Among my fond memories of my family’s annual summer pilgrimage to a cabin at Lake Tahoe was the “lake” yell. The moment a thin slice of Lake Tahoe, so blue that it’s nicknamed “Lake of the Sky,” became visible at a bend in the road, we’d all yell, “Lake!” That’s how excited we were to reach the place. The lake gave my sisters and me two weeks of beach visits, lake swims, forest hikes, and trips to “the line” (Stateline, Nevada) for casino buffets. Later trips with my own kids kept the memories coming.
A few years had passed since my last trip to the largest natural freshwater lake in the West, so I set out this year to refresh those memories with a drive around it — a classic 72-mile road trip accurately promoted as “America’s Most Beautiful Drive.”
TAHOE CITY & NORTH SHORE
Once you settle in at Tahoe City, several options await. For adventure, try the 27 zip lines (one a football-field long) at Tahoe Treetop Adventure Parks in a nearby forest. I remember freezing at one platform where my hesitation to lift off prompted the pigtailed girl behind me to give me the eye-roll. I deserved it. This time, I chose the less edgy option of renting an e-bike at the Olympic Bike Shop to pedal 20 miles round-trip on the West Shore paved path to glorious Sugar Pine Point State Park. Another outdoor option: Float down the calm Truckee River. (You’re shuttled to the upriver put-in.) The cultural option: Visit the Gatekeeper’s Museum, with North America’s largest collection of Native American baskets, plus memorabilia from the 1960 Winter Olympics, Tahoe’s boating and shipwreck history, and locally made films (notably The Godfather, Part II).
Next come the plentiful gastronomic choices in Tahoe City. The crowds, when I dined on a Tuesday in May at casual Minglewood for brunch and elegant Christy Hill for dinner, told me they may be the two most popular. I learned they’re both owned by one local couple. “Alex and I love this community,” Amanda Looby told me, adding that the name “Minglewood” combines the idea of mingling and the antler-like manzanita wood art that decorates the ceiling. That night at Christy Hill, the alpenglow over the lake’s peaks turned the sky pink, matching the hue of my rosé.
I started the lake loop by driving to the North Shore’s best beach — Kings Beach — and rented a kayak at Adrift Tahoe. (They also rent standup paddleboards.) Paddling out, I navigated a field of boulders jutting from the shallows, some so large and flat that fellow paddlers stopped to sunbathe on them. Magical.
EAST SHORE & STATELINE
Driving into Nevada, I soon reached Incline Village, so affluent that a lakefront home there sold for $62 million in 2024. It came with a private beach, of course, but Nevada’s best public beach nearby is also a gem, and it only costs a few bucks to park at Sand Harbor State Beach. Even better, it’s at the southern end of the Tahoe East Shore Trail. That paved path is only 2.6 miles one-way but offers jaw-dropping views of the lake from above and at the water’s edge. The aquamarine water is clear as glass as the path rolls past view benches and signs that tell the story of the lake. You can picnic on the beach upon returning or, as I did, have lunch at Tunnel Creek Café at the trail turnaround. Also at Sand Harbor is the Lake Tahoe Shakespeare Festival’s natural amphitheater, where this summer you can watch Lady Macbeth rub imaginary blood off her hands as a blood-red sun sets over the lake. I saw Midsummer Night’s Dream one year — and it was exactly that.
Driving south along the quiet, heavily forested eastern shore toward the forest of high-rise casinos in Stateline, Nevada, I made a brief stop at Zephyr Cove, the beach where my parents honeymooned at one of the rustic resort cabins (still there) and, decades later, where my kids built sandcastles and watched the M.S. Dixie 2 paddlewheeler (also still there) berth and depart. It’s the largest of the tour boats that crisscross the lake.
Five miles farther on, I stepped into one of Stateline’s four major casinos, the jingle of the slots reminding me of the time I wandered through with my kids on the way to a casino restaurant. My teenage son convinced me to drop a quarter in. Ding-ding-ding!
Fifty quarters gushed out as a security guard eyed my kids. Little sister wasn’t happy; I slipped her a few quarters later.
I spent my quarters this year on dinner and drinks. The 19th-floor Sage Room Steak House at Caesars Republic … and 18th-floor Friday’s Station Steak& Seafood Grill and Sapori Italian Kitchen at Harrah’s … offer stunning lake and mountain views with their literally elevated ….
By Bob Cooper
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