It was time to disconnect... I packed my bag, hired a pet sitter and drove to Lake Tahoe for the weekend. Ok, ok, I did a little bit more planning than this, but it would not have fit in one sentence as above.
I also booked a hotel after extensive research on Google and AirBnb, found a Meetup group that was hiking Ralston Peak, really by accident when looking through different hikes, signed up and then decided in the morning to start before the official start time of 11 AM.
The drive took around 3 hours, and by 10 AM I was safely parked in a dirt parking lot of Ralston Peak's trailhead. Parking was really limited, and I got one of the few last spots. Typically, I don't start hiking that late in the morning, but because of the Meetup group and 3 hour drive, I was ok with that. The group was late, so I made an executive decision to start solo.
It was already hot. The heat wave, although not as bad as the one from a week ago, had the temperatures up in the high 70s at 10 AM. This was going to be a hard hike. At 7 miles and 2,800 ft elevation gain, the trail was going to offer a real good workout, if nothing else.
The first two miles were relatively easy - around 500-600 ft elevation gain per mile. The trail offered nice shade, but the heat was pretty serious.
As the hike continued into the third mile, the difficulty quickly doubled to over 1,000 ft elevation gain per mile. Shade was gone with an occasional tree here and there offering some reprieve. I hate sweating, but there was no other option (duh, as if I had an option!). I brewed a cup of coffee before I left home and poured it in the mason jar to get some caffeine boost on the trail. Black coffee, nothing else. It tasted heavenly now!
I had to stop pretty often catching my breath. It was a combination of high elevation, heat and average shape I was in that contributed to the difficulty of this hike. I got lazy at the gym ignoring all cardio workouts focusing only on weight training. This was helpful, but on this hike cardio was the key.
I finally got to the top, and the views rewarded my efforts.
I sat on the edge (ok, I am exaggerating, it was not really an edge, just the top of the mountain) staring at the broad space in front of my. A guy next to me wanted to record every moment of his experience by setting his camera to a continuing clicking mode. I judgingly looked at him for disturbing everyone's peace. Two vivacious ladies further away had a loud conversation about something instead of just enjoying peace and quiet of the present moment. I wondered why people are so inconsiderate...
The group leader finally arrived and introduced himself. I told him I was heading down already and wished him a good hike back.
On the way back, I thanked the universe (and my mother) for the shoes I got from Merrell's for my birthday. Good traction was essential going downhill on a sandy terrain.
My knees were not happy, but at the bottom of the mountain I finally was able to sit down in my car and have a sandwich (also good planning ;). My hotel (or should I say, motel) was only 5 minutes away. Strawberry Lodge was the cheapest option, and I got a room there without a bathroom. Unfortunately, there was a wedding planned that day, so I knew peace would be hard to come by. I took a shower in a pretty nasty public tub (it was a shower nevertheless!), got changed and headed to South Lake Tahoe to get dinner.
I was not very hungry, but stopped at The Naked Fish to get sushi. I ordered my typical Philly roll and a seaweed salad which was quite impressive. The roll, on the other hand, was average at best, but with a bit of dry sake it tasted much better. But who the heck dilutes soy sauce???
I walked around the town for a bit noticing how things have changed from just 9 months ago when I went to Lake Tahoe on the way from Lassen National Park. The streets were crowded with people, lots of restaurants reopened as if COVID was just a bad dream. I resisted the urge to buy a caramel chocolate-covered apple at Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory's franchise (450 calories? seriously?) and drove back to the hotel where the wedding awaited.
I turned on the fan attempting to sleep, but with no air conditioning, thin walls and noise of wedding on one side of the room and road traffic on the other, I barely got a few hours of sleep. I was to wake up at 6 am to hike Mt. Tallac!
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