Your perfect Tahoe vacation
I have been living and writing about the Tahoe Sierra for more than 20 years and I’ve become a de facto tour guide anytime friends and family come to visit for the first time and are taken aback by its beauty.
I know I’ll never forget the first time I saw the lake coming into view as we drove over Brockway Summit heading to Kings Beach when I was in college. I was on my way to Reno, Nev., with my uncle and siblings when my uncle made a detour to show us Lake Tahoe. My sister and I were in awe of its beauty and years later we both moved to the North Shore and have made Tahoe our permanent home.
So, when friends and family come for a visit, I usually indulge in a sightseeing drive around Lake Tahoe to share some of my favorite spots. In this edition, I share my favorite spots on the West and South shores, along with some favorite eateries, for Part I of my feature “Your perfect Tahoe vacation.” In the next edition, I’ll share my favorite spots on the East and North shores.
Impacts of climate change
In the last few weeks, the Tahoe Environmental Research Center (TERC) has released its annual Clarity and State of the Lake reports, detailing its 2023 research on Lake Tahoe. The short of it is that clarity is down, lake temperatures are rising, wildfire smoke is more prevalent, microplastics are concerning, and aquatic invasive species remain a persistent challenge. Read my story on “State of the Lake” in this edition to learn more.
TERC researchers are some of the region’s unsung heroes who diligently work to understand the changes in our environment so that they can help find solutions to preserving and protecting the lake that we all cherish.
We can all help by making choices to reduce our plastic use, reporting conditions we observe in and around Lake Tahoe, picking up litter that may become microplastics when we see it, becoming informed on Tahoe’s health and supporting TERC’s work by donating at tahoe.ucdavis.edu/giving.
