Lake Adventure!

 In May of 2022 we went on a waterfall adventure

 in search of 10 waterfalls in northern California.

Recently we went on a lake adventure

 and saw many beautiful lakes in the Sierras!

Day 1: Grandpa found this on the internet:

"The Shortest (But Most Scenic) Drive in California

Officially known as the Gold Lake Highway, this little ribbon of road snakes its way past the shores of over twenty alpine lakes."

On our first day we drove 15 miles on Gold Lake Highway and saw many of the lakes including these:

Packer Lake

Salmon Lake

Snag Lake

Haven lake

Lake Lily

The only one where the word "lake" came first

but this is all we could see of it from the highway!

Gold Lake

The largest of the lakes in the area and 100 feet deep.

Professional photos:  Helgramite Lake

Scene from above of four lakes

We also saw lots of views of the Sierra Buttes as they are called.

Later we did a tour of downtown Reno. 

 This is the best photo I could get of the famous sign.

So here it is from the Internet

We enjoyed seeing many works of art throughout the downtown.

This one was interesting!

Later we drove up higher into neighborhoods and looked down on the city.

Day 2: 

Spooner Lake, Nevada

We reached this lake by driving through Reno and Carson City.

This is a manmade lake which is 22 feet deep, covers 100 acres, and surface elevation is 6,972 feet.

We could never find a place to take a picture of it without a hike or causing a traffic accident so this is from the Internet.  That is Lake Tahoe in the background.

Lake Tahoe

We visited Lake Tahoe last year in August

 and I posted about it with lots of pictures.

Lake Tahoe is 1,645 feet deep, 22 miles by 12 miles and surface elevation is 6,225 feet.   It is definitely one of the most beautiful lakes in the world.

It was super crowded everywhere with cars parked long roadways and people walking long distances to see the views.  We stayed in the car to get some photos.

It was bumper to bumper traffic through the towns.

Fallen Leaf Lake:

This is another lake right next to Lake Tahoe

Grandpa took this picture of it in 2017 after a hike.

It is 380 feet deep, 2.9 miles by 1.0 miles and surface elevation is 6,377 feet.

Here is an internet picture of it:

We traveled back to our hotel by way of Mt.Rose

The summit of Mt. Rose is 8,911 feet so it was quite a climb and then down to Reno.

There were some beautiful meadows along the way.

Grandpa has ridden his bike on this road in a 100 mile bike ride from Sparks around the lake and back to Sparks.

Day 3: More Lake Tahoe

We headed back to Lake Tahoe via Truckee and drove through the neighborhood where our family used to rent homes in the summer for vacation.

We also traveled the rest of the road we had missed the day before--mostly in Nevada.

On our way back we enjoyed these beautiful puffy cloud formations!

Day 4: Donner Lake

We drove down to the lake and drove around as much of it as is possible.

Donner Lake is 238 feet deep, 2.7 miles by .6 miles and surface elevation is 5,936 feet.

Then we traveled up the old highway for some spectacular views.

First we checked out the interesting granite outcroppings:

And then there were pull-outs for views of Donner Lake:

It is really a beautiful lake!

We had fun on our Lake Adventure!