Lake Tahoe sits square across the Nevada/California border. 22 miles long, 12 miles wide and 1,000 feet deep it sits over 6,000 feet above sea level. Crystal clear waters, framed in a mountain basin surrounded by pine forest, make a spectacular setting. Now my official route says to stay on the US50 around the South of the lake, but as always, the long way around looks way more attractive. Pretty much as soon as I turn North, the views of the rock strewn shore get me itching for a little swimming excursion.
After I took this video, I settled down to watch the stars come out. The skies are massive out here, there's no light pollution becasue the nearest towns are so far away. About the only familiar constellation I could identify was the big dipper/plough, but the sheer volume of stars is pretty mind blowing. Usually there's too much crap in the atmosphere to pick out much, but when there's so little cloud, it's pretty much a straight line for those ancient photons to hit the back of your eyeballs. The Milky Way is clearly visible as well. As we're edge on to the galaxy, looking through it from the rim of the spiral arm we're in means the sheer density of stars gives a cloudy effect. My poor old Panasonic Lumix FT2 wasn't quite up to the job but plenty of others with better gear can show you what I mean.
Up on the crest of the dune it's very peaceful. It takes about 2 hours for the last of the sun's light to completely vanish from the sky so it's an unhurried process. I was lying flat on my back looking directly up into the stars and enjoying the gradual change in the velvety black night and deepening violet of sundown. So relaxing in fact that I dropped off and fell asleep, waking suddenly at about 2 in the morning.
At 110 million square miles, Nevada is about 20 million square miles bigger than the UK, but only has a 30th of the population, and most of them are concentrated in a few larger cities. No surprise that US government (hereinafter referred to as They) own/manage about 90% of the land and use it as the military's private playground.
I'll say one thing, there's no shortage of rest areas and basic unmanned campsites about in which one can park up and snuggle down. This night's room with a view was at the Hickison Petroglyphs - a site of prehistoric paintings and marked rocks - about 15 miles East of Austin, Nevada.
wasn't quite up to the job but plenty of others with better gear can 
