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Old Jul 26th, 2016, 08:00 AM
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Lake Tahoe and environs are over 6,000 ft elevation. So beautiful. I always hate coming home.
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Old Jul 26th, 2016, 08:17 AM
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Actually, it's supposed to be in the 90s in Tahoe this weekend, but that's unusual.

Send me an email (same screen name at gmail) and I'll send you some pictures taken on our recent hikes.
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Old Jul 26th, 2016, 01:55 PM
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Sf7307- 90's in Tahoe and 108 here. I want to go back!
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Old Jul 26th, 2016, 06:56 PM
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That's funny MIchelle - you'd probably freeze in Tahoe while we're sweltering.

Buck minster, I got your email and I'll send you some pix!
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