Story:
"testing our product" is a great excuse for a weekend trip to Tahoe's Desolation Wilderness. The engineers at EveryTrail (Benoit, Matt, Michael, Paul, Werner, and I) drove up early Saturday morning for this weekend trip. We parked around 1 and had a quick breakfast of wraps with hummus, tomatoes, cucumbers and cheese, put on our packs and started our trek. The first 2 miles were steep but had some great views overlooking Emerald Bay and Lake Tahoe. After about 5 hours of hiking we made it to Middle Velma Lake where we found a great campsite.
We quickly dropped our packs and jumped into the (not-as-cold-as-expected) water and swam around until it was too cold to handle. After setting up camp we broke out the stoves (or stove, one didn't work) and had so couscous with various Indian toppings--we ate pretty well. We managed to snap some photos during sunset despite the cloudy weather and then got into our tents because we were pretty exhausted from our long day.
It started raining around 2am and didn't stop until morning (which wasn't appreciated by Paul who decided to spend the night without a tent). We woke up in the morning mostly well-rested (some of us woke up a few times) and ate a very welcomed breakfast of oatmeal, raisins, dried cranberries with other seeds and grains mixed in. We slowly packed up camp and left just before 11 (we were in no real hurry).
We didn't want to hike the same trail we hiked in, so we took a little detour past Fontanillis lake and Dicks lake, which were both spectacular. The desolate scenery turned into a forest with big trees and green shrubs on the descent to Eagle Lake. We had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at Eagle Lake while the chipmunks tried to steal our bread and lick the spilled peanut butter off the rocks. Rather than scare them away while they stole half of my sandwhich, Michael decided to snap about 50 pictures of the theft--thanks Michael!. We stayed a little longer to swim in the lake (which was a perfect temperature) and then hiked down the final mile to the Eagle Falls trailhead.
We still had another mile on the road to walk back to the cars, but it wasn't too bad because we were able to see Emerald Bay the entire time. Once back at the cards we threw our backs into the back of the car and drove to the Burger Lounge for some Heavenly burgers (that means with avocado and bacon, but they also tasted heavenly after the long hike), beer, and pesto fries. A few hours later (more than expected due to road work) we were back in the bay area and (almost) ready for work the next day.
It was a great weekend break from the bay area, a fun trip with my co-workers at EveryTrail, and we also learned a few things from fellow hikers we met on the trail that we hope will improve EveryTrail some more. Can't wait for the next one!
"testing our product" is a great excuse for a weekend trip to Tahoe's Desolation Wilderness. The engineers at EveryTrail (Benoit, Matt, Michael, Paul, Werner, and I) drove up early Saturday morning for this weekend trip. We parked around 1 and had a quick breakfast of wraps with hummus, tomatoes, cucumbers and cheese, put on our packs and started our trek. The first 2 miles were steep but had some great views overlooking Emerald Bay and Lake Tahoe. After about 5 hours of hiking we made it to Middle Velma Lake where we found a great campsite.
We quickly dropped our packs and jumped into the (not-as-cold-as-expected) water and swam around until it was too cold to handle. After setting up camp we broke out the stoves (or stove, one didn't work) and had so couscous with various Indian toppings--we ate pretty well. We managed to snap some photos during sunset despite the cloudy weather and then got into our tents because we were pretty exhausted from our long day.
It started raining around 2am and didn't stop until morning (which wasn't appreciated by Paul who decided to spend the night without a tent). We woke up in the morning mostly well-rested (some of us woke up a few times) and ate a very welcomed breakfast of oatmeal, raisins, dried cranberries with other seeds and grains mixed in. We slowly packed up camp and left just before 11 (we were in no real hurry).
We didn't want to hike the same trail we hiked in, so we took a little detour past Fontanillis lake and Dicks lake, which were both spectacular. The desolate scenery turned into a forest with big trees and green shrubs on the descent to Eagle Lake. We had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at Eagle Lake while the chipmunks tried to steal our bread and lick the spilled peanut butter off the rocks. Rather than scare them away while they stole half of my sandwhich, Michael decided to snap about 50 pictures of the theft--thanks Michael!. We stayed a little longer to swim in the lake (which was a perfect temperature) and then hiked down the final mile to the Eagle Falls trailhead.
We still had another mile on the road to walk back to the cars, but it wasn't too bad because we were able to see Emerald Bay the entire time. Once back at the cards we threw our backs into the back of the car and drove to the Burger Lounge for some Heavenly burgers (that means with avocado and bacon, but they also tasted heavenly after the long hike), beer, and pesto fries. A few hours later (more than expected due to road work) we were back in the bay area and (almost) ready for work the next day.
It was a great weekend break from the bay area, a fun trip with my co-workers at EveryTrail, and we also learned a few things from fellow hikers we met on the trail that we hope will improve EveryTrail some more. Can't wait for the next one!
Comments (10)
dude! good job! Im hitting the trail fri. with a friend. Just got the permit and the ok with the wife. That was the hard part!!
by diablo2ride on Sep 11, 2010
Chris. Excellent job here. Your skills with making this work really expose the power of the site. I haven't been back to this area since the early 90s, and these beautiful photos make me think it's time to go back. Also, I like the skinsuit you're wearing in your new profile picture. Where can I get one of those?
by mlvlvr on Aug 30, 2009
I've thought about day hiking to Dick's Lake and wonder if you thought this trip was too long for a day hike.
by wooac on Aug 27, 2009
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