I love the name – “the Lake Country”. It conjures up images of touring in a four-horse carriage in a Jane Austen novel. Anyway, I decamp from my pleasant campsite with the idea of taking the long way around back to Sierraville, to drive on this road I’ve never been on before and to see what the local version of the Lake Country is all about.
So instead of taking a right to go back through Bassets to retrace my journey, I take a left for Graeagle, and about 300 yards down the road, boom! there is another campground – Salmon Creek. This turned out to be more pleasant and spacious than where I stayed last night, and there is even a little trail across from site #9 that takes you right back up to the swimming hole!
But the interesting thing here was the camp host, who flagged me down to look at my van. Turns out he watched me drive past, slow down and make a u-ey, and was thinking “oh I hope he comes in here!”, because he is customizing his old Chevy van and wanted to check my s— out. He gave Outsidevan high compliments on the quality of their construction – real plywood not particle board, nice finishing, excellent appliances, etc. He made me feel happy about my choice!
I think this is a way better campground – bigger trees, better shade, more privacy, and a really nice, pleasant campground host instead of the slightly crabby uncheerful folks who ran Sardine Lake. This guy notwithstanding, I have come to feel that campground hosts are like umpires, if you don’t notice them they are doing a good job, and if you do notice them they are a pain in the ass. A creepy or intrusive host can severely degrade the whole campground experience.
This is the Wednesday before Labor Day, and pretty much every spot in all the campgrounds I’ve checked out is reserved. I am glad I will be elsewhere.
The Lake Country turns out to be a collection of small quiet alpine lakes. At the south end the public lands change administrators from from Tahoe NF to Plumas NF. The trees didn’t seem to care. What I cared about is that dispersed (i.e. free) camping seemed to be OK up here. I will return.
On to Graeagle, which seems to have been remade as an upscale golfing/retirement community in the middle of nowhere. The restaurant was nice and the food was good. The attached bar looked like it wouldn’t be too scary, which is often not the case in these little towns. There are some local country-looking folks, but mostly it was prosperous older city-looking folks poring over real estate brochures.
I got myself registered at Sierra Hot Springs at about 2:30, which of course means I will be there till exactly 2:30 tomorrow. Found a nice little spot under the trees to park, got out the bike, and started relaxin’. This is a perfect place to have a bike – it’s mostly flat and everything is a few hundred yards from everything else, slightly annoying to have to walk to, but a very easy and quick bike ride.
There was nothing remarkable about the stay, so I will just give the overview and check out: bike to Meditation Pool -> bike to the main house for some internet’in (free wifi!) -> read and write and eat till sunset-ish -> bike to the big pool for sunset -> bike sloowly back in the pitch-black, new moon darkenss -> sleep -> wake -> bike the 2-ish miles in to town for excellent lunch at Dos Hermanos -> bike back past the asphalt trucks -> hang out -> exit at 2:30 => home, shower -> Museum of Art First Thursday party -> drink too much with Alana at Jungle all night happy hour == woo hoo!
Actually, there is one thing worth remarking upon, I’d forgotten how unpleasant it is to ride a bike on a poorly graded country gravel road. I felt righteous for getting off my ass and riding to town in the midday sun, but I cannot say it was fun in any way, and will just probably drive next time.
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