Dave's Hiking Adventures: Tahoe Rim Trail

Day 3, South Camp to Star Lake, 18 miles of trails plus 3 1/2 miles on paved roads at Kingbury Grade.

ok, we woke up knowing that this day would be a bitch! It is the longest mileage day of the entire trip, plus it has a lot of elevation change, and the annoyance of several miles of paved road. Morning was great, though, 7 or 8 miles in about 2 1/2 hours (a good pace for us old guys), through nice shaded forest, to get to Kingsbury North trailhead. Walking on the road the next few miles really gets the feet hurting. Great brunch of french toast and fresh fruit at the Fox and Hound Grill. Highly recommend it! Water up, we've got some climbing to do, with minimal water sources along the way. You actually climb up and across several ski runs that are part of Heavenly Valley. You get the feeling that this climb will be a bitch. How? you ask? Easy, the less day-hikers you see, the harder the trail is going to be. That's Dave's Rule #5 of trail diffculty.

The views out over the Carson Valley are amazing. One thing so great about the east side of this hike, is that each day you get views not only west, over to Lake Tahoe, but you also get view east, out over the basins of Nevada.

Got to Star Lake, all of us are sporting some nice blisters. I really need to change socks sometime during the day, instead of using one pair for the whole day.

One interesting thing about the TRT, is how it makes you view the Tahoe Basin from a different perspective. For most people in the Tahoe area, the highway passes are the very highest point in their trip. They start someplace lower like Reno or Sacramento, hit the pass, and then drop down to the lake level. When hiking the TRT, the mountain passes are the very lowest you go, with all hiking actually done ABOVE the passes. There is a good feeling, each time you cross a highway, that you are just hitting a low spot, and all the cars are hitting their high spot. If they only knew what they were missing!