We’ve spent the last two days playing around the southwestern shores of Tahoe.
Here’s a view from our campground looking out over the opening of Emerald Bay.
When we left Sugar Pine SP, we still had some time before we could arrive at Emerald Bay SP. We passed by D.L. Bliss and the sign said beach parking was full. Because we had a state park pass on our windshield from camping the previous night, the ranger waved us through. (Good tip to know, when you pay for camping at a CA State Park, that pass is good for any CA State Park until sunset). Just for the heck of it we drove all the way down to the beach (passing hordes of people carrying coolers and beach paraphernalia) and were able to nab a spot directly on the beach. Originally, we were just going to scope out this area, but since the parking gods had smiled upon us we decided to spend the day at this sandy beach.
It was super crowded, but the sandy beach and clear water felt like we were swimming in a pool.
The smoke had been slowly drifting over to the west shore for most of the day, so we were quite delighted that the campground at Emerald Bay SP still had good visibility. Right after I took this picture a bald eagle soared by. So beautiful.
Because we got this campsite as a last minute cancellation we didn’t know what to expect. It was awesome! It had a little terrace that you walked up to that overlooked the campground. Great place for snacks and late afternoon adult libations.
We even went for an evening swim in Emerald Bay!
The bear activity at this park is out of control. We know the drill about using the bear lockers and storing all your food and we’ve encountered bear activity at other parks, but nothing like here! Starting in the early evening you could repeatedly hear cars honking their horns, people beating pots and pans and yelling at the bear to scare it away. This kept up until after one in the morning. I would drift off to sleep and then was startled awake with a neighbor on one side or the other making noise and chasing the bear away. I’ve never been so happy that we sleep on the second floor! Needless to say we didn’t sleep well the first night here.
We woke Saturday to a lot more smoke in the air and very little visibility. So glad I was able to get some clear shots of Tahoe on the day before. The last day of our vacation was spent doing pretty much what we’ve been doing everyday…swimming, snorkeling, reading, biking and eating. Sounds like a pretty great vacation to me!
We really enjoyed this sweet little cove at Emerald Bay. Watching all the boats coming in and out of the bay was really fun.
Tomorrow we head back to Megan and Kevin’s. We’ve missed Maddy and Theo and are looking forward to hanging out with the munchkins. Here’s hoping the bear decides to sleep tonight and not terrorize the campground.
We haven’t plugged in once this trip. Having solar with a good fridge is so appreciated. Thanks Wolfgang.
