Travelling the USA | Lake Tahoe, CA

Sunday 18th September

Today was an early start for Bethan, Emma and myself as we were preparing for our trip to Lake Tahoe! Heather was staying behind as she was flying back to England tonight. We quickly packed all of our things together and by 9:30am, we'd ordered an Uber to take us out to the airport so we can pick up the car we'd rented. Due to the price, we couldn't get one from a rent-a-car company, so we used an app called Turo; it's a lot like AirBnb, but for cars! As we arrived at the parking lot, we were greeted by a Fiat 500 which I was certain wouldn't fit our stuff in, but after some insane Tetris skills, we managed to do it! Once all this was done, we headed off on our trip up the north of California. After about an hour of driving (we got to drive over the Golden Gate bridge!), we arrived in San Rafael, where we dropped off Emma's luggage at her Aunts and found our way to Johnny's donut shop. This place is famed for it's donuts and they make them fresh every day! Due to the time we arrived, our choices were limited and I opted for a chocolate and vanilla cream donut, which unfortunately, was underwhelming. I'm not going to let this cast a bad shadow on the place as we did arrive late and I probably wouldn't have chosen this one. Anyway, we headed back to the car to finish the rest of our 4 hour journey to Tahoe.

As we were getting near, we could tell why this is such a popular vacation destination, it was absolutely beautiful! The horizon was huge mountains covered in thousands of pine trees which scaled the whole mountain side. The hills surrounded us as we made our way into the valley, and as we got to the bottom we came across a huge mass of water, the most stunning lake; it was incredible to see, almost like we had stumbled into a landscape painting. It's the sort of view you have as your desktop background. I was literally in awe of what I was seeing, I don't think I've seen a setting so beautiful.

We made our way through South Lake Tahoe and after about 30 minutes we arrived at our hotel, Tahoe Seasons Resort. It was nothing like I expected. It was like someone had taken an old woodland cabin and turned it into a hotel, it's great! Everything was decked out to the woodland theme and as we arrived in our room, we were taken aback as to how nice it was. For $205, we paid for 3 nights in a family sized room, 2 bedrooms with a bathroom in the centre of them and a jet-bath which was directly between the two rooms only seperated by shutters.

I still couldn't quite believe how beautiful it was outside, so we decided to head out and try and catch the sunset from the best possible view. A lovely hotel valet kindly told us the best place in the area to catch it, a place they called Party Rock, so we headed out of the hotel to find it. I marched ahead of the girls and soon enough lost them, so I headed up a mountain side on my own. As I got to the top, I was greeted by a pile of boulders that peaked the hill. I made my way to the top of these and sat on the highest rock to get the best view of the horizon. I sat here for what seemed like 30 minutes, but could've been longer; I was stunned by how beautiful the whole place was, it's something I'd always wished to see and finally I was here taking in everything. The only sounds were that of the animals and wind and it was just the right temperature to be up there. As the sun fell, the darkness soon came and I realised I should probably get back before it gets too dark.

Monday 19th September

I was eager to see everything, so I woke up quite early today, but before setting off on an adventure, we attended a breakfast in the hotel that was hosted by some guys who represented different companies in the area. It was actually a benefit to go to this as we learned a lot about the area, got a free breakfast and won a 2-4-1 kayaking voucher. After this had finished, we hopped in the car and headed to a place that was recommended by a hotel concierge called Camp Richardson. As we arrived, there didn't seem to be anywhere to hike, but we were advised by a restaurant employee to head to a place called Fallen Leaf Lake, where there are multiple hiking trails, so we jumped back in the car and headed that way. The drive seemed to take a long time, but it didn't matter as the views of the area were astounding, but we evenutally made it to the parking lot where the hikes started from and we gathered ourselves before heading out. After about 30 minutes of trying to find the right trails and sign the hiking permits we were on our route through the forests and hills of South Tahoe. The landscapes we came across were so beautiful and I couldn't put my camera down, there was so much I needed to take in and show people! We walked for about an hour and a half, we came across waterfalls and miniature lakes before deciding to head back so we could see some more of Tahoe. If you ever go to Tahoe I definitely recommend trekking through the mountains and forests, there isn't many places on this earth that I've visited that can compete with the beauty of the woodlands of Tahoe.

On the route back, we decided to pull over and take in the beauty of Fallen Leaf Lake and take a few photographs before grabbing some grub and heading to the first beach we could find. We arrived at El Dorado beach, which was surprisingly dead, there werent many people there at all, and nobody in the water. The beach wasn't the best I've seen, but the scenery around it made it so picturesque. After about 30 minutes, we decided to shoot off and try and find a different beach to watch the sunset. We arrived at one place, but there was a car fee of $8, so we decided to move on, but not before chatting to the parking attendant who recommended Lakeside beach, just a bit further down from where we were. So we headed there. The beach he recommended was beautiful, there were much more people there, however there still wasn't as many as I'd expected but this was far better. We stayed here for over an hour and watched the sun set over the mountains; it was incredible to see and the landscape made it 1000 times better than I could've imagined. I still wasn't over the beauty of this place.

On the way back we stopped at a local grocery store to stock up on snacks and lunch for our trip to Yosemite tomorrow, before heading back to the hotel. The day had taken all of our energy and we needed to sleep.

Tuesday 20th September

After talking last night, the girls and I decided it wasn't really logical to head to Yosemite today, it was just too far and we wouldn't have been able to see much, so we decided to have a chilled, lazy day in South Lake Tahoe. The first thing we decided to do was head to the local beach and try our hand at some paddle boarding on Lake Tahoe. When we got to the beach, the watersports place was nowhere to be seen, so we decided to save our money and chill on the beach, maybe go for a swim. The water was FREEZING, so we decided to only go ankle deep and just relax on the sand. We must've been here for about an hour and it was so peaceful. I went and sat by the shore on my own and just take in the beautiful sights and sounds of the lake; there was no noise pollution, the only sounds I could hear was the flowing of the water and the sounds of the seagulls, it was amazing! After a while, we decided we were starving and went on the hunt for food. Due to a budget, we headed back to Dennys (AGAIN?!). We managed to fill up for about $10; this includes a desert that was on the house!

From here we decided to head to the local Goodwill (my favourite shop!) to see what they had in stock. Unfortunately, I didn't find anything that I wanted, but Bethan splashed out and bought a couple of things. We didn't really do much for the rest of the day, it was our relaxing day and we were all shattered, so we headed back to the hotel to have a ip in the pool and chill out. As we got back, I decided to head out and check out the local area and see the sights; I was only out for about 20 minutes before getting back, had a quick swim and went up to the room. Where we just chilled out for the rest of the evening, and we had to pack up as we were leaving in the morning.