fstopandsee

This might not be the last snow of the season, but it is the last snow I will likely see.

Winter has returned to Tahoe, or more accurately, we got a little bit of snow for the first time in a long time. To celebrate, I dug into the archives and found this shot of boulders in Donner Lake with some fresh snow.

The hike to Lake Margaret is a great way to escape the heat of the valley. I extended the hike by taking the short scamper to a peak above the lake to get this panorama. The sun shining down through the clouds made the Tahoe sky come alive. It is always worth the extra effort for the view from the top!

I wanted to make sure I got this shot before all the snow was gone in the mountains. There was supposed to be some interesting weather that night, but I wasn’t lucky enough to get crazy clouds for sunset. What I did get were some great colors to offset the little tree on the rock.

The Cottonwood is a fantastic old ski lodge overlooking Truckee, CA that has been restored as a restaurant. An abandoned ski lift stands nearby that used to take skiers up all 700 feet of available vertical. Since then the resorts in Tahoe have greatly expanded their terrain, but this place remains to show what skiing in the area used to be like.

Apparently this tree wasn’t getting enough water, it had to reach out a bit into the Truckee River for a drink!

This orange butterfly was minding his own business when I found him, and he didn’t mind posing for a photo op.

On a hike out after a day of back country skiing, I was rewarded with this intense sunset. The mountains provided the perfect venue to take it all in and relax for a minute before heading back to the cabin. What a great day!

As part of my plan to not admit that it is summer, I went skiing on Saturday. There is plenty of snow on the mountain, more than usual for this time of year, but down at the base things were looking a little bit like spring.

The first and last thing you see on the hike to Freel Peak in the Sierra Nevada is Willow Creek. The forest road that takes you to the trail head ends here at Willow Creek, which you must cross in order to make the summit. This spot at the end of the hike was particularly well lit for a photo.