I live in the suburbs, where the city lights block out all but the most determinedly bright stars and celestial objects. A few nights ago the sky was particularly clear, and my husband and I stood in our front yard finding satellites and identifying planets. That got me to thinking about how significant stargazing used to be for me, in my home town in Maine. I’ve never seen stars so bright, since I moved away. I’ve really stopped looking up as much as I used to – a fact which I hope to rectify in the very near future.
Here are a handful of excellent locations from which to gaze at the stars.
1. Lake Tahoe, California/Nevada. Rent a houseboat for a week, and spend your evenings floating along, laying on a blanket or lounge chair on the roof, and gazing up at the unrestricted view, free from the dampening of city lights.
2. Haleakala National Park, Maui. The summit of Haleakala Mountain is the highest point on Maui and brings you above the cloud level and close to the night sky. The clear air has been washed clean by Pacific winds and rain, and the unrestricted view is glorious.
The family spent the recent Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday weekend at our Lake Tahoe North Shore compound in Dollar Point. We’d been promising the kids a trip up to the snow for about two years now but I’ve been hesitant to make the drive until I was reasonably sure it wouldn’t snow.
Let me explain.
We’re not really snow people in that we don’t ski or snowboard or take part in any other snow related activities short of building snowmen or sledding. The last time we went to Tahoe during the winter we nearly got snowed in. I couldn’t manage to get the chains on the car and had to be towed out of the Dollar Point development, much to my embarrassment. In short it was an exercise in frustration and one I vowed not to repeat. So when I say I would only make the drive if I was reasonably sure it wouldn’t snow I mean at least during the 48-hours we planned to be there.
As luck would have it the weather was on our side that weekend. The forecast was for clear skies and cold temperatures, which to my way of thinking is just about perfect, so go we did. We arrived about 12:30 AM on Saturday to a freezing cold cabin and what appeared to be a broken furnace. The house was probably below 50 degrees, and remained so until the following morning when the heater inexplicably decided to begin working. I did not question it I simply enjoyed it, and left it on for the remainder of our visit lest it decide to stop working again.
But this is all background information that I’m sure does not interest you so let’s get to the activities.
Mt. Rose
The kids wanted to do some sledding so we drove to the summit of Mt. Rose. From Tahoe City it’s about a 45 minute drive on N. Tahoe Blvd (Hwy 28) to the Mt. Rose turn-off (Hwy 431). On the drive up Hwy 431 there are a couple of other places that are great for sledding as well. Don’t ask me exactly where, but they’re right on 431. You can’t miss them. Just look for the people sliding down the hillsides.
According to Wikipedia, Mt. Rose is “the highest point of the highway and the highest mountain pass open-year round in the Sierra Nevada.” In other words, during the winter you’re very likely to find snow there, which we did. Unfortunately we also found a lot of other people there so we had to share the hillside, alas. Never the less we spent about two hours having a great time nearly killing ourselves.
If skiing is more your bag there are more than twenty resorts in North Lake Tahoe to…enjoy your bag – including Squaw Valley, Sugar Bowl and North-Star, just to name three. Many of the ski resorts offer “sno-parks” for those of you with younger kids.
For lots more on Lake Tahoe winter activities check out Gold Country Best, with information on ice-skating, snowmobiling and even dog-sledding.
Of course we had to hit CB’s Pizza & Grill, our traditional Tahoe dining establishment. While the pizza is good this time we opted for something other than pizza. CB’s offers a full array of burgers (the girl is a burger fanatic) and sandwiches, salads, pastas and appetizers. A note of caution; don’t order the eggplant Parmesan. My wife ordered it and it was basically a thick slab of tough eggplant covered in sauce and melted cheese. Eggplant Parmesan should be sliced thin, fried and then baked with all the accompanying goodies. Live and learn.
It was a short trip; up late Friday night, home by Sunday evening. But that’s one of the great things about Tahoe. It’s only a 3-hour drive from most locations in the San Francisco Bay Area. At 188 miles door to door, it’s a very doable weekend trip for us, and one we’re hoping to do again before the spring thaw.
